Understanding Classroom Discourse (With Steve Walsh)
Summary
TLDRIn this TEFL training institute podcast, Professor Steve Walsh from Newcastle University delves into classroom discourse, exploring the significance of teacher-student interactions. Walsh discusses common teaching practices like elicitation, error correction, and feedback, emphasizing their impact on learning. He advocates for a balance between display and referential questions to foster genuine student engagement. The conversation also touches on the role of institutional discourse, the influence of cultural context on teaching practices, and the importance of adapting teacher roles to enhance the learning experience.
Takeaways
- đ Classroom discourse refers to all interactions in the classroom, focusing on teacher-student exchanges.
- đ Elicitation, error correction, and feedback are key classroom practices that require language.
- đŁ Feedback is critical in the classroom but has been harder to gauge during online teaching due to lack of visual cues.
- â Display questions are commonly used in classrooms to prompt students to show what they know, but referential questions could encourage more authentic interactions.
- đ€ Teachers should balance the use of display and referential questions to promote more genuine student engagement.
- đŻ The language teachers use should align with their teaching goals. For example, promoting fluency requires more open-ended questions.
- đ« Classroom interactions are structured and follow institutional rules, making them different from casual conversations.
- đ Cultural context influences teaching roles and expectations, but teachers need to adapt based on the immediate classroom needs.
- đ Teacher roles should be flexible, varying throughout the lesson based on the activity and learning goals.
- đŒ External pressures, such as from parents or exam requirements, can also shape how teachers behave in the classroom.
Q & A
What is classroom discourse according to Steve Walsh?
-Classroom discourse covers all the interactions that take place in any classroom, including the actual recording, observation, and transcript of those interactions.
Why is studying classroom discourse important?
-Studying classroom discourse is important because it shows what's happening in a classroom, providing insights into whether teaching and learning are occurring.
What are the common teaching practices that involve language?
-Common teaching practices that involve language include asking questions, correcting errors, giving feedback, and managing learning through instructions and organization.
How does feedback play a role in online teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic?
-Feedback is crucial in online teaching as it helps teachers understand if students are understanding or learning. However, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the lack of visual cues like head nods and smiles makes it challenging to gauge student comprehension.
What is the difference between elicitation, repair, and feedback in classroom discourse?
-Elicitation is about getting students to say something by asking a question. Repair refers to the ways teachers correct errors. Feedback is the information teachers and students give to each other to understand what's going on in the classroom.
Why is it suggested to push learners for 'pushed output' in the classroom?
-Pushing learners for 'pushed output' is suggested to encourage more extensive responses from students, thus promoting deeper learning and engagement beyond simple yes/no answers.
What are display questions and referential questions in the classroom?
-Display questions are those where teachers know the answers and are used to prompt students to display their knowledge. Referential questions are genuine inquiries where teachers do not know the answers and are aimed at accessing information and showing interest in students' experiences.
How do institutional discourse settings differ from everyday conversations?
-Institutional discourse settings like classrooms have specific rules and roles that restrict the types of interactions that can occur, making them different from more informal, everyday conversations.
What influences the role a teacher adopts in the classroom?
-The role a teacher adopts in the classroom is influenced by factors such as the lesson's micro-context, teaching goals, cultural expectations, and external pressures like curriculum, assessment, and examinations.
Why is it beneficial for teachers to vary their roles during a lesson?
-Varying their roles allows teachers to match their interaction style with the lesson's goals, promoting effective teaching and learning by adapting to the needs of the students and the subject matter.
How can understanding classroom discourse contribute to a teacher's professional development?
-Understanding classroom discourse can contribute to a teacher's professional development by providing insights into effective teaching practices, student engagement, and strategies for enhancing learning outcomes.
Outlines
đŁïž Classroom Discourse and Interactions
In this podcast segment, Steve Walsh, a professor of applied linguistics at Newcastle University, discusses the concept of classroom discourse. He explains that classroom discourse encompasses all interactions within a classroom setting and is crucial for understanding what occurs during teaching and learning. Walsh emphasizes the importance of studying these interactions to infer whether teaching and learning are effectively taking place. He also touches on the common teaching practices such as elicitation, error correction (repair), and feedback, highlighting their significance in the classroom. Walsh points out the challenges of online teaching, where traditional forms of feedback are less accessible, affecting the quality of interaction and the ability to assess student understanding.
đ€ The Role of Questions in Classroom Discourse
Steve Walsh delves into the role of questions in classroom discourse, differentiating between display questions, which teachers ask with known answers to prompt student responses, and referential questions, which are genuine inquiries that teachers do not have the answers to. He suggests that while display questions are common and serve a purpose in eliciting student responses, there should be a balance with referential questions that show genuine interest in students' experiences and thoughts. Walsh argues for a rebalance towards more authentic questioning to foster a more engaging and interactive learning environment. He also addresses the difference between classroom interactions and everyday conversations, noting that classroom discourse is governed by specific institutional rules that define the roles and interactions between teachers and students.
đ« Navigating Classroom Roles and Rules
In this part of the podcast, the discussion turns to the rules and roles that govern classroom interactions. Steve Walsh explains that classroom discourse is an institutional discourse with its own set of rules and roles, which can vary depending on cultural contexts and educational philosophies. He discusses how the teacher's role can shift from being an authority figure to a facilitator, depending on the teaching goals and the stage of the lesson. Walsh also acknowledges the external pressures on teachers, such as expectations from parents, administrators, and curriculum requirements, which can influence their role and classroom interactions. The segment concludes with the idea that understanding and adapting to these roles and rules is essential for effective teaching and learning.
Mindmap
Keywords
đĄClassroom Discourse
đĄElicitation
đĄRepair
đĄFeedback
đĄTeaching Practices
đĄDisplay Questions
đĄReferential Questions
đĄInstitutional Discourse
đĄMicro Context
đĄAsymmetrical Roles
đĄSocialization of Learning
Highlights
Classroom discourse covers all interactions in a classroom and is crucial for understanding teaching and learning.
Interactions between teachers and students are key to studying classroom discourse.
Elicitation, repair, and feedback are common teaching practices found in classroom discourse.
Error correction through repair is a frequent practice, though debated in its effectiveness.
Feedback is vital for understanding student comprehension, especially in online learning environments.
Teachers use discourse markers to encourage students, but they can also limit further interaction.
Pushed output, inspired by Merrill Swain, encourages students to produce more complex responses.
Classroom management and organization are intertwined with the language teachers use.
The language used in teaching should align with pedagogical goals to promote effective learning.
Display questions are common in classrooms, but referential questions can foster more genuine student engagement.
Rebalancing questioning techniques to include more referential questions can enhance student interaction.
Classroom discourse differs from everyday conversation due to institutional rules and roles.
The teacher's role in the classroom can vary and should be adapted to match teaching goals.
External factors such as curriculum and examinations influence the teacher's role and classroom discourse.
Understanding and varying the teacher's role can lead to more effective teaching practices.
The quality of teacher talk is more important than the quantity in promoting learning.
Classroom discourse, while not authentic in the same way as everyday conversation, has its own norms and practices.
Transcripts
hi everyone welcome back the TEFL
training institute podcast this week we
are looking at interactions that happen
in the classroom we're talking about
classroom discourse and to help us do
that we have Steve Walsh professor of
applied linguistics at Newcastle
University
Steve's were in extensively several
books and many many articles about
classroom discourse how it affects unit
learning and how teachers can use
classroom discourse as a starting point
for the professional development I hope
you enjoyed today's episode
[Music]
[Applause]
I Steve thanks very much for joining us
to begin with Steve what is classroom
discourse or classroom discourses the
basically covers all the interactions
which take place in any classroom and
its use interchangeably quite frequently
in the literature you'll see people talk
about interaction you'll see the book
about classroom discourse or classroom
discourse is the actual recording the
observation the transcript all of that
constitutes mastering discuss and what
we're really interested in in certainly
in my work anyway are the interactions
between teacher and students and the
reason we're interested in it is because
it shows us what's actually happening in
a classroom it gives us a clue as to
whether anything is being taught or
learned you can't study learning by
looking inside people's heads but you
can actually make a lot of inferences as
I suppose by looking at what people do
and what people say so that's that's the
kind of the essence of classroom
discourse and also one of the reasons
for studying it in terms of those
interactions then like what do we know
about what usually or what often happens
how do teachers typically interact with
their students and what are some of the
common purposes that teachers use
teacher talk for sure yeah I mean we're
we're interested in the what you might
call the teaching practices which take
place in the classroom and all of these
practices such as asking a question or
correcting an error these practices are
encompassed in language right you can't
actually do these things without using
language so we have for example in in
some of my work which I'll talk about
later we've identified a number of these
practices which are frequently occurring
which are found in any classroom
anywhere in the world which merit study
so let's take the most frequently
occurring ones these would be
elicitation so elicitation is about
basically trying to get your students to
say something by asking a question for
example which is the most commonly used
elicitation strategy the second one
would be repair which would be the ways
in which we correct errors something
that teachers do all the time is error
correction and there are huge debates of
course around this as to whether we
should correct every error or not the
third one which is perhaps the most
important one in many ways is feedback
and the feedback that we give to our
students and that students give to us is
hugely important because it tells us
what's going on and right now for
example in the current situation with
kovat we're all working online and we're
teaching online and we're not getting
the feedback that we do depend on from
our students so for example if we don't
get visual clues if we don't get head
nods and smiles and raised eyebrows and
these kind of multimodal features we
don't know really whether they're
actually understanding us or learning
anything and similarly the feedback that
we give to our students the ways in
which we add knowledge a contribution
for example so typically teachers say
things like yes good thank you
excellent right that kind of thing right
these discourse markers these simple
single words although they're used to
encourage and motivate they can actually
close the interaction down and signal
the end of a turn so although they are
well meant in the work I'm doing I'm
suggesting that we need to push learners
a little bit and say things like oh
that's really interesting can you tell
us a bit more about that so we get what
I'm calling pushed output using Merrill
Swain's word output from our students
and finally you know all the stuff that
we do which is clusters management of
learning giving instructions organizing
setting up pair work bringing a task to
a conclusion all of these things are
what we would call teaching practices
but they are absolutely interlinked with
the language that we use so what's
really important here is to understand
that the language we use and the
pedagogical that we're trying to achieve
the pedagogical of the
they have to work together so if my
pedagogy goal is to promote fluency and
I'm simply asking yes/no questions
there's a mismatch between my language
and my pedagogical if my pedagogy goal
is to give a grammatical explanation
about a point of grammar then it's
absolutely fine to talk at length and
have what you might call a high level of
teacher talk so we're interested in the
quality of teacher talk rather than the
quantity were interested in the extent
to which our language and our
interaction promote learning so maybe we
can drill down a bit deeper into some of
those concepts and Steve I mean look at
magic questions for a second I think
before we book it on the podcast about
how useful it is for teachers to ask
questions to students that they don't
know the answers to yeah do you want to
tell us a bit more about those kind of
questions and also display questions
where our teachers are students
questions that they already know the
answers to
or those sometimes useful or sometimes
appropriate or or does it already just
depend it depends well okay so with
regard to questions we ask a lot of
questions you know there have been
various studies on this to calculate the
percentage time that teachers actually
devote to asking questions and it's it's
huge its enormous and then you know one
kind of question for ourselves is
perhaps do we always need to ask a
question other other ways of eliciting a
response when I first started teaching
we used to use flashcards for example to
elicit responses there are ways of doing
this but let's stay with questions for a
minute basically I would I would divide
questions into two types display
questions and referential questions
right so display questions are questions
that we use to get our students to
display what they know there are prompt
and display questions or questions that
we as teachers know the answer to
they're not the kind of question you
would ask your family or friends because
your family your friends would think you
were crazy if you kept asking them
questions that you knew the answer to
but in classrooms it's okay to ask
display questions because they prompt
and they
elicit they try to encourage some some
kind of response the problem is that we
ask too many in my work we ask a lot of
us display questions where in fact
sometimes we should and could be asking
the other type of question which are
referential questions referential
questions are simply genuine questions
that we don't know the answer to
questions such as what did you do over
the weekend how did you spend Saturday
have you ever been to Paris you know
these types of questions which are
genuine and real in the central part of
human communication so what I'm
suggesting is that we need to rebalance
questioning and perhaps try to
incorporate more genuine questions of
our students and fewer display questions
you'll hear people talk about these as
open and closed as well and some people
including my colleague at Newcastle
ports Heath House would suggest that
every question in the classroom is some
kind of display question because it's
there for a purpose it's designed to get
a response from our students rather than
the normal purpose of questions which is
to access information and find out about
things so some people would argue you
can't actually ask a genuine question I
think you can and I think we should
because it shows an interest in our
students and it shows that we're
listening to what they're saying
and where we're interested we're
genuinely interested you mentioned there
how your friends and family would look
at you very strangely if you ask them a
display question you know what colors
does pay and how many shoes are there
that kind of thing and obviously that
that's true but that suggests that
there's a difference between how
teachers interact with students inside
the classroom and how they interact with
other people outside of the classroom so
can you tell us a bit more about that
and is it ever really possible for
classroom interactions to and classroom
communication to be similar or to mirror
what's going on in the real world hmm
okay well the simple answer is he can't
interactions in the classroom are bound
by rules
we're talking here to use a little bit
of technical language we're talking
about an institutional discourse setting
an institutional discourse means any
situation within an institution which
has got its own rules so for example a
visit to the doctor you know you go to
the doctor it would be unusual for you
to say to the doctor how are you today
but it's absolutely fine for the doctor
to say to you how are you and what can I
do for you
right so these rules that apply restrict
the kind of interaction that we can have
in the classroom and some people say
it's not genuine but the other way of
looking at it is to say that the
classroom is as much a social setting as
any other it's a place where people come
they have a goal or institutional
discourse is goal oriented we have a
purpose for being there we have roles
and in the in the roles that we have we
have in a classroom the roles are
asymmetrical they're not equal so the
teacher is the authority figure and they
have control of the discourse for
example these roles and the rules roles
and rules if you like in a classroom
restrict the kinds of discourse that
we're going to get and they limit us to
certain patterns but that's actually
quite interesting because then we can
say well what is an appropriate
interaction in a classroom and why is a
less appropriate type of interaction so
although on the one hand classroom
interaction classroom discourse it's not
authentic and can never be genuine in
the same way that an interaction with a
friend can be on the other hand it's a
social setting which has certain norms
and practices which can be studied and
that's what makes it useful in terms of
understanding teaching and learning
better she mentioned there the idea of
rules and rules let's talk about the
rules a little bit more how so set and
stone are those teacher roles Steve like
they obviously must change a little bit
depending on the culture maybe the part
of the world that you're teaching in but
I wonder if they're also influenced by
other things like the expectations of
students or even just influenced by what
it is that the teachers are teaching
yeah
as a good question and and this is
really very much about the socialization
of learning that we're all socialized
into behaving in certain ways in
classrooms right
typically we expect to answer questions
rather than ask questions we expect to
sit quietly for much of the time we we
expect what our hands up when we want to
say something or answer a question these
are the rules if you like the social
rules of the classroom and of course
these vary from one context to another
if you go to some parts of the world the
Middle East the Far East possibly South
America places like that then the role
of the teacher is very much seen as a
traditional role in some people's eyes
in other words they are there to impart
knowledge in other parts of the world
the role of the teacher might be seen in
quite a different way as somebody who's
there as a facilitator as a catalyst
somebody who can help people learn but
in a more possibly informal way now I
don't think these two contexts that I've
just described are mutually exclusive
and in the work that I do I talk about
micro context which very as a lesson
progresses and the teachers role and the
interactions that unfold after vary
according to what's going on in the
classroom according to the agenda the
teaching goals of the moment so at one
point in a lesson you might be
dominating the interaction for 10 or 15
minutes while you give an explanation or
give some instructions at another moment
in the lesson you might be taking more
of a back seat and letting the students
get on with something and interact
together but what's important I think
for good teaching is to learn how to
vary the role that you adopt and match
the role according to what you're trying
to achieve that with the students at
that point in time and some people are
good at this and I'm afraid some are not
and some people feel that they have to
remain as the authority figure that what
the literature would refer to as the
sage on the stage the one who has
all the knowledge especially language
classrooms I think it's probably a
mistake to completely follow that rule
the other thing of course is that
teachers are earned pressure from
outside the classroom and this perhaps
influences their role very strongly as
well they're under pressure from parents
from head teachers perhaps the
curriculum assessment and the
examinations all these kind of external
invisible or hidden factors have an
important effect on how we behave in
classrooms and the kind of role that we
adopt
[Laughter]
[Music]
one more time everyone that was Steve
Walsh if you'd like to find out more
from Steve check out his books and
articles there's a list on Steve's
University of Newcastle page which I'll
put a link to if you'd like to find out
more from us please go to our website
www.jfn.co.jp/toho
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