Aspects of verbal classroom discourse= An exploatory investigation into teacher follow-up moves.pdf

7/27/2019 Aspects of verbal classroom discourse= An exploatory investigation into teacher follow-up moves.pdf

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Verbal Classroom Discourse: A small-scale investigation into teacher

follow-up moves in pre-intermediate-level EFL classes at an Omani

Basic Education school

Jamel Abdenacer ALIMI

e-mail: [email protected]

Date: 10 July, 2007.

PAPER PLAN

Introduction

1. Theoretical Background2. The Study

2.1 Research Question

2.2 Methodology2.2.1 Participants

2.2.2 Data Collection

2.2.3 Procedure

2.3 Data Analytical Framework

3. Data Analysis

3.1 Preliminary Observations

3.2 Analysis4. Data Interpretation

4.1 Pedagogical Roles

4.2 Evaluative Roles

4.3 Discoursal Roles

5. Discussion

6. Conclusion

7. End Notes8. References9. Appendices

APPENDICES

Appendix A: Transcription Conventions

Appendix B: Lesson Transcript (Exchanges 2-4 )

Appendix C: Lesson Transcript (Exchanges 2-4 analysed and keyed according to the Jarvis-Robinson 1997 Model)

ABBREVIATIONS

ESL: English as a Second Language

EFL: English as a Foreign Language

TEYL: Teaching English to Young Learners

BE: Basic Education

CLT: Communicative Language Teaching

Creating a patterned, supportive discourse cannot be seen

as easy. It involves skills in using many functions, in

analyzing many voices and in developing interlinked

conversational exchanges.

Jarvis (1996: 49)
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]


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INTRODUCTION

The much-debated issue of teacher classroom discourse has recently received a fresh

impetus as ESL/EFL studies are increasingly interpreting classroom encounters from

(neo-) Vygotskian principles of education1 (e.g., Mercer 1994; Jarvis and Robinson

1997; McCarthy 1991; Cazden 1988; Sinclair and Coulthard 1975; Coulthard 1985;

Demo 2001). A great deal has been subsequently written on such crucial issues asinitiation, questioning, explaining, and giving instructions (e.g., Tsui 1995; Doff 1998;

Brown and Wragg 1993; Kerry 1982; Sinclair and Brazil 1982). In contrast, less

attention has been paid to the form, patterns and functions of teacher verbal feedback

provision (Hewings 1992: 183; Jarvis 1996). As a result, the latter's influence in creating

a supportive discourse as well as an acquisition-rich classroom has, unfortunately,

remained hardly imperceptible by ELT practitioners in many educational settings to

date.

Building on previous studies by Jarvis and Robinson (1997), Cullen (2002) and Jarvis

(1996), the present paper is a modest step towards filling that serious gap in research. It

specifically aims to critically describe the functions and patterns of a non-native EFL2teacher's Follow up moves as they emerge in an interactive lesson that has been

recorded for that very purpose (Appendices A and C).

For a comprehensive report on this mini-scale project, we propose to divide the

remainder into the following five sections: Section One provides a brief theoretical

background of the concept of teacher follow-up. Section Two focuses on the study at

issue, in terms of its aims, method, and analytical framework. Sections Three and Four,

in turn, analyze and comment on the functions and patterns of teacher responsive moves

as observed in the data collected. Section Five discusses the study results in relation to

the set research questions and the framework of analysis here selected.

1. THEORETICAL BACKGROUNDTeacher follow-ups are part of the exchange structure I (R/I) R (F) (F), where

the abbreviations stand for teacher Initiation, student Response, and teacher

Follow-up (Coulthard 1985:136). Described as "the lynchpins of a lesson" by

Brown and Wragg (1993: 34), they specifically refer to those "utterances which

are devoted explicitly to making remarks about what has gone before [in

student responses]" (Sinclair and Brazil 1982: 44).

The self-imposing, functional presence of the said acts in language teaching/learning

could not be over-emphasized (Tsui 1995: 42). For they allow the teacher to, inter alia,

introduce new information, alter the course of a given topic in progress, expand the

scope of a discussion onwards, and move the lesson back on track (Brown and Bragg,

Op.Cit). In so doing, they adequately respond to the legitimate, basic needs of the

learner for being told or shown by the teacher how s/he is learning thus, hopefully,

allowing early correction, stopping bad habit forming and isolating particular difficulties

(Sinclair and Brazil, Op.Cit.). Their realization, in Jarvis and Robinson (1997)'s view, is

thought to emanate from a conscious minute-by-minute decision-making on the part of

the teacher. Accordingly, each F-move or 'responsiveness"


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looks back to what the pupils have said, and forward to topic development or

topic shift (). Through these two [contingent and planning] types of

responsiveness, the teacher's ongoing awareness of the pupils' ZPD3 and her

support to their learning may be created (219).

According to Cullen (2002: 118), they thus fulfill two distinct, yet complementary

pedagogical roles evaluative and discoursal. In the former, as he explains,

support for learning is in the formal correction which the F-move offers. In

the latter, support for learning consists primarily in the teacher providing a

rich source of message-oriented target language input as s/he reformulates

and elaborates on the students' contributions, and derives further Initiating

moves from them (ibid: 122).

Taken together, these various standpoints and categorizations strongly hint at the

possibilities and limitations which surround teacher-whole class interactions, in general,

and the feedback-related discourse within them, in particular. The stakes of generating a

coherent classroom discourse out of a multi-pattern and function follow-up moves arehigh in ESL settings (Malouf 1995). They are potentially higher in EFL counterparts,

including the Sultanate of Oman, where TEYL teachers' skills in receiving learners'

contributions are reportedly not known much about and, therefore, need further probing.

The next Section will shed some preliminary light on a case in point at one of the

Sultanate's Basic Education (BE) schools. (For the sake of avoiding unnecessary

repetition, the term "F-move" is used interchangeably with "teacher responsiveness",

"follow-up moves", "follow-ups" and "feedback" in the pages to follow).

2. THE STUDY2.1 RESEARCH QUESTION:

The present study generally aimed at exploring aspects of oral teacher feedback as

occurring in a pre-intermediate level EFL lesson within the Omani context. It

specifically addressed the following questions:

Given young learners in a context officially adopting a multi-layered, task-based

approach to English language learning4,

a- What pedagogical functions can be identified in the ways teachers respond tostudent contributions in the ongoing interactions?

b- What discourse patterns can be identified in the said ways of responses?The underlying question was:

c- How effective are the kinds of teacher responsiveness on the overall discourseand potential support to learning?


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2.2 METHOD:

2.2.1 Participants

The investigation was conducted in late September 2006 at Sheikh Hamdan Al-Yousefi

Basic Education (BE) School, Oman. It involved a Grade Nine class with a total number

of 35 students. These were Omani nationals, aged between 13 and 14, and in their ninth

year of English instruction. They were considered to be at a pre-intermediate level ofEFL.

The teacher was an Omani national, a holder of an MA in ELT, and with a four-year

teaching experience. He took up an intensive training course in teaching English to

young learners. He was thought as being a highly effective and dedicated teacher.

2.2.2 Data Collection

The data that form the basis of the project are taken from a 45-minute lesson. The class

was selected out of mere convenience and the expectation for a fairly developed level at

communication skills in the students concerned.

2.2.3 Procedure

The class was audio-recorded with the tape-recorder kept on a table right in front of the

room and the microphone aimed at the teacher and learners. The recorded tape was then

transcribed and keyed for analysis. The teacher in question was not informed of the

specific object of the study in order to secure maximum levels of spontaneity and

authenticity of data. No claims are made as to the absolute generalizability of the

teacher responsiveness features illustrated here for all EFL practitioners in the Sultanate.

The patterns and functions referred to in Section Three below are it is strongly

believed very much in common with those pervading in standard BE institutions,

though.

2.3 DATA ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK

A relevant and appealing analytical framework for answering the research questions

mentioned above was the one devised by Jarvis and Robinson (1997). The said model,

as briefly summed up in Table 2 here below, was selected for two reasons: Firstly, it

TEACHER RESPONSIVE MOVES

I- FUNCTIONS:GROUP/CATEGORY PEDAGOGICAL FUNCTION EXAMPLES

A Show acceptance of pupils' utterances Accept; complete; talk now

B Model language Rephrase

C Give clues Clue

D Develop, elaborate, build-up the

discourse

Extend/guide; Extend/bridge


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E Clarify pupils'

understanding/task/purposes/principles

Check; set

F Disconfirm; reject; rebuke Ignore

II- PATTERNS:

i- FOCUS: "This involves the teacher overly focusing on a topic and making that focuspublic (and therefore potentially shareable)" (ibid, 219).

ii- BUILD: "The topic is then built, usually in interaction with the pupils. Builddepends onthe teacher's sense of "unfinished business" so that ideas are pursued and developed" (ibid,

220).

iii- SUMMARIZE: "Teachers may then summarize the point or principle which has been builtin the segment of the lesson" (ibid, 220).

Table 1: Main features of teacher responsive moves (Adapted from Jarvis and Robinson 1997).

offers detailed codes for identifying and by extension understanding the motives

behind the joint pedagogical and discoursal functions of teacher responsive moves.

Secondly, it does without all the paralinguistic features such as gestures and eye-gaze,

which allows us to pre-empt the possible criticisma valid one in the case of face-to-

face interactionthat only video recording can capture all the features of conversation(Francis and Hunston 1992: 124).

The Section above provided necessary background details about the study at issue in

terms of its research questions, methodology, and data analysis framework. The Section

to follow will now turn to the analytical description of the various R- Moves made bythe teacher here concerned. Due to obvious constraints with time and space, the Section

will limit itself to Exchanges Two through Four from the Lesson in question (See

Appendix D).

3. DATA ANALYSIS3.1 PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS:

The segment reproduced below is extracted from the second Exchange in a lesson that

has been audio-recorded in a Grade Nine class at a Basic Education school in Muscat

Region, Oman (See Appendices A and C for details). The sequences under study extend

from Points 16 through 175. The functions and patterns of the primarily responsive

moves in the teacher-participants talk are glossed down the left-hand and right-hand

sides of the Transcript, respectively (Transcription conventions appear in Appendix B).

Though not explicitly articulated, the teacher was


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FUNCTIONS LESSON TRANSCRIPT PATTERNS

E2 Set

E1 Check

A4 Confirm

E1 Check

F6 Doubt

A1 Accept

EXCHANGE TWO: VOCABULARY REVIEW

16-T: OK,

last time (0.3)

Where are you? Which Page now

you're come? Which page?

17- S1: Five18- S2: Me, teacher!

19- T: Page five

= How did you fini.. = How

did you get hangingout

20- Ss: Yes.

21- T: We took "hanging out"?

22- Ss: Yes!

23- T: [OK OK (..)

FOCUS. Teacher shift

to a new focus

Students' thinking

related to a concept

previously dealt with.

Unsuccessful attempt.

The teacher seems at

odds where to start!

BUILD. Student's

reply in 17 is taken up

FOCUS. Students

asked if they have

already dealt with a

vocabulary item.

False start. Non-

idiomatic English

BUILD. Teacher's

idea in 19 continued.

Students' confirmation

in 19 doubted.

Table 2: An extract from the tape-recorded Lesson (Appendix One) keyed and

analyzed according to the Jarvis-Robinson model.

actually engaging his class of 34 boys in a vocabulary revision in preparation for a

subsequent consolidation task in Exchange Three.

3.2 ANALYSIS

The Transcript of Exchanges 2 through 4 is composed of a total of 105 student turns and54 teacher interventions. With very few exceptions, the learners offers were incorrect,

ill-formed or simply expressed in the mother tongue, Arabic. In response, the teachers

follow-ups as further evidenced in the commentary notes in


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F. REJECT: At Point 25, the teacher sharply rejects the students definition of the phrase hang out at

24, which was given in Arabic.

E. CHECK: At 25, he picks up the students utterance at 24 and checks the students; understanding of

the vocabulary item by means of a question.

A. ACCEPT: At 27, he accepts what the student hassaid by reiterating the utterance (and adding the

words the house, by the way).

D. EXTENG/GUIDE + A. TALK NOW: At 27, he builds on the students response in 26 to extend/

guide the discourse. He also invites the class to join in the lesson andtalk.

A. ACCEPT: At 29, he explicitly shows his acceptance of the students offer at 28, by dint of the

customary signal Goodand of the reiteration of the answer given (Notice the error made, though).

F. DISMISS + E. SUMMARIZE + D. EXTEND/BRIDGE: At 31, he rejects the students offer at 30.

He, nonetheless, sums up the concept at issue before extending andguiding the discourse forward via

two focus questions.

Table3: Explanatory comments on the ways in which the teacher here concerned took

up his students' utterances.

Table 3 came in various ways as he apparently felt most convenient. Their individual

occurrences per patterns and functions were tabulated as follows:

TEACHER RESPONSIVE MOVES

TOTAL %

I- FUNCTIONS: 102 100

CATEGORY PEDAGOGICAL FUNCTION

42

12

1204

1202

23,52A Show acceptance of pupils' utterances

1 Accept

2 Encourage

4 Confirm

6 Talk now7 Complete

B Model language

1 Rephrase

04

04

03,92

C Give clues

2 Clue

3 Prompt

4 Reiterate

12

04

01

07

11,76

D Develop, elaborate, build-up the discourse

04 03,92


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3 Extend/guide

3 Extend/bridge 03

01

E Clarify pupils' understanding/ task/ purposes/principles

1 Check

2 Set

3 Purpose

4 Summarize

32

18

05

05

04

31,37

F Disconfirm; reject; rebuke

2 Reject

4 Dismiss

6 Doubt

08

04

02

02

07,84

II- PATTERNS: 40 28,16

iv- Focusv- Buildvi- Summarize

1224

04

Table 4: Totals of teacher Follow-ups per Patterns and Functions (Adapted from Jarvis

and Robinson [1997])

Interpretation of the above F-move choices is turned to in the next Section.

4. DATA INTERPRETATIONVaried as they were, the teacher-participant's F-moves tended, nonetheless, to converge

towards the performance of three fundamental roles pedagogical, evaluative, and

discoursal. Details about each of these roles are presented in the following sub-sections.

4.1 PEDAGOGICAL ROLES:

From a pedagogical perspective, the responsiveness moves were resorted to help

introduce, use and practise some lexical and syntactic aspects of the target language

which had already been selected by teaching materials designers for learners at Grade

Nine classes (The Simple Past Tense plus the phrasal verbs hang outandchill out, in our

case).

Equally, the said moves sought to pave the way for a greater involvement on the part of

the students in the course of the Lesson. This was attempted by getting them, amongst

others, to offer suggestions (Points 46; 51-62), to tell about personal experiences (The

Al-Bahjat sequence at Points 73-86), and to react either verbally or non-verbally to


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peers contributions (at point 63; 73 and 82). The segment here below illustrates the

latter points:

45- T: Good [writes on the board] "He's chilling in or out" (0.5) [to one of the

students]And what about you, good-looking youngman, where do you

hang out? where do you hang out? (.) Ehm?

46- S: beach

47- T: beach? =Finished the beach48- S: Now?

49- T: Finished the beach (0.1) In the city inside the city you can make

50- S1: [ building buildings

51- S: skating

52- T: skating

53- S2: walking

54- T: walking

55- S: play football [unclear]

56-T: playing football

57- S4: Drive bicycle

58- S5: play tennis59- S6: listening to music

60-S7: watching snooker

61- S8: go to the stadium

62-S7: I go to see er..er..[Unclear] the national football team

63- S8: a team? Which team?

64- S7:Oman's.

65-T: Good!

66- S9: I go to buy er.. a present

67- S10: [I go to visit my parents

68-T: [No that's not hanging out

69- S: [unclear]

70-T: No, that's not you're (.) That's not hanging out (0.1) Hanging out means

with your friends= you go about aimlessly. Where wouldyou hang out?

71- Ss: [unclear]

72-T: Okay

73- S2: = I go to Bahjat

74-T: Bahjat = what do you do at Bahjat

75- S2: I go to see er..

76- S3: [to fight with boys

77-T: to see the cinema?

78- S4: [ to smoke hookah79- S2: sorry?

80- T: Nothing else (.) Only to see the cinema?

81-S2: Yeah

82-Ss:[ quiet laughter]

83-T: Noflir

ting with girls at all?

84- Ss: Sometimes!

85 S2: [yea

86-Ss: [Sometimes

4.2 EVALUATIVE ROLE:

In parallel with the objectives pointed out previously was the evaluative role so much

salient across Exchanges Two through Four. As illustrated in the extract below, the


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23- T: What is "hanging out"? (0.2) What is "to hang out"? Yes?

24- S: It means to spend the time outside home

25- T: English (0.1) Are you inside your house or outside your house?

26- S: Outside

27- T: Outside house = with whom

28- S: With my friends

29- T: Good = with your friends30- S: With my family

31- T: Not your family. It's always you're with your friends outside home when

you have free time you have free time. The question is where do you hang

out? (.) Where do you like to hang out?

follow-ups, expounded here by a show of acceptance (Point 29) or, adversely, by

outright rejection (Point 31), rather focused on form correctness be it lexical or

syntactic. They were meant, in the first place, to confirm, disconfirm and modify the

interlanguage rules which they had formed about the target language system (Chaudron

1988: 133; quoted in Cullen 2002:110).

Interestingly, the statistics provided in Table Four show a neatly low number of form-

focused F-moves (Reject: 4, Dismiss: 2, Rephrase: 4). In contrast, the totals of F-moves

of Types A, C and D clearly demonstrate the teacher-participants tolerance towards

learners non-target-like utterances as possible. Coming from a non-native practitioner

in an EFL educational context where focus-on-forms attitudes are notoriously

preponderant, this is quite exceptional (see Nunan and Lamb 1996 for a dissimilar

account).

4.3 DISCOURSAL ROLE:

The preoccupation with the lexico-grammatical correctness of student utterances was

intertwined with discourse-oriented concerns. The purpose this time was to sustain and

develop the interaction between the teacher and student interlocutors and attempt in

the process at making the meaning publicly emanating from it fully shareable among

the class members at large (Jarvis and Robinson 1997: 220; Cullen 2002: 120).

As could be evident in the Exchanges at study, the latter type of role was worked at by

dint of various channels. These namely include:

a- The Focus,Build, andSummarizepattern,b-

The Functions of Types A, C, and D.c- The input modification (i.e., the linguistic simplification of teacher talk), and

d- The interaction modifications or ways in which teachers alter the patterns ofclassroom discourse to help students understand (Lynch 1996: 44; Tsui 1995; 55).

5. DISCUSSION

The discussion of the teacher-participant's F-moves will address the two

research questions which guided the study (see Subsection 2.1).


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Insofar as the first Question is concerned, the data obtained tend to reveal the

presence of a rich variety of Function-oriented, verbal feedback moves. This

finding is hardly surprising or unusual given the predominantly oral character

of interactions at this stage of the Lesson. It does, however, support earlier

conclusions about the versality of this aspect of teacher behavior. The latter's

characterization as a important agent for sequencing and structuring a lesson

(Brown and Wragg 1993: 22) is well-founded in this regard.

The above remarks, however, should in no way blur the intrinsic limitations of

the F-moves as to their intended pedagogical effects. The failure of generating

reasonably well-formed, communicative stretches of spoken discourse on the

part of the students stands out as one of the most pertinent tokens, in this

respect. This finding sharply contrasts with the virtually native-like fluency

which learners seem to prove of in other educational settings (see, for instance,

the data collected in Cullen 2002; Jarvis and Robinson 1997). The reasons

behind such a state of affairs are numerous. But, they could be traceable in the

teacher's rather non-standard language proficiency level as well as the

conspicuous deficiencies relating to his feedback provision techniques. This

fairly intersects with findings which denounce the inconsistency, ambiguity,and imprecision within teacher responsiveness moves (Allwright 1975;

Fanselow 1975; Slimani 1989; cited in Panova and Lyster 2002: 574-5).

Concerning the second research question, the Exchanges feedback patterns

exhibit two fundamental characteristics:

a- The considerable involvement on the part of the teacher-participant inpursuing and developing the ideas which keep springing out of the

ongoing interactions, and

b- The repeated disruption of the flow of ideas because of the highfrequency of Focus, Build, and Summarize acts.

The latter feature casts serious doubts as to the effect of the feedback moves on

the overall quality of discourse and on the potential support to learning. The

relative smoothness in teacher-student talk reported, for instance, in Sinclair

and Coulthard (1975), Jarvis and Robinson (1997), and Cullen (2002) is

strikingly alien to the present Lesson snapshots. Rather, The prevalence of little

meaningful communication, which tangibly touches on a sense of "time-

passing" (Dinsmore 1985), tends to be the case in our data. Should they be

checked out against the tenets and procedures of the methodology and

approach officially en vigueur at BE institutions, the interactions at issue wouldreveal little or no correspondence to TBLT in its either strong or weak forms

(Willis 1996; Skehan 1998). Their "[resemblance] to traditional patterns of

classroom interaction rather than genuine interaction" (Nunan 1987: 137)

appears much more evident, in fact. In this sense, their efficacy to pupils'

learning as well as compatibility with recent theories of EFL/ESL language

instruction remains highly questionable.

The foregoing comments bring the issue of effectiveness of verbal teacher

responsiveness on the overall classroom discourse and on potential learning, which was

posed in the third research question, centrestage. The analysis, and hearing, of theExchanges under study yield no obviously definite answer. The correlation remains hard

to establish. Astonishingly enough, the sequences seem an almost ideal example of what

a discoursally ambivalent learning environment may mean. This conclusion is, more or


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less, in line with similar ones in recent field studies, where the ways in which teachers,

through their choice of language, construct learner participation in face-to-face

classroom communication are fraught with considerable obstruction (Walsh 2002: 3).

Facilitation and promotion of learner talk via reformulation, clarification checks,

direct error correction, content feedback, scaffolding, and voluntary adoption of a "back-

seat" attitude as the discourse progresses are outweighed by too many instances of

teacher interruptions thus, obstructing smooth flowing of exchanges as well as

learning potential (see Walsh, Op.Cit., for implications for teacher education andresearch).

The above findings and insights about spoken teacher responsiveness were made

available with exclusive reference to the Jarvis-Robinson typology. As such, they are

representative rather than comprehensive. Their elevation to a fuller, much more

illuminating account for the features of this highly complex communication aspect

would undoubtedly be possible provided that the current deficiencies in the said

framework were eradicated. As personally experienced, these mainly concern the

following:

The overt tendency to assign every feedback move, whatever it may turn to be,with a priori, pre-ordained single function. A one-to-one correspondence

between utterance and function is simply not possible to establish in all cases

(Cook 1989; McCarthy 1991). The subjectivity and, therefore, the risk of unaccountability, when labeling and

sorting out teacher moves. Categories such as "Reject" and "Dismiss", for

instance, have proved quite confusing.

The absence of a clear-cut boundary between types of move in teacher talk as iscommonly identified in discourse analysis literature. As apparently conceived

of, the differences between teacher Initiation and Feedback are not relevant

here. Indeed, all teacher utterances are to be viewed as types of responsiveness

because of the concepts of contingency and planning (Jarvis and Robinson,

Op.Cit.: 219).

The reliance on what is only observable in teacher behaviour whilst taking upstudents' contributions. Conceptualization of additional sub-categories to the

taxonomy in order to account for inner teacher beliefs, conceptions and attitudes

regarding feedback provision will not be an extravagance in this case.

6. CONCLUSIONThis paper has critically described the verbal feedback practices of an in-service Omani

EFL practitioner in the context of a small action-research project and based on the Jarvis

and Robinson's 1997 model for analyzing teacher responsiveness. The analysis of the

patterns and functions of such an aspect of classroom talk-in-interaction has revealed the

major points here below:

The high-ranking position of verbal teacher responsiveness as a factor inbuilding up in-class interaction patterns and language learning, in thelong run.


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The complexities inherent in the strategies of providing such a feedbackat a moment-by-moment basis.

The lack of a firm command of the techniques and ways in respondingadequately to learner contributions and initiatives.

The study, however limited in scope, is hoped to contribute to an emerging

body of research that examines the complex ways in which student discoursaloffers and teacher responsiveness interact in English Language Teaching

contexts. Though the feedback strategies of the teacher in this study cannot, in

any ways, be assumed to echo those of ELT colleagues in other educational

settings, the paper ushers to possibilities for future research investigations that

will touch further onto the numerous intricacies that lie behind the deployment

of spoken feedback strategies.

Stubbs (1983: 43)'s suggestion

to study how the script [for a classroom dialogue] is constructed, and

how general taken-for-granted stereotypes of teacher and pupil

behaviour are related to the detailed utterance-by-utteranceorganization of classroom discourse

will surely provide a useful starting point to this end.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Thanks to Mr. Saeed Al-Saadi and all the students in Grade Nine at Sheikh Hamdan bin

Khamis Al-Yousefi School.

I wish to make it clear that the comments on the Lesson data here provided are

in no way an attack on the teaching style of the teacher concerned or the

learning proficiency of his students. Quite on the contrary.

7. END NOTES1- Vygotsky's philosophy rests on the notion of language acquisition taking place in

'social space' rather than in the enclosed and isolated mind of the individual. See

Mercer (1994) for a detailed discussion on Neo-Vygotskian theory and classroom

education.

2- Hall and Walsh (2002) draw a distinction between three types of languageclassrooms: "first language classrooms; second language classrooms, which

include contexts in which the language being learned in the classroom is also the

language of the community; andforeign language classrooms. Foreign languagelearning contexts are those in which exposure to and opportunities for target


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language interaction are restricted for the most part to the language classroom"

(186).

3- L.S. Vygotsky (1978) defines ZPD or Zone of Proximal Development asthe distance between the actual development level as determined by

independent problem solving and the level of potential development

as determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in

collaboration with more capable peers (86).

4- English for Me 9A. Teacher's Book(2005-6: vii)

8. REFERENCESAllen, D. (1996) (Ed.), Entry Points. Papers from a Symposium of the

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Brown G. and E.C. Wragg (1993), Questioning in the Secondary School,

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Burt, M. and H. Dulay (1975) (Eds.), New Directions in Second Language

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Coulthard, M. (1977/1985), An Introduction to Discourse Analysis. 2nd Edn,

Harlow: Longman Group UK Limited.

Coulthard, M. (1992) (ed.), Advances in Spoken Discourse Analysis, London:

Routledge.


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Cullen, R. (2002), "Supportive teacher talk: The importance of the F-move",

English Language Teaching Journal 52, 2: 117-27.

Demo, D.A (2001), "Discourse analysis for language teachers", [1 April, 2002]

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9. APPENDICESAppendix A: Transcription System


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The transcription system is adapted from various sources, including, most notably,

Johnstone (2002), Hutchby and Wooffitt (1998: vi-vii) and Jarvis and Robinson (1997).

N.B: The Lesson Exchanges under study were recorded under normal classroom

conditions with no specialist equipment. Occasional unintelligibility of the recording is

due to background noise, simultaneous speech and other types of interference.

Unintelligible parts of the transcripts are marked indistinct. Language has not been

corrected so as to preserve authenticity of data.

Symbol/Notation Glossary Illustration

T

S

S1: S2: etc,

Ss

[

=

(( ))

(.)

(4)

?

!

T organisesgroups

:

Italics

Superscript

*

.

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Documents

Aspects of verbal classroom discourse= An exploatory investigation into teacher follow-up moves.pdf