Multimodal Engagement in Teenagers' Exploratory Talk in Classrooms

• In Event: 64.060 - Participation in Interaction: Multimodal Understandings of Interaction in a Range of Education Settings

Abstract

Objectives
This paper presents insights into the texture of exploratory classroom talk arising from multimodal micro- analysis. These insights lead to an understanding of the contributions of embodied semiosis (meaning making through gesture, posture, gaze, haptics and proxemics) as central to the organisation and accomplishment of classroom talk.
Theoretical Perspectives
Rather than viewing postural modes as add-ons which enrich the story of the participants' interaction, these contributions are viewed as central to meaning-making and enacting interpersonal, ideational and textual metafunctions in discourse (Halliday, 1985) and encompassing emotional and agentic aspects to participation and engagement.
Methods
The data presented draws from a study which is investigating the contributions of multiple modes in secondary classroom interactions of a cohort of 12 learners across curricular areas in Science, Mathematics, History, English Literature, Sociology and Engineering classes. The learners aged 15-16 were in their final year of formal schooling in the UK in a post-industrial city in the north of England and were preparing to take national examinations at the end of the academic year (2014) and this prospect determined the pedagogic experience of these learners as being largely focussed on examination preparation. Within this context the personal concerns and relationships of the learners are seen to be integral to the multimodal realisation of their meaning making. An ethnographically -contextualised Multimodal Discourse Analysis (AUTHOR,) approach informed by the social semiotic theory of communication (Kress, 2010) and underpinned by an understanding of language as a semiotic resource (Halliday 1978) was employed to interrogate observations and videoed interactions from 41 lessons.
Findings
Examples are presented of learners employing embodied modes in cohering and organizing text, presenting notions, themes and concepts, and articulating rapport, empathy and the shared-ness of collaborative learning. The ways in which postural synchrony enacts a shared space of mutual resonance, or dialogic space, as described by Wegerif, (2018) are demonstrated and examples of punctuating postures, that is posture aa a form of discourse marker, are presented.. The indivisibility of private worlds from school discourses and the embeddedness of metaphorical meaning making are also explored.
Significance
The significance of this study lies in its purpose, which is to critique explanations of the value of classroom talk as being the end - goal of polished texts through standard, presentational talk and offer a broader conceptualisation of face to face interaction which celebrates the spontaneous ephemeral and exploratory nature of what goes on between learners as they collaborate. Only when the importance of unconstrained talk for learning is understood will educators be allowed to encourage the kind of classroom interaction which will empower learners and foster creative, collaboration, which advocates for a shift in 21st century learning (Scott, 2015,) are calling for.

Author

• Roberta Taylor, Sheffield Hallam University