Teaching of academic reading and writing through programs across the university curriculum: theoretical, pedagogical and administrative choices

ABSTRACT This paper deals with the development of academic and professional reading and writing at the tertiary level. First, the paper argues for the teaching of reading and writing in Argentina, considering the specific tertiary context, the features of its students and the characteristics of the discourse they need to approach at this level. This consideration enables the proposal of generalizations suitable for other contexts. Then, the paper introduces the pedagogical choice of developing reading and writing programs across the tertiary curriculum, as well as the theoretical, pedagogical and administrative requirements for this choice. Thus, the paper presents a theory of learning, a theory of language and context, and a pedagogical and academic program administration proposal. The theory of learning considered corresponds to Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), which understands learning as a process enacted through language; as a theory of language, the paper proposes the model of genre and discourse proposed within the framework of SFL; as a pedagogical choice, an adaptation of genre-based pedagogy developed by the Sydney School is introduced and its adaptations to the Argentinian university context are presented. Finally, the features of a program design are made explicit, as well as some problems arising from its administration and proposals for its solution. The paper ends with a discussion of some of the results emerging from the implementation of the program.