First-year students in higher education settings tend to face ongoing challenges with variations in discursive practices and genres within their discipline. Within this context, a Diagnostic English Language Needs Assessment (DELNA) was administered to first-year engineering students to assess the strengths and needs of their ability to navigate academic language. The purpose of this paper is to report on our initiative to support student’s development of academic literacy, specifically their disciplinary language proficiency through the implementation of pedagogical support activities.

First-year engineering students not only have to grapple with academic discursive practices specific to their discipline, but they also have to learn genre-specific conventions. The engineering notebook is one such genre common in the field of engineering. This article describes specific teaching strategies employed in the delivery of a workshop designed specifically for first-year engineers. The purpose of the workshop was to equip novice engineers with engineering notebook conventions that constitute a major literacy practice in their respective discourse community.

Multimodality in assignments is increasingly common in higher education, thereby requiring students to demonstrate competency in the employment of multiple modes to communicate. Specifically, the field of engineering communication relies on multimodal resources to construct meaning and convey information. This article describes the integration of multimodality in a second-year software design and communication course assignment. In this assignment, students read the text, Made to Stick that enlists six principles of effective communication strategies and are expected to apply these communicative principles to a tech talk video. Students then produce a written argument which evaluates how effectively the presenter employed Made to Stick principles. Through engagement with multimodal resources, students are afforded the opportunity to practice and develop three skills of application, analysis and argumentation.