A “Speaking in the Disciplines” Approach to Teaching and Learning Oral Genres

Welcome to the PASS—the Precedents Archive for Scholarly Speaking! This site has been created to help students gain confidence and competence in academic speaking situations. At the heart of the site are speaking precedents—video recordings of student presentations—that you can watch to become familiar with what it looks like to speak in university settings. You will also find guides that focus on the specific moves scholars make when they speak, and resources specifically for instructors.

Different speaking situations invite different forms or styles of speaking. How do we speak to each other as scholars? How do students new to university learn to speak confidently and successfully here? One of the best ways to learn about the conventions and practices of scholarly speaking is by seeing how others have done it before you. This site is designed to offer easy access to what scholarly speaking—by students, to students—looks like.

Who should use this site – and how?

Students	Faculty
Browse the scholarly speaking archive. Watch a first-year student give a 10-minute presentation on, for example, healthcare systems in Canada and the US or the criminalization of protest. There are many videos to choose from and while they all feature student speakers, they vary in length, format, discipline, and topic. Learn about the features of scholarly speaking. We have developed guides that specifically highlight how speakers cite their sources, make their arguments, anticipate their audience’s needs, and participate in discussions in oral settings.	Use our archives in your teaching. Share precedent videos with your classes. You may also want to explore or assign our guides that break down the specific features of scholarly speaking. Explore our instructor resources. In our Teaching with Precedents section, we provide some scholarly context for this project as well as a selection of suggested activities and assessments for teaching with the PASS.

Students

Faculty

Browse the scholarly speaking archive. Watch a first-year student give a 10-minute presentation on, for example, healthcare systems in Canada and the US or the criminalization of protest. There are many videos to choose from and while they all feature student speakers, they vary in length, format, discipline, and topic.
Learn about the features of scholarly speaking. We have developed guides that specifically highlight how speakers cite their sources, make their arguments, anticipate their audience’s needs, and participate in discussions in oral settings.

Use our archives in your teaching. Share precedent videos with your classes. You may also want to explore or assign our guides that break down the specific features of scholarly speaking.
Explore our instructor resources. In our Teaching with Precedents section, we provide some scholarly context for this project as well as a selection of suggested activities and assessments for teaching with the PASS.

Acknowledgment: UBC’s Point Grey Campus is located on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam) people. The land it is situated on has always been a place of learning for the Musqueam people, who for millennia have passed on their culture, history, and traditions from one generation to the next on this site.

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A “Speaking in the Disciplines” Approach to Teaching and Learning Oral Genres

Who should use this site – and how?