The influence of tutorials on the improvement of tertiary students’ academic literacy

Abstract

This paper describes a study which explored whether attending tutorials facilitated by senior students improves tertiary students’ marks in an academic literacy course. Data were drawn from the academic literacy test marks and essay assignment marks of students who took a year-long academic literacy course at the University of Pretoria. A statistical analysis was done to determine whether there was any improvement in the test marks and the essay assignments of students who attended tutorials at least 10 times, in addition to regular lectures. Findings suggest that attending extra academic literacy tutorials has little effect on students’ TALL (Test of Academic Literacy Levels) marks, but it does seem to have an influence on students’ writing ability. Because of the number of problems encountered in doing the research, it also illustrates the complex and problematic nature of research into language performance.

Keywords

• academic literacy
• test of Academic Literacy Levels; writing ability; at-risk students