Systematically Capturing Teacher-Student Co-Construction of Knowledge in Whole-Class Teaching

• In Event: The Dreams, Possibilities, and Necessity of Student Classroom Talk Within Public Education

Abstract

Enabling students to become more adept at using language is seen as one of the major goals of education: firstly, so they can express their thoughts and engage with others in joint intellectual activity to develop their communication skills; secondly, so as to advance their individual capacity for productive, rational, and reflective thinking. Within classrooms, students can develop their proficiency in the use of spoken language through teacher-student and student-student interactions. This paper focuses on the first of these educational approaches with regard to classroom talk: teacher-student interaction in the guided co-construction of learning.
Drawing on an experimental study of an intervention designed to improve the quality of teacher-student interaction, engagement and learning in the teaching of primary English, mathematics and science in England, this paper presents the computer-based system of analysis that was used for analysing a large database of spoken language. The findings are also complemented by transcription analysis of selected episodes from the data to allow for a more nuanced interpretation of the learning engaged in by the students. The framework of analysis draws on recent research that has identified a key number of teacher discourse moves that have been found to be academically productive in whole class talk (Michaels & O’Connor, 2012: Author Paper3). Such moves have been found to open up space in the classroom discourse by encouraging students to share and expand upon their ideas, provide evidence for their thinking, and to listen carefully to other student contributions so as to build on, elaborate, and improve on the shared thinking. By establishing clear ground rules for class discussion alongside the introduction of the talk moves, the research has also found that a culture of productive talk can be established resulting in higher levels of critical thinking and student learning outcomes. The paper concludes with a discussion of the types of school-based teacher development and research programmes that will be needed to encourage teachers to conduct their own action research and to theorize their teaching so as to make confident and professionally informed decisions about the way they interact with students so as to encourage greater participation and higher levels of cognitive engagement and learning outcomes.

Author

• Jan Hardman, University of York