Why is Academic Language so Challenging?
Linguistic Complexity!!
Vocabulary
Polysemous words: word that sound and are spelled alike but have multiple meanings depending on the context/content arte
(e.g. consumer in biology vs. social studies; plane, round up, odd, foot, culture, solution, variable)
Compound Words: word that result from the combination of two different words (e.g., offspring, moonlight)
Homophones: words that sound the same but are spelled differently (e.g., genes/jeans)
Multisyllabic words: words longer than 3 syllables (e.g., multisyllabic)
Word Derivations: prefixes or suffixes attached to base words that alter meaning (e.g., reproduction, preview)
Grammatical Structures
Compound and complex sentences: two independent clauses, often with special “connector” words, or embedded clauses are
included in sentences to ensure brevity, embellish the information in the main part of the sentence by clarifying information,
giving examples or providing information which it is not essential to include. (e.g., although, as a result; Opaque material,
including wood, metal and stone, do not let light pass through them.)
Nominalization: using a verb or an adjective as a noun or noun phrase (e.g., the students were enthusiastic about vs. the
enthusiasm with which students; as students rely on scripted spoken texts vs. reliance on scripted spoken texts; global
warming; a correlation between)
Verb tenses and passive voice: (e.g., The best fit line was drawn though the points; The water took on a cloudy appearance)
Multiple prepositional phrases: (e.g., from point C to the common vertex of the adjacent interior angles of the polygon)
Text & Discourse
Interlocking definitions: (e.g., The male part of a flower is called the stamen which consists of a long stalk called a filament which
supports an anther, inside which, pollen grains grow.)
Technical taxonomies: ordered, systematic classification of some phenomena based on ... principles of super-ordination (where
something is a kind or type of something else) or composition (where something is part of something else). (e.g., mathematical
axioms, conjectures, corollaries; graphite and metal grouped under the category ‘conductors’)
Lexical density: a measure of how much information there is in a particular piece of writing. Lexical words are perhaps more
commonly known as content words (e.g., Conductors are materials that allow electricity to flow through them and are mostly
metals apart from a material called graphite which can be found in pencils. (12 total) vs. Conductors are materials which can
carry electricity. Conductors are mostly metals but also include a material called graphite. Graphite can be found in your
pencil. (average of 4))
Grammatical metaphor: events that are usually separated in clauses- condensed into one single action (e.g., Furthermore,
reliance on scripted spoken texts retards students’ ability to interact in the unscripted world of conversation outside the
classroom vs. 1. Furthermore, as students rely on scripted spoken texts, 2. they become less able to interact outside the
classroom, 3. where people in the world converse without a script)
Special Expressions: features tend to go together in modern scientific writing, forming a schema or genre by which we recognize
that something is written in scientific language (e.g., Your completed table should tell you what happens to the risk of getting
lung cancer as smoking increases.; All these states will loudly clamor for 'consideration' by our hypothetical function units but
only a few will become conscious.)
To narrow the verbal achievement gap
lessons must include:
 scaffolded and accountable academic talk that addresses lesson content,
 framed in complete sentences
 with appropriate register, vocabulary syntax, and grammar.
Project MAST2ER Academic Language Workshop, 2014.
Burns, 2001; Carlson, 2000; Dutro & Kinsella, 2009; Halliday, 1993; Swain & Lampkin, 1998
http://www.fredonia.edu/faculty/education/pickreign/edu640/tcm2002-10-107a.pdf
http://www.primaryschoolscience.com/literacy/lit-technical.php