Fostering bilingual scientific writing through a systematic and purposeful code-switching pedagogical strategy

ABSTRACT

English dominates as an international language for science and research. Consequently, this is the most widely used language in university bilingual (e.g. Spanish–English, Chinese–English, Swedish–English) science courses around the world. However, very little is known about how to foster bilingual scientific writing in these types of courses. This article describes the effect of a systematic and purposeful code-switching pedagogical strategy in fostering undergraduates’ bilingual scientific writing. Participants were 76 students (41 female and 35 male, 17–23 years old) enrolled in a university bilingual (Spanish–English) Biology course in Colombia. The data used in this analysis were derived from students’ argumentative written productions, and audio and video recordings. The findings show that this systematic and purposeful code-switching pedagogical strategy was not only a useful basis for promoting students’ bilingual scientific writing but also a valuable way for students to gain confidence in their foreign language written skills.

KEYWORDS:

• Bilingual scientific writing
• code-switching
• higher education
• university bilingual science course

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Zaide Katherine Montes Ortiz and Juan Diego Pyco Gutiérrez for their assistance in transcribing the audio recordings. Also, we would like to express our deepest appreciation to the participants who agreed to contribute to this project.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Pablo Antonio Archila

Pablo Antonio Archila is a researcher in bilingual science education in the Faculty of Education, Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia. He holds a PhD in education from Universidad Distrital Francisco José de Caldas, Bogotá, Colombia, and a PhD in educational sciences from Université Lumière Lyon 2, Lyon, France. He conducted postdoctoral research at Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia, and Université Paris Diderot, Paris 7–Sorbonne Paris Cité, Paris, France.

Jorge Molina

Jorge Molina is an Associate Professor at the Department of Biological Sciences at Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia. He holds a Dr. rer. nat. degree in neurobiology at Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Göttingen, Lower Saxony, Germany. Recently, he has cooperated in various bilingual Biology education innovation projects at university level.

Anne-Marie Truscott de Mejía

Anne-Marie Truscott de Mejía is Professor in the Faculty of Education at Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia. Her recent publications include Forging Multilingual Spaces (2008), Empowering Teachers across Cultures (2011, with Christine Hélot), and Bilingüismo en el Contexto Colombiano (2011, with Alexis López and Beatriz Peña).