Initial encounters

The first interviews with the students in the longitudinal study were still taking place in the third week of the semester. All but two of the students had been to their first class by the time of their interview. Early encounters were obviously continuing the process of framing their view of themselves in relation to the institution.

5.5.1.

Orienting to institutional life

Inevitably as they sought to integrate with such a complex institution through

interaction mediated in L29 there were some confusions. These arose in particular over

matters related to course choice. Cross-crediting papers from their studies in China, planning ahead to ensure that majoring requirements could be met within a course of study which was truncated by the cross-crediting, understanding lecture timetables for courses that were streamed because of high enrolments, and finding the offices where

9

For a note on the use of this terminology, see Appendix 1, 3.3

Personal change Elaborated expectations of university study

Enjoying study

More outgoing

Orientated to the new community

Apprehensive but ready for the university challenge

Friendly relations with teachers

Scaffolding for new requirements

High motivation

Harder work

Independent study

Greater, though probably attainable, language challenge

Nascent friendships with Kiwi students

Varied timetable including leisure opportunities

Teacher characteristics

Nature of classes IELTS attempts

Friendly accessibility

Helpfulness

Comprehensible English

Positive encouragement

Small

High degree of interaction

Intrinsically enjoyable

Providing scaffolding for new practices

Introducing aspects of academic discourse

Experience of failure

Eventual success as a result of persistence

these measures could be effected required some guidance, often from more experienced friends (near peers, as Lave and Wenger, 1991, call them).

As Connor sought course information, he felt he was being given different treatment from other students and that his needs as a second language speaker in a strange environment were not being recognised:

Trouble, and some my classmates go to this room, OK, but I’ll go to this room choose the same course, not OK. I should go another room. It’s like the

football, I think it’s like the soccer, they kick the soccer, kick to that room, you should find go somewhere find some people … Another people say you should go there. Because my English is not good, some words I can’t understand, some programme because it’s a foreign country. I don’t know. I need someone help me. (1)

Looking back later, Scott explained that he had been entirely dependent on his Chinese friends at this time. He was unaware that a course consultation day was offered a few days before study began, but, in any case, apprehended risk in seeking advice from institutional sources:

After they get in the office they will feel, ‘Oh, that’s maybe a lecturer, and I will, maybe, if I say something wrong, or if I use very poor English, I will give very bad feeling or imagination from this lecturer. If later on I meet him, what do I think?’ (4)

He was thus constructing a view of a university in which his status as L2 speaker was not seen as legitimate and could leave a dangerous lasting impression, which therefore discouraged him from seeking the guidance available when he most needed it.

In spite of this later disclosure, the predominant feeling expressed in the first interview was of available help and friendly service: “staff in Rutherford is very patient and warm-hearted” (Louise 1).

5.5.2.

First classes

Severe language shock had been encountered in their first classes. In stark contrast to the carefully adjusted communication of the language centres, lectures were monologic and took no account of whether or not those being addressed actually comprehended:

At the first course I say, ‘What she’s talking about? She talks too quick,

doesn’t to think we are understand or not,’ and go to C10110, that course, the

tutors talk ‘Lalalalalala,’ like that. (May 1)

Difficulties contributing to this fog were the speed of delivery, the wide scope of content of the lectures, the use of technical vocabulary, the requirement for concentration over an extended time and the varied accents of teachers. The university’s entry criterion proved not to be the reflection of its demands, which they had supposed:

I just like make by wood, and nothing, got nothing to do because I couldn’t understand. That’s totally different with the IELTS test, that’s totally different. (YQ 1)

This initial blank might belie their concurrent relatively confident assessments of their English, but they seemed ready to give themselves permission to find the first lectures difficult, to strategise about how to cope with them, and to promise themselves improvement with time.

Strategies for trying to draw some kind of meaning from the onslaught of language included both top-down approaches: “Some key points, I just can guess some key points, but when start to discuss, that’s really hard” (Sky 1); and bottom-up, as KT here sets aside attention to the framing concepts to try to deal with deciphering the words:

I couldn’t follow them at all. I tried to catch up with the English, I mean the accents, and, well, forgot about the logics that they are talking about, the concepts they are talking about, panicked a little bit. (KT)

There was, too, an added complication: the need for a written record of the lecture. At this point, writing and listening at the same time was not a possibility. One strategy was to concentrate on the written notes provided on overhead transparencies (OHTs), as at least they represented some certainty. However this resulted in a serious reduction of the potential input:

I had to keep writing. Maybe I mean her word is very important but I had to -- I

had no idea to focus on two things, I had to take notes.(Saul 1)

Others took the opposite path:

The next course I just to say, ‘No, I stop. I don’t want to take [notes], maybe a little later I can ask my friend to borrow the notes for me to copy it,’ so I try to listen, and I can listen some but not all of them. (May 1)

The other strategy that a number of them mentioned as an intent, preview reading, seemed to be serving Mike well already:

before the lecture I read the books and see the WebCT and then the tutor say anything, I know. Because I read the books, textbooks. (1)

I try to solve the problem step by step, but if I have a problem I can solve it, I think. It’s not such difficult problem. (Linda 1)