5 - Coordinating Meaning: Scaffolding Teaching/Learning in Pedagogic Discourse

Summary

This chapter adopts an extended SFL perspective on pedagogic discourse, in dialogue with Bernstein’s work on regulative and instructional discourse and Maton’s work on autonomy codes. The model proposed establishes a framework for analysing shifts to and from disciplinary knowledge and values as curriculum genres unfold. Examples are taken from secondary school classroom discourse, a history lesson on castles in particular. Resources for scaffolding these shifts are reviewed, including internal connexion, semiotic entities, text reference, periodicity, linguistic services, and ‘internal’ attitude. The model is intended as a practical framework for designing and monitoring the role of disciplinary and extra-disciplinary knowledge and values in pedagogic discourse and as a theoretical framework for interpreting the accommodation of unity and difference in coherent text.