Research Approach to Analyse and Foster Discipline-Specific Language Competency in Software Engineering Education
- Language - spoken and written - is the medium for information and knowledge sharing; and it is almost always even a role of every subject in (higher) education. The language therefore plays an important part in teaching and learning. This is further underlined by the fact that "discipline-specific language" - which is "the uses of language in university discipline learning and teaching and in professional life in a particular discipline" - can be understood as a link between knowledge and generic/personal/interpersonal competencies; especially communication skills. In this paper a research proposal is outlined to enable an enhanced and conscious approach to the use of language and special terms in Software Engineering in higher education. This is done by a two-piece approach that considers terminology from a linguistic and a didactical point of view. All of this combined is intended to contribute toward the development of a terminology in Software Engineering and, in a wider context, to reach the top goal of this research agenda: To be able to obtain recommendations for action for teaching and learning methods to improve the quality and sustainability of teaching and learning in this discipline.