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A Students Guide to the MA TESOL

N. Bell

Palgrave Macmillan 2009, 59 pp., 14.99

isbn 13: 978 0 230 22431 5

Writing an Applied Linguistics Thesis or Dissertation:A Guide to Presenting Empirical Research

J. Bitchener

Palgrave Macmillan 2010, 216 pp., 18.99

isbn 978 0 230 22454 4

Two titles from the same publisher in two successiveyears on closely related topics seem to provide proofthat publications in our field are becomingincreasingly specific. Written in different parts of theworld (Washington State University for Bell andAuckland University of Technology for Bitchener),

both draw on current research and are strengthenedby the authors personal experience. Anothercommon feature is that each could be of interest toa wider readership than the suggested MA TESOL /Applied Linguistics students of the titles, as thisreview intends to show.

In A Students Guide, Bell models the academicstyle students will need to use themselves byincluding internal referencing to support the theory.Of her six chapters, the first three (with one slight

exception) are an introduction to the T E S OLdiscipline, with only the last three addressing thetopic of studying for the MA of the books title. This isnot a criticism since students will never reach thepoint of putting together their dissertation or thesisif they have not first thought more widely about thefield.

The first chapter, Situating ourselves, has a sectionon finding the right course and another which will beuseful to students mystified by the language taken forgranted in MA programmes. Some quite basic terms

are included. For instance, as Bell points out, thetermESL refers to a range of learning conditions (p. 18)for students who are actually learning English asa third or fourth language. The chapter ends withthree suggested activities to help readers digest thecontent.

Chapter 2, Language, learning and teaching, addsfurther background knowledge based around threequestions, one each about the nature of language, oflearning, and of teaching. The message draws onclassic texts by leaders in the field such as Halliday,

Chomsky, Krashen, Oxford, and van Lier. Therelationship between this chapter and the next one is

more of a continuum than a distinction. Perhaps theywere once the same chapter since, at the risk of nit-picking, one reference (p. 31) in Chapter 2 points thereader back to itself rather than to Chapter 3, Keyconcepts in TESOL, where I found it. Here, too, thereare summaries of more of the basic topics such asindividual differences and classroom discourse.Appendix A sheds further light on terminology by

elaborating on common acronyms, from AmericanCouncil on the Teaching of Foreign Languages toWorld Englishes. A glossary at the end of the booktakes this clarification a step further by providingdefinitions.

The final three chapters assume that the reader hasfound a place to study and needs guidance on how todo this successfully. Chapter 4, Learning to learn ingraduate school, although not written specifically forinternational students, could be particularly helpfulto

them, especially the advice on relationships withpeers and staff. The title of Chapter 5, Research andthe (future) TESOL instructor suggested (to me atleast) that the research focus would be classroombased. This did not seem to be the case. The adviceabout doing library-based or primary research, whichare the two topics covered, would be suitable fora wider readership, as suggested earlier. The finalchapter goes a step further: Professionaldevelopment in and beyond graduate school. Asyet another example of the wider potential of thebook, this content could be useful to staff. I shallcertainly refer to it in a forthcoming workshopon ongoing professional development forpractising teachers who may or may not have an MAin mind.

Despite its specific title, Bitcheners book, too,deserves a wider readership from other areas of thesocial sciences as the author indicates in his Preface(p. viii). The book has as one of its raisons detre theanswering of questions asked by students aboutexactly what goes in each section of a thesis.

Following a short introductory chapter explaining thebooks focus and organization, the content isorganized around the seven parts of a thesis, witha chapter each for the abstract, introduction,literature review, methodology, results, discussion ofresults, and conclusion. Running through thesechapters is the unifying thread of extracts from oneparticular Masters thesis that won a recent nationalcompetition in New Zealand. In each chapter, thereader has a mixture of advice and illustrationspresented in boxes, questions, and subheadings.

The result is a very accessible format.In order to give the flavour of the book withoutcovering every detail, this review now examines three

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chapters (2, 3, and 8). These deal with sections ofa thesis often confused by students: the abstract, theintroduction, and the conclusion. In Chapter 2, I wasinterested to compare the five-point list of anabstracts functions with a much earlier summary byBhatia (1993: 78) and to find this newer one morefocused. The analysis of the abstract in the prize-winning thesis is done in two ways, first in two

columns with a brief analysis of each move and thensentence by sentence with a more detailedcommentary. This seemed a particularly helpful wayof leading students to an understanding of what isrequired. Very occasionally there was a glossary ofterms that included in its explanation the termbeing defined, as in willingness to communicatebeing defined as the extent to which a secondlanguage learner is willing to communicate in theclassroom (p. 16)but for themost part the glossariesare helpful.

In Chapter 3, the thesis introduction comes under themicroscope. Bitchener explains its form in terms oflinguistic features such as tense, voice, and parts ofspeech. Students looking for a template to imitatewill, of course, be disappointed. Throughout the bookthe author is careful not to be dogmatic: There is nohard and fast rule on this (p. 51) and Opinions varyabout . . . (p. 53). This is not to say that the content isvague. In this chapter, for example, the authorincludes a helpful list of words from which a studentcould select to indicate the niche in which their ownthesis is placed.

Chapter 8 deals with the conclusion of a thesis andstarts with a warning: Conventions may vary not onlyfrom discipline to discipline but also withindisciplines. (p. 197). Against this there is adviceabout what all conclusions have as their aim. There isa five-point summary of the conclusions functions,which provides an easy comparison with the earlierpoints mentioned for the introduction. This shouldhelp clarify once and for all the fact that a conclusion

is not simply a rewrite of the introduction indifferent words. For readers using the book alone,rather than as part of a study centre programme,there are helpful personal notes such as the onesuggesting they do their own analysis of thesample provided before reading the analysiscolumn.

All the chapters have a Further Activities section andconcludewith a list of frequently asked questions, twofeatures that make the book suitable for use instudent learning centre seminars. The questions are

so familiar that one can picture some students usingthem as the starting point to their reading. As anexample, How long should the Introduction be?

Finally there is a four-page Appendix that would be anexcellent final checklist for students towards the endof their writing process. For each of the seven parts ofthe thesis comes a summary, in table form, of themoves and sub-moves involved in each. As oneexample of the considerable detail presented, thefinal move of the methodology section is said to beElucidate the data analysis procedures (p. 215) for

which three sub-moves are suggested.

It seems to this reviewer that staff trying to decidewhich of these books to put on a reading list may findthemselves suggesting both. If length werea criterion, then Bitchener offers 216 pages to Bells159. Each provides extensive further reading, in Bellscase both following each chapter and at the end, inBitcheners only following each chapter. Only Bellshas a final index. However, these are smalldistinctions. As someone who is frequently asked

informally for advice about postgraduate courses,particularly by international students, I would bepleased to recommend both these titles topotential and currentstudentsas well as to staff.Bothbooks would heavily reduce the preparation timerequired by university teachers of graduate studentseminars.

What next for guidebooks in our field? Perhaps one ofthe authors might consider a title answering thefrequently asked question, How can I get publishedin Applied Linguistics/T E S OL journals? Either

author would be well placed to write such a book.

Reference

Bhatia, V. 1993. Analysing Genre: Language Use inProfessional Settings. London: Longman.

The reviewer

Marilyn Lewis was a senior lecturer in theDepartment of Applied Language Studies andLinguistics at The University of Auckland. In herretirement, she continues to do workshops with

volunteers working with English Language Partnersin New Zealand and with tertiary teachers in Asia.Sheis also the author of a number of books on learningand teaching.Email: mn.lewis@auckland.ac.nzdoi:10.1093/elt/ccq052

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