Academic writing in reflexive professional writing: citations of scientific literature in supervised pre-service training reports

Abstracts

Neste artigo, investigamos práticas de citação de literatura científica na escrita reflexiva do gênero relatório de estágio supervisionado, produzido por professores em formação, em disciplinas de estágio obrigatório em Ensino de Língua Inglesa numa Licenciatura em Letras. Analisaremos, especificamente, como esses professores se representam a partir de citações de literatura científica, e caracterizaremos algumas funções exercidas pelas citações na escrita reflexiva emergente na esfera acadêmica. Utilizamos a abordagem dialógica da linguagem dos estudos bakhtinianos como referencial teórico de base, além de aportes teórico-metodológicos acerca de tipos de sequência e de discurso propostos por Adam e Bronckart. Os resultados da pesquisa mostram que a prática de citação da literatura científica é uma invocação de autoridade com função de erudição, amplificação e ornamentação do discurso produzido, podendo orientar a ação pedagógica desenvolvida pelo professor em formação no estágio supervisionado.

Ensino de língua estrangeira; Gênero; Discurso científico

ARTIGOS

Academic writing in reflexive professional writing: citations of scientific literature in supervised pre-service training reports

Lívia Chaves de Melo^I; Adair Vieira Gonçalves^II; Wagner Rodrigues Silva^III

^IPh.D. student at Universidade Federal do Tocantins – UFT, Araguaína, Tocantins, Brazil; CAPES; [e-mail]

^IIProfessor at Universidade Federal da Grande Dourados, - UFGD, Dourados, Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil; CNPq; [e-mail]

^IIIProfessor at Universidade Federal do Tocantins – UFT, Araguaína, Tocantins, Brazil; CAPES; [e-mail]

ABSTRACT

In this paper we investigate citation practices of scientific literature in reflexive writing from the genre of supervised pre-service training report produced by pre-service teachers enrolled in the mandatory pre-service training subject of English Language Teaching, at an undergraduate language teaching course. The aim of this research is to analyze how these pre-services teacher represent themselves based on citation practices of scientific literature, and characterize some of the functions deployed by the citations in the reflexive writing emerging in the academic sphere. We use the dialogic approach to language from Bakhtinian studies as a theoretical base, as well as theoretical and methodological contributions regarding types of sequences and of discourse proposed by Adam and Bronckart. The results of this research show that the practice of citation of scientific literature is an invocation of authority as a form of erudition, amplification and ornamentation of the discourse produced. This practice can also guide pedagogical action developed by pre-service teachers in their supervised training.

Keywords: Foreign language teaching; Genre; Scientific discourse

Introduction

In this paper we investigate reports from supervised pre-service training produced by pre-service teachers

Scientific literature corresponds to utterances that are responsible for academic knowledge dissemination and arise from scientific research. In the studied context, this literature is a product of research produced in applied linguistics or in related areas, and may elucidate emerging demands in mandatory supervised pre-service trainings. This literature is also mobilized by pre-service teachers based on readings of theoretical reviews that integrate curricular guidelines or pedagogical projects, and also on advisors of school work in institutions of elementary education, where practical activities of supervised pre-service training are performed. These writings comprise an enunciative chain of uninterrupted activity in scientific knowledge production, and circulate in different media by means of different academic genres, as master theses, articles, books and scientific entries. In short, scientific literature unfolds by means of voices which attribute an incontestable, respectable, credible and serious character to the arguments raised by pre-service teachers in their pre-service training reports.

Supervised pre-service training reports derive from theoretical and interactive discourse arrangements named theoretical-interactive

The lack of detailed research on the writing of reports in supervised pre-service training seems to be a fact, even though this genre is a highly valued assessment instrument as a grade component in the disciplines' appraisal (SILVA, 2012a). The significant compositional instability of genre foregrounds the absence of a consensus on the importance of the reports writing production within the context of teacher's initial education.

Documents investigated in this study do not have a single standard as regards their structural compositional organization. The component parts or sections of the reports are diversified, despite the fact that several documents contain formal elements of the genre 'project of scientific research', such as: Introduction, theoretical framework, argument, objectives, methodology, statement of the problem, bibliographical references, and even epigraphs among other items. Some of the investigated documents do not present sections in their textual macrostructure as genre, but only a plain text lacking explicit indication of subdivisions Introduction, body, or main text, and conclusions.

Based on the investigation of reports produced in different undergraduate programs, Silva (2013, p.183) highlights that texts named reports or records of supervised pre-service training, and presented by pre-service teachers "display a diversified configuration, marked from its textual extension to its textual organization in subsections," and they often resemble school portfolios. Still, as the author states, "a report may be configured as a simple text of one or two pages corresponding to records in field notes, or as longer texts corresponding to research or intervention projects, or even academic papers".

When reports are applied in a productive way, "the detailed reflection on the didactic activities experienced in pre-service trainings, and guided by teacher knowledge of various natures," including there the scientific literature mobilization, may result in "contributions for future work situations, that is, for teacher's professionalization" (SILVA, 2012a, p.288). Some contributions were presented by Guerra (2012), and Silva, Santos and Farrah (2013) undertook two case studies, realized with contributions of two teachers, departing from a comparative investigation between pedagogical practices implemented in mandatory supervised pre-service trainings during an undergraduate teaching licensure course (Certification in the English and Portuguese Languages), and in actual teaching performance after graduation as public servants in a state school. Based on the comparison among different research data, taking pre-service training reports, field journals, and didactic activities as examples, the authors present convergences or alignments between pedagogical practices developed in the two focused moments, which were informed by current theoretical-methodological tendencies for language teaching. These results demonstrate a solid professional education in undergraduate teaching licensure programs.

A critical look upon pedagogical practices, combined to reports of life stories, justifies the professional nature of the typical reflexive writing in reports. Within this genre, we find writing confluences featured in two enunciative spheres: academic and educational. In this sense, typical practices from the academic discourse emerge from the first, as the dialog with ground scientific literature to guide professional action; reports of life stories emerge from the second, including the professional trajectory of a school teacher and discourses about teachers' actions in elementary schools. Reports both resemble some academic genres and might be similar to what so-called 'professional genres' used for remember life paths developed in working environments, such as journals, portfolios, and autobiographical reports, all of which influenced by a rather subjective writing, including individual and social memories (REICHMANN, 2012).

Pre-service training reports allow us to understand social self representations of pre-service teachers as producers of this genre. By means of this document, pre-service teachers are advised to reflect critically about the pedagogical practices experienced in elementary schools during supervised pre-service training, or even before, in a distant past when they were still elementary school students. This recollection might result later in a reorientation of professional performance in ensuing stages, or at the workplace proper after graduation. Considering this recollection as one of the main purposes accomplished through the reports, we named this language activity or literacy practice in initial teacher's education professional reflexive writing.

The notion of representation discussed within literacy studies of a teacher in initial education informs data for this research. According to Kleiman, we understand representation as

[...] Sets of knowledge about objectives, people, ideas, which, being shared by the individuals, or groups that represent themselves through these sets, determine their behavior and the relationships established with other objects, phenomena, practices, people, and ideas; they guide us in ways for naming and defining different aspects of everyday reality, as in decision-making, and positioning. (2006, p. 78).

Social representations contribute to orienting behavior of social actors, regulate the interest in interaction networks, and assist us with the identity definition linked to the group to which the actors belong. In mandatory supervised pre-service trainings, pedagogical practices are informed by representations that contribute to the development of professional identities, built at the confluence of academic and school discursive practices through the dissemination of typical discourses of the corresponding enunciative spheres.

In the present work, we closely investigate eleven reports, selected from analytical readings of around 500 pre-service training reports, presented as a final writing task of the following discipline, Investigation of the Pedagogical Practice and Supervised pre-service training in the English Language: Language and Literature, offered during the years 2006 to 2010, at Universidade Federal do Tocantins (UFT), Araguaína Campus. Analyses presented in this paper provide some generalizations motivated by the reading of this larger universe of documents, even considering the effective study of eleven reports as representatives of the aforementioned universe. Such documents belong to the database of Centro Interdisciplinar de Memória dos Estágios Supervisionados das Licenciaturas (CIMES), an area for teaching, research, and extension, designed to contribute with activities of interest in mandatory supervised pre-service trainings. These documents are available to the academic community.

In addition to the Introduction, Final Remarks and References, this paper is organized in two main sections. The first, named Dialogism in the construction of academic writing, discusses the Bakthinian dialogic approach to language, which guides the production and the analysis of the research data. The second, named Quotation practices in pre-service training reports, is organized in the following subsections: Direct quotations from scientific literature and Indirect quotations from scientific literature.

Along with strengthening the views pointed out by pre-service teachers, quoting scientific works guides their pedagogical practices, and this could lead to significant changes in English language classes in elementary schools and result in the confluence of typical writings from the academic and school enunciative spheres.

1 Dialogism in the construction of academic writings

In Marxism and the Philosophy of Language, language is viewed as a constitutive phenomenon of discourse, contributing to knowledge construction, and to the training of the subject or of social actors, who live in a concrete relation between The I and the other. In this sense, language unfolds as utterances in verbal interactions (VOLOŠINOV, 1986). Therefore, enunciation is related to social interactions linked to historical, cultural, and ideological aspects in the different enunciative spheres of society.

Within studies of the Bakhtin Circle, language is viewed as a process of interactions among subjects, and as a product of collective human activity. Any utterance produced by the social phenomenon of verbal interaction, in a given context, not only oral and aloud communication face to face, but any verbal communication, whether in oral or written discourse of any kind is not excluded from social dialog (MOZDZENSKI, 2010, p.58).

The notion of subject is understood not only from a biological perspective, but also from a socio-historical one, which is realized interweaving past, present and future, contextualizing, and using language as a facilitation tool for mediating human beings and their actions in the world. The subject is constructed in correlation with others by means of language. In this correlation, the subject talks to and acts oriented by various voices, which constitute him/her, and by a diversity of 'masks' [personas]; thus, subjects constitute themselves in discursive acts.

This way, it is worth briefly mentioning that one of the basic and nuclear categories that play a vital role in the body of works of the Russian theorist Mikhail Bakhtin, who calls himself as "philosopher" and "thinker", is the dialogical nature of language and of discourse. According to him, dialogism is established between the I and the other, and in discursive processes socially and historically transmitted in interactions among subjects. Thus, in his work entitled Toward a Methodology for the Human Sciences, Bakhtin highlights:

There is neither a first nor a last word and there are no limits to the dialogic context (it extends into boundless past and boundless future). Even past meanings, that is, those born in the dialogue of past centuries, can never be stable (finalized, ended once and for all) – they will always change (be renewed) in the process of subsequent, future development of the dialogue. At any moment in the development of the dialogue, there are immense, boundless masses of forgotten contextual meanings, but at certain moments of the dialogue's subsequent development along the way they are recalled and invigorated in renewed form (in a new context). Nothing is absolutely dead: every meaning will have its homecoming festival. The problem of great time (1986a, p.170; emphasis in original).

From this perspective, we must infer that Bakhtin seeks to understanding the word in its enunciation value, as a "living cell" of the "dialogical exchange," having their meaning determined by their context. According to the Bakhtinian purpose, it is important to emphasize that as in a musical note, our words are gradually and slowly built, deriving from words assimilated from others, from multiple resonating voices, assuming a character of plurivocal discourse, or even objectified discourse, generally coming from a refoundation. In Bakhtin's words:

[...] when the listener receives and understands the meaning (the language meaning) of speech, he simultaneously takes an active, responsive attitude toward it. He either agrees or disagrees with (completely or partially), arguments it, applies it, prepares for it execution, and so on. And the listener adopts this responsive attitude for the entire duration of the process of listening and understanding, from the very beginning – sometimes literally from the speaker's first word (1986b, p.68).

To illustrate this, in supervised pre-service training report, pre-service teachers, when mobilizing the work of scientific literature in writing, incorporate the other's discourse, relying on proficient "voices" within this genre which are recognized by their symbolic value in the area of linguistics and the English language, for example, in order to sustain their rhetorical discussions. These pre-service teachers might even reproduce a response to other discourses including the source text discourse, which collaborates for the construction of their representations. The notion of representation enables us to understand how subjects orient their actions, or are guided by pre-constructed knowledge in acting. This concept has the function to assign the construction of social and individual identities, which are the result of (re)ownership of elements from the past brought to present. In this sense, the representations include cognitive, affective and social elements, in order to integrate the components of social and cognitive nature.

Professional genres produced during teacher's training, which employ chiefly descriptive and narrative typological sequences, are recognized as a strategy of mediation for the strengthening of teacher's literacy, since they allow a greater engagement of pre-service teachers with the theme, "capable of accepting subjective or unique characteristics of the one who writes," distancing themselves from the seemingly neutrality, detachment and objectivity in academic writing (FIAD and SILVA, 2009, p.127). However, we credit to the representation of parameters of situation and production contexts the mobilization of a more academic writing (the thesis of neutrality, detachment, etc.) or closer to the interlocutor (more subjective, interactive, etc.)

As highlighted by Fiad and Silva (2009, p.126), the work with language in pre-service training reports, allow pre-service teachers to describe, tell, expose, foreground, select, comment, compare and evaluate

By the representation in Figure 1, we defend the idea of consecutive didactic transpositions, which derive from a wise knowledge (or specialized literature knowledge), and undertake various adaptations/modifications until achieving writing of the supervised pre-service training (CHEVALLARD; JOSHUA, 1991). In the relation AB, at the time of initial teacher education, we have a university wise knowledge in theoretical texts or in practical activities. In order to be taught, such knowledge (now in the relation BC), must undertake some modifications simultaneously to pre-service teachers pre-service training. This means there must be no direct application of theoretical conceptions of any nature, in no teaching context whatsoever, by pre-service teachers to elementary school students. In the CD axis, there will be a professional reflexive writing, at least according to the data we had, which derives from the didactic transposition in class. Finally, in the DA axis, a new didacticism will occur after the completion of pre-service teachers initial education, or prior to the degree's integration in another subsequent supervised pre-service training.

Due to our previous reflections, we can say that, in academic writing, we have quotations in a markedly theoretical discourse (BRONCKART, 2003), which will act as an authority argument to what one wishes to defend. In supervised pre-service training reports, in the other hand, we have more hybrid quotations formed by an interactive-theoretical discourse, which are the result of, at least, two successive stages of internal didactic transposition: the academic knowledge will face coercions from school sphere in a class taught by pre-service teachers, and later on, at the writing moment, by the same pre-service teacher when writing the pre-service training report. We can say that the reports quotations have a continuous dialog (as in a chain of dialogical connections) with wise knowledge and with didactic and remembered knowledge at the moment of the pre-service training report text writing.

The confluence among studied writings illustrates the fact that discourses are answers to understandings construed in other discourses. Therefore, in a communicative chain, every subject, having the intention of answering other voices, through agreement or disproval, (re)formulates his/her discourse. This might result in a tension of dialogical social voices (FIORIN, 2006, p.24), perceived by two opposed tendencies in real life: centripetal forces and centrifugal forces

When the producer of a discourse quotes someone's thought, it involves additional information and a stance when facing what is exposed. The quoted utterance can be literally transcribed or reproduced differently by means of paraphrasing, or even by other language strategies. Hence, the quoted discourse raises a deconstruction of a foreign discourse, in order to construct the enunciator's own discourse by taking a stance within a specific thematic (CUNHA, 2008). Consequently, when an utterance is inserted in another discourse, it unfolds differently assuming new functions within the new applied context. This strategy was called by Blommaert (2005) entextualisation. For the author, this phenomenon

refers to the process by means of which discourses are successively or simultaneously decontextualised and metadiscursively recontextualised, so that they become a new discourse associated to a new context and accompanied by a particular metadiscourse which provides a sort of 'preferred reading' for the discourse.

This decontextualisation and recontextualisation adds a new metadiscursive context to the text; instead of its original context-of-production, the text is accompanied by a metadiscursive complex suggesting all kinds of things about the text (most prominently, the suggestion that the discourse is indeed a text).

[...] entextualisation has considerably less currency than intertextuality, but adds important qualifications and turns intertextuality (BLOMMAERT, 2005, p.47; emphasis in original).

We have still to investigate which roles quotations would play in professional reflexive writings of supervised pre-service training reports. In this regard, it is worth mentioning that a discourse, when quoting others, mobilizes other voice to warrant what the enunciator says, and to persuade through other statements of the stated truth. When convened, however, the quotation may also serve as an employed strategy not to jeopardize the discourse regarding the speaker, assigning the enunciation responsibility to another discourse (BRUNELLI, 2004, p.112).

It is expected, in pre-service training reports, that the dialogs between pre-service teachers and other actors (other voices), employing different theoretical lines of approach, serve as starting points for their fruitful reflections and the empowerment of their statements and conclusions, and might contribute to guide their critical views regarding the experienced pedagogical practice in the context of formal education in elementary school. The quoted discourses cannot silence pre-service teachers' voices; otherwise, the purpose of reflexive writing is lost. Quoted discourse, which serves as a transmission of words/enunciations from others, takes place by means of the following language schemes: direct discourse, indirect discourse, free indirect discourse, which are covered in the studies of Vološinov

The scientific knowledge quotations, which result from established scientific researches, are employed in the investigated reports of this study, possibly, in order to make an impression on the educator responsible for supervised pre-service training in undergraduate courses; after all, the report represents an instrument for pre-service teachers' evaluation. Therefore, quotations provide an aspect of reliability and irrefutability to the text, in ways that might make the intended reader accept the presented arguments. Consequently, it is a way of trying to prevent possible objections or undesired enunciative responses. The scientific discourse is constructed by the interweaving of different discourses, something which, connected to the voices of pre-service teachers, reveals a desire to sustain a certain point of view.

In studies about quotation practices in scientific academic works, Hoffnagel (2009) examines texts from Brazilian scientific journals in anthropology and psychology, and reveals that quotations are considered as an inter textual practice which allows the writer to rely on other authors, in order to sustain his/her argument, playing the role of a scaffold for the quoting writer's work. According to the author:

The practice of quotation within the social context of persuasion in a sense that can provide justifications for statements and demonstrate a new position helps writers in establishing a persuasive epistemological structure for the acceptance of arguments (HOFFNAGEL, 2009, p.74).

Another academic study which we cannot neglect is the one by Macedo and Pagano (2011). The authors discuss the use of quotation practices in academic writing when examining some scientific papers and final works of certain disciplines, produced by students of an undergraduate teaching licensure program from a Brazilian public university. After the research, they concluded that the use of quotations in academic texts empowers the enunciators to construct an authorial instance in their discursive community. According to Macedo and Pagano (2011, p.268),

To quote the other's discourse means to assume the other's presence in a text supposed to be "mine," it means to admit that my discourse is in fact a combination of voices, which meet each other and are expressed in "my text." It means mainly to admit that I exist only by means of the other, and the way I articulate this relation. Nevertheless, to allow the presence of the other in "my" text does not imply submission, passivity, but understanding that the construction of knowledge occurs precisely because of the tension among the various voices which inhabit the text (our emphasis).

This empowerment also seems to occur in the initial training of an English teacher, being demonstrated by the writings of pre-service training reports. In this case, empowerment would not be triggered simply by the mobilization of specialized literature, but, because of subjectivity emerging in reflexive writing of reports, motivated not only by the demands of the pedagogical practice experienced in elementary schools (i.e. of their internal didactic transposition), but also by a broader and more restricted context of production

In dialogues with other authors, we observed in the analyzed data that the voices of pre-service teachers make them speak or silence them because, for some voices to be heard, especially voices from a scientific view, others have to be silenced and redirected by other counter words. As Bakhtin (1986c, p.121) emphasizes:

Confidence in another's word, reverential reception (the authoritative word), apprenticeship, the search for and mandatory nature of deep meaning, agreement, its infinite gradations and shadings (but not its logical limitations and note purely referential reservations), the layering of meaning upon meaning, voice upon voice, strengthening through merging (but not identification), the combination of many voices (a corridor of voices) that augments understanding, departure beyond the limits of the understood, and so forth. These special relations can be reduced neither to the purely logical nor to the purely thematic. Here one encounters integral positions, integral personalities (the personality does not require extensive disclosure – it can be articulated in a single sound, revealed in a single word), precisely voices. (emphasis in original).

In the investigated reports, technical scientific discourses are generally mobilized when facing the same language schemes employed in the Bakhtinian theory, namely: Direct discourse, indirect discourse and free indirect discourse. However, the direct discourse and the indirect discourse stand out, and the direct discourse is even more expressive, as demonstrated in the following analyses.

2 Quotation practices in pre-service training reports

We analyzed quotations from the scientific literature in pre-service training reports by means of language schemes form the quoted discourse (direct discourse, indirect discourse). We focused on the following linguistic resources, which lead us to the understanding of the investigated data: pronouns, verbs, nouns, adverbs, locutions, nominal expressions, discursive-argumentative operators, metaphorical linguistic resources, and some formal meta-enunciative figures (quotation marks, parentheses, ellipses, upper case). We want to emphasize that many voices intermingle in the analyzed passages. These voices can be perceived by different readers, based on their world knowledge brought to the analyzed texts. We want to emphasize only the voices we were able to identify based on our repertoire.

2.1 Direct quotations of scientific literature

In the textual passage reproduced below, we demonstrate that the voice of a pre-service teacher emerge mingled with the voice of the other, the voice of scientific discourse, in order to strengthen argument presented.

The passage reproduced below was selected from a scientific paper called "Processes of signification in reading classes of foreign language" by Marisa Grigoletto

Grigoletto states that "the student ends up being a mere restorer or guesser of an already given meaning in the text." The student is the subject who unveils the meanings of unfamiliar words by means of translation. In the author words, "at least in a foreign language, the concept of rebuilding seems to be associated to the linearity of the sum of words, and to the discovery of the meaning of unfamiliar words by means of translation" (GRIGOLETTO, 1995, p.106). After these explanations, Grigoletto shows how the foreign language methodology is applied, which seems to be reproduced by the direct discourse in the following passage.

Textual passage 01

We have to bear in mind that language teaching must be, in spite of limitations, almost the same as the mother language. We do not learn to speak Portuguese from didactic books, we learn indeed, to write from them; however, the primary function of any language is communication. Learning about the need of this communication comprises various contextualized situations, which are not achieved by fragmented or isolated phrases. Considering this fact, Maria Grigoletto states in her paper that: "Processes of signification in a foreign language class" and that "Such constructions are not surprising, still the tradition in foreign language teaching has been to emphasize grammar (...) in a teaching approach, which favors the fragment as a way to achieve an idealized whole, 'the completeness of language' (...). Fragments mean (...) phrases which express grammar structures, which are repeated until they get automatic, or 'pieces of language' to solve a puzzle never completed before. Considering this fact, our intention was to show the use of a second language. (Informer 01 – Pre-service training III, 2007.1 – Body or main text of the report).

The thematic expression Such constructions reveals that this pre-service teacher continues the discussions proposals. But the proposals are not mentioned in the report passage reproduced. Consequently, we observed pre-service teachers' difficulty to articulate their own utterances in the mentioned report.

We highlight the use of the verb state (Maria states

Scientific discourse seems to contribute for the construction of a positive image of pre-service teachers. The quoted literature justifies shared knowledge, which guides the developed pedagogical work. The importance of foreign language teaching is justified, and it is not limited to this study and to a description of grammatical items. In a language acquisition process, one must articulate communicative, socio linguistic and linguistic competences considering living language. The use of our intention was to show the use of a second language proves the emphasized analysis.

Grigoletto (1995) does not follow the communicative perspective in language teaching, but socio interactionism and discursive perspectives. However, this discourse was mobilized by pre-service teachers, possibly to reinforce the importance of non-restricting their classes to a study or a description of grammatical items, but having rather a focus on language as a real and living system. Inferred from the report readings, the assumed representation of what a teacher is in the view of pre-service teachers, is: a subject capable to promote a communicative approach. Nevertheless, when analyzing the didactic exercises employed by pre-service teachers themselves (SILVA and MELO, 2011), we observed that the communicative approach is not emphasized in classes taught by pre-service teachers in field-schools of supervised pre-service training.

Still on the quoted passage, we emphasize the use of parentheses and ellipsis marks in the text as meta-enunciative elements which show the deletion of utterances that seem not to be relevant in the enunciator's argumentative construction. We literally reproduced Grigoletto's quotation below and underlined the points in which words punctuation, or even clauses were completely deleted.

Nonetheless, such constructions are surprising. The foreign language teaching tradition has been stressing grammar and vocabulary, as a teaching conception which privileges the fragment as means to achieve an idealized whole, 'the completeness in language', that, in the end, is an obviously frustrated expectation for the teacher as well as for students. Fragments are expressed through vocabulary lists to be memorized, through phrases which express grammar structures that are repeated until they get automatic, or 'pieces of language' to solve a puzzle never completed before (1995, p.106).

In the reproduced quote, the parts deleted by pre-service teachers had as their theme work with vocabulary, one of the main traditional teaching methods in foreign language classes. However, the main objective of pre-service teachers should be the discussion about the emphasis on normative grammar studies. The scientific literature quotation assumed new functions, renewing the already constructed discourse. By eliminating issues related to vocabulary teaching, this pre-service teacher is possibly protecting the face, since this work with vocabulary is decontextualized. This can be observed in the didactic exercises applied by this pre-service teacher in practical classes, displayed at the report's appendix and analyzed in other works (MELO et al., 2012).

At the very beginning of the passage, the use of the verbal locution we have to remember has a thematic function and, in this case, is a rhetorical strategy of alignment between the enunciator and the interlocutor, assuming that the interlocutor shares the same point of view as pre-service teachers. According to the reproduced opinion, the teaching of any language has to be similar to the teaching of the mother language, which is signaled by the deontic modal verbal form i must, and by the use of the adverb of delimitation almost creating an approximation that makes the use of the adjective same (almost the same) stand out for setting the limits of the verified veracity.

The transcribed passage echoes academic voices, which are against the use of didactic books in language teaching. Language is acquired through the interaction between historical, cultural and ideological aspects of a society, as established by Bakhtinian studies. Thus, the most important aspect in the study of a language is communication (the major function of any language is communication), by means of its contextualized study using discursive genres instead of decontextualized linguistic items, such as single, isolated and fragmented phrases (Learning about the need of this communication comprises various contextualized situations, which are not achieved by fragmented or isolated phrases).

Consequently, the enunciator (pre-service teachers) counteracts the traditional methodological discourse applied in school practices, in which what stands out is the use of a normative grammar approach restricted to grammar exercises using words and phrases, and alludes to innovation attempts to provoke significant transformations in foreign language classes.

2.2 Indirect quotations from scientific literature

In the following reproduced textual passage, the quotation of technical-scientific discourse is realized though paraphrases, a very common resource for the reproduction of the other's view. In this kind of discourse, the exposed ideas present the same semantic conditions as the source and original texts. The section under analysis does not have direct indications which explicitly display the voice of the other, such as the use of quotation marks, or even authorship identification with bibliographical references.

In the passage, the pre-service teacher points out that, in the observed classes, guided by the pre-service training collaborator-teacher

Textual passage 02:

Teaching is a challenge, and considering teaching of the English language it becomes even more challenging. It is extremely important that the student feels motivated for learning, and in order to motivate him/her to participate in class, it is vital that this class is presented in a playful and involving fashion. Authors such as Vygotsky value the playful methodology as a fundamental tool for the development of pupils, along with creativity, autonomy, and cooperation. Still, according to Vygotsky, motivation is one of the contribution factors, not only in learning, but also in the acquisition of a foreign language. When a student realizes the real value of what is being taught, he/she becomes more engaged in class, for he/she will use the acquired knowledge not only in class but in his/her daily life.

(Informer 03, Pre-service training IV, 2009.2 - Justification).

In this extract, although we do not see clear references to Vygotsky, we can observe an allusion to his studies (VYGOTSKY, 1978). The studies of this Russian psychologist are based in a social-interactive theory, in which, as the designation points out, the learning process happens through an essentially social process of interaction among people. According to this perspective, it is through language that interaction between individuals takes place, they communicate, they build knowledge, concepts, autonomy, values, and they regulate their actions. In his research, Vygotsky's concern was directed to the social origins of thought, departing from the principle that the development of human beings is an internal process of mobilization (intrapersonal), which happens by external stimulation (interpersonal), and is normally triggered by experienced people (VYGOTSKY, 1978).

In the above mentioned passage, the use of the nominal expression authors such as Vigotsky and the adverbial construction according to Vygotsky indicate the other's opinions using paraphrases, and leaves the underlined opinions as a responsibility of the quoted enunciator. At the end of the passage, we highlight the use of the qualifier real (When the student realizes the real value of what is being taught he/she becomes more engaged in class). This qualifier opposes other voices, which possibly points to the current discourse, which states that: in elementary teaching, the language class is restricted to an artificial study of the operation of the linguistic system, disregarding authentic situations of communication from genre studies. In addition, the passage allows us to observe that the students are not instructed on the practical usage of the language as a means for real communication, which also gives them an opportunity of continuing their studies. In higher education, for instance, various areas demand an effective knowledge of a foreign language. The purpose of a language study in elementary school does not consist on the denial of the external world. The enunciator describes an effort to show his/her students the importance of foreign language teaching, which might be achieved by the contributions of playful activities, which will possibly motivate them, as the school does not seem to succeed as regards this aspect.

The use of playful activities is a resource for empowerment which contributes to creativity, autonomy, and cooperation development among students. This resource helps them in the process of second language acquisition and might create a pleasant environment, as the use of the nominal expression vital tool preceded by the accidental preposition as shows. Such preposition is used as an attribute to the playful resource, which is viewed as an indispensable item (It is extremely important that the student feels motivated for learning, and in order to motivate him/her to participate in class, it is vital that this class is presented in a playful and involving fashion).

In the above passage, the theory this pre-service teacher refers to probably contributed to the use of innovative didactic strategies at the beginning of professional practice. The use of quotations in reflexive writing may provide pre-service teachers the acquisition of the teaching knowledge required for the teaching profession. By using references to the scientific literature, pre-service teachers may critically analyze their own pedagogical performance. As happens to any other professional, a teacher must critically analyze daily his/her own work context, a fact that may lead him/her and his/her students to assimilate and develop knowledge.

Some final remarks

Analyzing the quotations from scientific literature on the investigated reports, we understand that, in those reports, pre-service teachers represent themselves as subjects: i) who do not restrict classes to the study and description of grammar contents and to the decontextualized teaching of vocabulary; ii) who make an effort to use the teaching of a foreign language as a concrete means of communication; iii) who are capable of transforming failure situations in English language teaching and learning into productive situations; iv) who are interested in contributing to the learning and to the acquisition of the target language in students, even with limited didactic resources; v) who use innovative didactic strategies in order to stimulate elementary students to reach new learning levels; vi) who seek to articulate academic theory and the experienced school practices, although this articulation is frequently unreachable.

The practice of scientific literature quotation promotes guidance, as well as innovative didactic strategies for practical activities in supervised pre-service training for English language teaching. Along with supervisors responsible for pre-service training, pre-service teachers must make an effort to integrate academic theories and professional practice in class. Professional reflexive writing is a promising path for such articulation. On the other hand, quoting specialized works daily may give a theoretical foundation to pre-service teachers' point of view when facing experiences in elementary school, so as they may evade from responsibility for utterances enunciated, even though quoting is a work of invoking authority for suggesting erudition, broadening and ornamenting the new discourse produced.

Pre-service teacher have difficulties in paraphrasing, commenting, criticizing or reformulating and interpreting with their own words the contents of reference literature which is mobilized during the report's development. Perhaps this difficulty is due to the fact that there is a thin limit between academic and professional reflexive writing, undertaken in a discursive genre not very well known by trainers responsible for mandatory supervised pre-service training disciplines in undergraduate programs.

In this perspective, a greater effort is needed to practice writing in the mother language at foreign language teaching licensure programs, as well as a greater support for scientific researches about the use of reflexive writing for teachers in initial training. We believe in the emergency of a differentiated writing practice in teachers' education, about which there is still much to be known. Probably the very situation for production (and the command of writing production of pre-service training reports) might be an important element for professional reflexive writing.

In consequence, pre-service teachers in the initial stage of implementation of teaching objects in class (internal didactic transposition, i.e. the conversion of the object from the scientific area to the school area), combined with the need to recall the discursive event which took place during pre-service training in a given context, would be lead to write according to an interactive-theoretical discourse because of the double restriction in the moment of writing the reports and the quotations, namely the need for presenting independent truths (discourse of specialized literature), but, at the same time, bearing in mind the teacher as a interlocutor, pre-service teachers recall the connections of internal didactic transposition, and, in these terms, becomes more reflexive.

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• BAKHTIN, M. (VOLOSHINOV). Marxismo e filosofia da linguagem Problemas fundamentais do método sociológico na ciência da linguagem. 10 ed. Trad. Michel Lahud e Yara Frateschi Vieira. São Paulo: HUCITEC, 2002. [1929]
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• BLOMMAERT, J. Discourse: A Critical Introduction. Key Topics in Sociolinguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2005.
• BRONCKART, J. P. Atividades de linguagem, textos e discursos. Por um interacionismo sócio-discursivo. São Paulo: Educ, 2003.
• BRUNELLI, A. F. "O sucesso está em suas mãos": análise do discurso de auto-ajuda. Campinas, 2004. 149p. Tese (Doutorado em Linguística) Instituto de Estudos da Linguagem: Universidade Estadual de Campinas, 2004.
• CASTRO, G. O marxismo e a ideologia em Bakhtin. In: Luciane de Paula, Grenissa Stafuzza (orgs.). Círculo de Bakhtin: teoria inclassificável Campinas: Mercado de Letras, 2010. p.175-202.
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• FAIRCHILD, T. O professor no espelho: refletindo sobre a leitura de um relatório de estágio na graduação em letras. Revista Brasileira de Linguística Aplicada Belo Horizonte. v. 10, n. 1, p.249-269, 2010.
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• FIORIN, L. L. Introdução ao pensamento de Bakhtin São Paulo: Ática, 2006.
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• GRIGOLETTO, M. Processos de significação na aula de leitura em Língua Estrangeira. In: Coracini, M. J. (org.). O jogo discursivo na aula de leitura: Língua materna e língua estrangeira. Campinas: Pontes, 1995. p.103-111.
• HOFFNAGEL, J. C. A prática de citação em trabalhos acadêmicos. In: Cadernos de Linguagem e Sociedade, Brasília, 10(1), 2009.
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• _______; ANDRADE, K. S.; SILVA, W. R. Trabalho Escolar com vocabulário em relatórios de estágios supervisionados em ensino de língua Inglesa. Trabalhos em Linguística Aplicada Campinas: IEL/UNICAMP, v. 51, n. 1, p.51-75, 2012.
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• _______; SANTOS, J. S. dos; FARAH, B. F. Sustentabilidade e letramento do professor em formação inicial: demandas para atividades acadêmicas de ensino e de pesquisa. Araguaína, 2013.
• VYGOTSKY, L. S. A formação social da mente: o desenvolvimento dos processos psicológicos superiores Michael Cole; Vera John-Steiner; Sylvia Scribner; Ellen Souberman (orgs.). Trad. José Cipolla Neto, Luis Silveira Menna Barreto,Solange Castro Afeche. São Paulo: Martins Fontes, 2003.

¹

in a context of formal education where undergraduate teachers' training programs have mandatory pre-service training. We investigate how pre-service teachers represent themselves in language teaching licensures (Certification in the English Language) by studying quotations of scientific works in pre-service reports. Based on the dialogical approach to language, we analyze excerpts of reports, in which pre-service teachers mobilize directly or indirectly citations of scientific literature as an argumentative strategy for the production of professional reflexive writing typical of the investigated discursive genre.

²

(BRONCKART, 2003), as well as the integration of typological sequences argumentatively, descriptively, and narratively marked (ADAM, 1992). The prevalence of the latter two sequences in the textual configuration of the report may lead to an underutilization of the genre as a tool for mediation in teachers' critical education, restricting contributions derived from the uses of the report for the empowerment of pre-service teachers

³

.

⁴

.

⁵

. Reflexive and professional writing brings characteristics of academic genres, because it is produced in the interface between the academic and school spheres, even if configured as opposed to academic writing itself. This academic writing is to be found in other academic genres, aiming at enabling a more spontaneous and subjective expression of pre-service teachers facing the experienced situations during supervised pre-service trainings, which involve the construction of educational objects for the elementary education. In the investigated documents, the quotation of scientific literature is an academic practice employed in professional reflexive writing, which refutes Fiad and Silva (2009, p.126)

⁶

statement which describes this genre as: "a writing piece of work, whose major reference would not be from this or that author, or set of studied ideas, but the experience constructed by the student distant from the teacher and other classmates". Nevertheless, despite the frequent presence of specialized literature quotations, there is an outline of facts and figures in the report, arising from an internal didactic transposition moment

⁷

accomplished in class by pre-service teachers, who may show (not necessarily, of course) an explanation of the agent-producer by means of the language parameters at the moment of supervised pre-service training report writing, (part 1 as follows: "...We have to remember...", "...Our intention..."). In this case, we have an agency involved in the language situation and to understand it we need to have access to the production conditions (BRONCKART, 2003). Thus, we can state that the production of pre-service training reports, which resulted from the fusion of discursive types and their typological variety, including the approximation of academic and school spheres, will lead to writing closer to the interlocutor.

⁸

.

⁹

and employed in the investigated and analyzed documents in this paper.

¹⁰

.

¹¹

. In the source text, Grigoletto shows the results of a research about the processes of signification used by students during the readings of texts in English. This research was undertaken in São Paulo at an elementary school. According to the research, the privileged reading approach is from fragments to the whole, meaning they translate word after word and join them as a puzzle. In teaching, the focus on vocabulary lists, translation, and grammar is privileged. Above all, students develop the construction of meaning in texts, according to the teachers' instructions, which are in an authority position, as knowledge holders, and as the ones who guide the class, disregarding life experiences and ideologies, which might allow different readings of the same text.

¹²

:

¹³

) and the use of scientific literature written within quotation marks. These uses explicitly express the other's opinion, the other's voice mobilized to support didactic procedures assumed by pre-service teachers in an elementary school during mandatory supervised pre-service training. The textual argumentative – discursive articulator:

Considering this fact appears twice, with the purpose, in the first case, to guide the argumentation summoning the speaker to agree, and, in the second case, to stress the conclusion. This articulator, in a theme position, demonstrates the moment in which a pre-service teacher assumes the responsibility for guiding the orchestra of voices in the report.

¹⁴

, this teacher did not seem to motivate the elementary students for studying the English language. As reproduced in the same report's section, the pre-service teacher expresses the desire and the interest in using playful activities for motivation, and for calling the students' attention, such as bingo games, flashcards, cross-words, word search puzzles, among others. The reason for this use is said to be the fact of these being considered instruments of mediation which might favor motivation and lead the students to employ the target language in real communication situations.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  22 July 2013
• Date of issue
  June 2013

History

• Received
  26 Feb 2013
• Accepted
  16 June 2013