The challenge of changing classroom discourse patterns

Culican, S. J. (2007). Troubling teacher talk: The challenge of changing classroom discourse patterns. The Australian Educational Researcher, 34(2), 7-27.

Background

Patterns of classroom talk are largely unconscious and can remain unrecognised as a determinant of academic success or as a mechanism for excluding certain students. The questioning sequences in the conventional IRE (Initiation-Response-Evaluation) pattern of classroom talk can pose a challenge to less advantaged students who lack the prior knowledge required to participate in these interactions.

Aims

The study explored how English teachers in the language arts classroom demonstrated understanding of the scaffolding approach. The purpose of the study was to examine the change in teachers’ pedagogic discourse and the struggles and successes they experienced in taking up the new discourse pattern.

Sample

Four teachers in Australia were involved in the study focusing on the teachers’ practice of the discourse pattern laid out below with small groups of students described as ‘low literacy’. The paper looked at the transcript of lessons involving one of the teachers and her students in the upper primary years.

Method

Rather than beginning with a question, the scaffolding approach involves three moves (1) prepare: beginning with sentence preparation by paraphrasing the general meaning of the sentence, and using position and meaning cues to give students prompts to identify sentence wordings, (2) identify: posing a question for students to identify specified sentence wordings, and (3) elaborate: leading students in a discussion of ideas. The study involved the video-taping of lessons and the discourse analysis of lesson transcripts. Some joint discussion of lesson transcripts with the teachers was used both as a tool for analysis and a pedagogic tool for engaging teachers in conversations that supported pedagogic change.

Findings

Teachers found the ‘prepare’ move difficult as measured by how often the sentence preparation was overlooked or omitted. They also tended to use more ‘wh’ cues which resulted in ‘comprehension’ style questions beginning with who, what, when, where, why or how. They used fewer ‘commonsense paraphrase’ meaning cues such as alternative wordings or synonyms from ‘everyday’ language for language in the text that would have offered more specific support for students’ reading. During the elaborate move which can vary depending on the meanings being discussed, the teachers commonly reverted to more familiar IRE questioning routines.

Implications

Examining written transcripts of lessons creates a reflective space for teachers to evaluate particular patterns in their classroom talk. It allows teachers to reconsider their habitual discourse patterns.

Original article retrieved from EBSCOHost.