Last updated: October 05, 2010
SCS2 Coding Scheme Manual
Centre for Research in Pedagogy and Practice
National Institute of Education, Singapore
The Singapore Coding Scheme 2 (SCS2) has been adapted and redeveloped based on the
Singapore Coding Scheme for classroom knowledge discourse (Luke, Freebody, Cazden, &
Lin, 2005) through a series of discussions among PIs, Co-PIs, collaborators, research
associates and research assistants on the Core 2 project lead by Prof. David Hogan. The
coding scheme was tested, adjusted, and finalised collaboratively by the Core 2 team as part
of the ongoing process of data collection. The Core 2 project team held several meetings for
more than a year to look over the coding scheme described above and to consider how this
might be helpful for understanding the teachers’ pedagogical and instructional practices, the
nature of intellectual development and knowledge work in Singapore classrooms, and the
impact of various educational reforms on day-to-day classroom work and student learning.
Framing Pedagogy
Alexander
Galton
Cohen and Ball
The conception of pedagogy developed by Cohen, Ball and Raudenbush a decade ago at the
University of Michigan focuses on how effectively and expertly teachers allocate and use
instructional resources, broadly defined, in interactions within the classroom.
What we call teaching in common parlance is not what teachers do and say and
think, which is what many researchers have studied and many innovators have
tried to change… What we often mistakenly refer to as the practice of teaching
is a collection of practices, including pedagogy, learning practices (individual
and collective), the design of instruction, and the management of instructional
organization. (Cohen & Ball, 2000, p. 5)1
1
See also Cohen & Ball (2001a, 2001b, 2003, 2006).
SCS2 Coding Scheme Manual
Cohen, Raudenbush and Ball (2000) explicate this conception of pedagogy further:
Although many people think of instruction as what teachers do, it consists of
interactions among teachers, students and content, in environments. The
interactions occur in such varied settings as distance learning, small groups in
classrooms, informal groups, tutorials, and large lectures. Instruction is not
created by teachers alone, or students, or content, but in their interactions.
“Interaction” does not refer to a particular form of discourse but to the connected
work of teachers and students on content, in environments
The interactions extend through time. Although the figure seems static, we mean
it to represent repeated interactions over minutes, days, weeks, and months.
Instruction evolves as tasks develop and lead to others, as students’ engagement
and understanding waxes and wanes, and as instructional organization changes.
Instruction is a stream, not an event. That stream flows in instructional
environments and draws on its elements, including other teachers and students,
school leaders, parents, professions, local districts, state agencies, test and text
publishers, and more. (Cohen, Raudenbush and Ball, 2000: 10).
From this perspective then
…what we casually call teaching is not what teachers do and say and think,
which is what many researchers have studied and many innovators have tried to
change. Teaching is what teachers do, say, and think with learners, concerning
content, in a particular organization of instruction, in environments, over time.
What we often mistakenly refer to as the practice of teaching is a collection of
practices, including pedagogy, learning, instructional design, and managing
instructional organization. There are more instructional practitioners than
teachers, and more practices than pedagogy. Moreover, the environments in
which teaching and learning are situated are not simply outside the classroom,
but often are implicated in teachers’ and students’ interactions. (Cohen,
Raudenbush and Ball, 2000: 12). (Italics added)
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SCS2 Coding Scheme Manual
Lefstein
Hogan
Framing SCS_ 1.
In explaining the original Singapore Coding Scheme, Alan Luke emphasized that the
formulation of effective school improvement strategies is substantially enhanced by a
detailed empirical understanding of the character and logic of classroom processes and
interactions:
To assume that outcomes measures are the principle and sole indicators of
institutional, system and governmental intervention is to fail to grasp the
simple and obvious matter that what teachers and students ‘do’ in
classrooms is not simply a means, a taken for granted ‘process’ in the road
to better test scores, but is at the heart of the educational enterprise. Given
the sheer volume of concentrated time that students spend in classrooms
with teachers, a case could be made that classroom practices – whether
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construed of in behaviourist, cognitivist or sociocultural terms – actually
matter as educative phenomena in themselves. That is, that educational
practices and classroom pedagogy are, among other things, educational
experiences that can be documented, weighed, interpreted, and evaluated,
qualitatively and quantitatively, nominally and ordinally.
It is in everyday “mediations” (Cole & Griffin, 1990), the face-to-face
modulations, changes, contours at work in classrooms – all educational
studies and disciplinary approaches tell us – that the ‘differences that make a
difference’ in performance, achievement, outcomes and consequences,
however construed, are shaped. Teachers work with students in classrooms
using language and discourse, symbols and technologies to shape their
capacities in making and developing cognitive artefacts, written, spoken and
intellectual products. They do so in culturally and institutionally variable
ways, shaping through social and linguistic interaction students’ senses of
and capacities with knowledge and discipline, skill and competence, attitude
and belief.
This shaping is not by any stretch of the educational imagination or
empirical data, determinate, linear and causal – but it is clear that teachers
and students interactional work in the classroom is a principal and primary
medium whereby students’ knowledges and skills, identities and practices
are shaped. Tests and curriculum documents may be powerful factors in
influencing how this shaping occurs. These other “message systems”
(Bernstein, 1991) may lead or pull pedagogy in particular ways, particular
intellectual and ideological directions – but ultimately they are brought to
ground, in Cole and Griffin’s (1986) words “remediated” into the
“curriculum-in-use” (Luke, DeCastell & Luke, 1983; Pinar, 2000) in
classrooms. Or, to put a somewhat more instrumentalist take on it: our view
is that the social and cognitive organization of classroom teaching and
learning by students and teachers – not curriculum syllabus writing or
standardized testing – is the core business of schools and can make both
lived and measurable differences in discourses, practices and forms of life
for learners.
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Luke then went on to identify the two broad traditions for the analysis of classroom
interaction.
1. The first tradition is based on sociolinguistics and ethnography of
communication, pragmatics and discourse analysis (for reviews, see Cazden,
2001; Westgate & Edwards, 1997; Gee & Greene, 1996). As such, it has a
strong descriptive focus on language and interaction.
2. The second tradition emerges from the teaching and school reform
literature (e.g., Flanders, 1970; Calfee, 1981; Newmann et al., 1996),
drawing on normative models from instructional psychology, cognitive
theory and applied classroom research. The latter has a strong normative
bias towards the identification and documentation of preferred patterns of
teacher/student interaction, cognitive operations, behaviour and so forth. It
tends to take language and discourse as more of a transparent rather than
constitutive phenomenon.
He then went on to explain how these traditions influenced the development
of the Singapore Coding Scheme.
1. Sociolinguistics and ethnography of communication, pragmatics and
discourse analysis. From Functions of Language in the Classroom
(Cazden, Johns & Hymes, 1972) and Towards and Analysis of Discourse
(Sinclair & Coulthard, 1970), educational research has had an increasing
focus on microanalytic analyses of the classroom – that is on student and
teacher interaction analytically broken down into specific turns, moves and
acts. The principal theoretical bases of this work were, variously, the
ethnography of communications and interactional sociolinguistics and
symbolic interactionism proposed by Hymes, Gumperz and colleagues in
the 1970s. The assumption of this work is that teacher/pupil face-to-face
interaction is cultural and linguistic work, where participants use language
and discourse to make sense through cultural practices, to exchange and
build meanings, and to engage in complex social and cultural interactions.
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These in turn, are taken to have differential effects on learning and
cognition, social relations and identity, language development, behavioural
skill acquisition and, generally, educational achievement.
The particular methodological tools for looking at classroom interaction in
this tradition have varied, reflecting not only diverse disciplinary
approaches, but as well debating the need for a priori observational
categories. Approaches therefore range from those that stress approach and
epistemic standpoint of the observer rather than operant categories (e.g.,
ethnomethodology, ethnography (Mehan, 1972; McDermott, 19xx)), to
those that begin by privilege specific analytic categories and units of
analysis (e.g., systemic functional linguistics, speech act analysis, (Sinclair
& Coulthard, 1968; Eggins & Slade, 1999)). The strongest early prototype
of the analytic approach is the programmatic agenda for the analysis of
classroom discourse proposed by Sinclair and Coulthard (1968), where they
model the parsing of lessons into phases, specific moves and turns. They,
Mehan (1968), Cazden (2002) and others place a strong analytic focus on
the exchange structures whereby teachers and students take ‘turns’ in
classroom talk.
Accordingly, classroom discourse research differs by the distinctive units of
analysis. These range from larger attempts to describe discourse moves as
social and linguistic actions (e.g., turn, move, exchange, speech act) to those
that begin a priori from a particular linguistic unit of analysis below the
level of the turn (e.g., clause, lexis, stress/intonation). Further to this, there
are more open ended approaches to the selection of units of analysis (e.g.,
interactional sociolinguistics, critical discourse analysis) that may draw
eclectically upon a range of levels and units for analysis depending upon the
features of the classroom exchange and the specific research questions at
issue (e.g., Gee, 2001).
Taken together, the last thirty years of work on discourse analysis in
classrooms have yielded substantial understandings on the practices and
procedures of classroom talk, on discipline and field specific techniques that
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teachers use, and on typical patterns of classroom talk. In sum, these various
approaches to discourse analysis in and of themselves tend to be descriptive.
They capture sense-making procedures, interactional and linguistic patterns
of exchange and discourse use – then enabling the grounds for close
descriptions of the classroom social order, or on the development of
particular linguistic and communicative patterns, competences and skills
among student cohorts. However, to make claims about educational
practice, reform and innovation – to shift from microanalysis to claims
about what ‘ought’ to occur interactionally, requires a linkage with other
disciplinary analyses.
To illustrate: much of the American work in interactional sociolinguistics of
the last two decades has focused on issues of language use, identity and
social relations between minority students in multicultural classrooms in the
US (e.g., Guiterrez, Larson, 1996). But to identify the implications of these
patterns, many analysts have turned to sociocultural psychology and activity
theory as a template for looking at classroom discourse (e.g., Wells, 2001).
By defining the interactional arena of the classroom as a zone of proximal
development (Cole & Griffin, 19xx; Moll, 199x), and seeing discourse
relations as variable pedagogic “scaffolds” (Cazden, 2001), claims can be
made about what kinds of inter-psychological relations appear to be
generating intra-psychological development, abstract and complex thinking
and so forth. To take another example, ‘critical’ approaches to discourse
analysis study speaking rights, differential power relations, the construction
of ideology and social identity (e.g., Luke, 1997). Yet they rely upon a
range of other theorizations of education to make normative claims, ranging
from critical social theory to curriculum theory.
In sum, classroom discourse analysis does not refer to a single disciplinary
or methodological tradition but rather a broad family of techniques and
theories. Its strength is in the provision of detailed micro-analytic
descriptions and analysis of everyday life in classrooms. These descriptions
can be linked to normative educational and disciplinary theories to critique
classroom interaction and to propose educationally viable alternatives. In
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instances, classroom discourse analysis leads to claims about paradigmatic
types of discourse that are specific to subjects, fields or institutions that have
potentially major impacts on how fields conceive and deal with knowledge
and interaction (see, for example, prototypical work by Lemke, 1986;
Michaels, 19xx on science classrooms). At the same time, classroom
discourse analysis has proven difficult to translate into large scale change in
classroom talk and practice. This is in part because of their methodological
limitations in the production of generalizable findings, sample sizes tend to
be small. It is also in part because of the difficulty of assembling a
prescriptive meta-language for talking about classrooms and classroom talk
that is accessible and useful for teachers (for notable exceptions, see
Nystrand, 2000; Gutierrez, et al. 199x).
2. The second tradition in the analysis of classroom discourse has its basis
in instructional psychology and, since the late 1980s, in the school reform
and improvement literature. Over forty years ago, Flanders (1970) and
colleagues developed systematic matrices for the observation and coding of
classroom practice. Bringing together behaviourist and interactionist
research traditions, this work looked at variable factors that influenced
student performance, including time on task, types of talk, speakers and
exchanges, silence, teacher question type and level, behaviour management
incidents and classroom control techniques. This prototypical work had a
powerful influence on teacher education, providing the foundations of the
“microteaching” models currently used and subsequent interactionist
analyses of teaching in a range of disciplinary fields, leading to the current
work in videography (e.g., Stigler, Goldman). It also provided the platform
for a host of ‘subject-specific’ observational scales. For example, Calfee and
colleagues (1980) developed matrices for the observation of reading lessons.
These included observation for practices that were said to improve reading
comprehension (e.g., explicit attention to vocabulary) and overall
educational achievement (e.g., time on task).
This tradition differs from the discourse analysis tradition in several
respects. First, it does not take language or discourse as its principal
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methodological unit of analysis – coders make appraisals of overall
behavioural patterns (e.g., time on task, teacher talk, student talk, silence,
disruptive behaviour, lower and higher order questions). Accordingly, these
systems require a priori definitions of classroom phenomena – that is, that
these patterns of classroom behaviour or interaction be defined and
exemplified prior to the actual classroom observation and analysis. This
means that the analysis is theoretically framed prior to the classroom work
through the identification, definition and development of rubrics for
identifying the phenomena in question – and that much of the analysis is
done synchronically in the classroom by trained observers (or via post hoc
video analysis). Relatedly, the phenomena that are coded for often are
normatively preferred patterns (e.g., vocabulary knowledge, higher order
thinking) that researchers hypothesise have effects on learning, skill and
knowledge acquisition, achievement and so forth.
In summary, there are obvious challenges raised by both traditions of
classroom interaction analysis. The strengths of the classroom discourse
analysis tradition is its micro-analytic focus, its capacity to describe in detail
linguistic, pragmatic and interactional moves made by teachers and students.
Yet historically it has had limitations of scale and scope, tending to focus on
small corpi of classroom lessons, and to yield rich, principally qualitative
descriptions. Its strength, a strong descriptive, ‘bottom-up’ descriptive
focus, makes it difficult to extrapolate the educational value of such patterns
and differences without recourse to other pedagogic and normative
theoretical models (e.g., models of mind, knowledge, behaviour, learning,
power, identity). Social and cultural normativity in discourse analysis is, of
course, a central issue raised by several scholars working in the Habemasian
tradition (Wodak, 2000; Young, 1996) – who argue that the stating of
“counterfactual ideals” (e.g., the ideal speech situation, symmetrical
speaking rights, sincerity) are necessary to translate analysis into revision of
practice.
By contrast, the classroom research approaches to coding are explicitly
normative. First, their more realist, rather than discourse constructive
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approach to classrooms yields more general descriptions of patterns of
classroom practice. Methodologically, it also is amenable to quantitative
description of larger corpi of classroom lessons, bearing in mind the training
required to address questions of the stability of the scales and the reliability
of coders. Finally, many of the categories of, for example the Newmann and
Queensland studies are based on normative assumptions about ‘what works’
in classrooms. Given the empirical demonstration of their efficacy at
producing better student artifacts and achievement, however construed, they
are more readily translatable into ‘should’ and ‘ought’ claims for teachers,
professional development and school improvement. This also makes this
coding approach more elastic and flexible in coverage of a range of
instructional, curricular and pedagogic concerns.
This said, the classroom coding approach potentially lacks the analytic
precision and replicability of the classroom discourse model, depending
upon high inference judgments by coders about the observability of
knowledge and cognition. Further, the latter model’s choice of coding
categories inevitably commits the analysis a priori into recognition and
representation of a particular model of teaching and learning that makes
broad assumptions about the normative purposes of pedagogy, the nature of
knowledge and what is observable. In what follows, we propose an
alternative approach which attempts to reframe both techniques and
approaches of both traditions using curriculum theory and the sociology of
knowledge.
Broadly speaking, the approach we have taken to the development of the SCS_2 draws
principally on the second tradition of classroom research. This is reflected in our reliance on a
theoretically framed coding scheme that directs coder attention to prescribed features of
classroom practice and interaction. We have done so for a variety of methodological reasons,
including the requirement that we needed to give ourselves the capacity to generate
representative system-wide data on classroom processes and interactions that we could
compare across classrooms, schools and time. This is simply not possible using a bottom up
approach to theory development and large sample sizes. But we have also gone some way to
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accommodate the classroom discourse tradition in that our use of Studio-Code will allow for a
more iterative interaction between the coder and the classroom data captured by the videos
and tape recordings of classroom interactions.
One of the important strengths of SCS_1 was its focus on knowledge work in the
classroom. SCS_2 attempts to expand and build on this focus. In its analysis of
classroom knowledge work, SCS_1 relied heavily on Basil Bernstein’s distinction
between the classification and framing of knowledge. Luke explains:
… one of the principal concerns we have in evaluating the efficacy of
reform and policy to date is to ask: What kinds of knowledge is being
transmitted, constructed and produced? And, further: What kinds of agency
and power with knowledge are students developing in classrooms?
What is interesting is that neither of the aforementioned traditions makes a
strong case about schooling and classrooms as sites for the shaping of
epistemology and knowledge. Without this theoretical work, the description
of classroom practice risks becoming a search, however unintentional, for a
universal pedagogy, whether termed ‘authentic’ or ‘productive’. With the
exception of recent work on the technical discourses of science … there is a
tendency to take thinking and cognition as generic phenomenon, rather than
specific to, constructive of, or implicated in specific fields of knowledge.
Further, the coding schemes of the school reform movement tend to be
content neutral in their composition (Nystrand, 2002). Accordingly, the
Singapore scheme sets out to address key questions about the social and
cultural formation of knowledge, epistemological stance, and about the
scaffolded production and manipulation of knowledge artifacts.
As part of the multilevel research design, Newmann (1996) and Queensland
(2002) studies argue that the data allows them to make claims about the
student cohort specific effectiveness of particular pedagogic strategies.
However, neither makes strong claims about the discipline/knowledge/field
specificity of pedagogy. Regardless of which model of culture, cognition
and subjectivity one subscribes to – it is difficult to theorise culture, context
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or subjective difference without having identified what actual knowledge or
epistemological contingencies are at work in the classroom. That is, how
can we say that teaching is context or cohort or culture specific, without
having identified how it may be knowledge and epistemology specific?
These matters of what counts as knowledge, information, discourse, data –
the perennial questions of curriculum theory and the sociology of
knowledge – are particularly important if we set out to examine the effects
of reforms like Thinking Schools Learning Nation. For these are explicit
responses to new economies, knowledge formations, and technological
media of communication.
The Singapore Coding Scheme reframes the problem of the coding of
classroom interaction as a curriculum question – as one of the classification
and framing of knowledge. The intention is to begin from but deliberately
expand Bernstein’s original framework, augmenting it with premises from
sociocultural and cognitive psychology. We begin from four broad
premises:

That knowledge is the architectonic principle in debates around
residual and emergent cultures, economies, new work orders and
new technologies;

That the representation of knowledge, unlike ‘cognition’ is visible,
traceable and documentable in the observation of classrooms via a
focus on classroom discourse, behaviour and textual artifacts;

That disciplines, fields, discourses – forms of life – have
characteristic structures, logics and syntaxes of knowledge, and
accompanying pedagogic sequences, practices and ‘moves’;

That pedagogy comprises of a series of orchestrated interactional
moves – what we here describe as “weaves” - between kinds and
levels of knowledge, discourse, fields, and frames of reference.
The Singaporean Coding Scheme attempted to address these core research questions. Each of
the coding items was designed to address one or more of the following research questions:
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
Which knowledge is selected? How is it classified?

By whom?

From what authoritative media, sources and disciplinary traditions?

In what kinds of mediating social and physical environments?

Framed in which sequence of interactional phases or activity
structures?

Through what kinds of discourse and language, exchange and talk?

Through what kinds and levels of technicality and conceptual
complexity?

Around and through which textual and semiotic tools and artifacts?

To what stated intellectual purposes and institutional ends?

With which connections and moves to other knowledges, worlds and
discourses?
To do so, we draw upon a range of sources. The curriculum theory of Basil
Bernstein (1996) defines “pedagogic discourse” on two basic axes: that of
“classification” and “framing”. Classification typically is used to refer to the
degree to which curricular knowledge is “strongly” or “weakly” classified,
that is, how strongly it adheres to well defined, canonical boundaries,
thresholds and strict disciplinary or discourse prototypes and procedures.
Less overtly disciplinary work which is organized around a particular task,
project or activity rather than field/discipline are examples of “weak
classification”. Framing generally refers to the degree to which the social
interaction is strongly and overtly structured around traditional authority
relations. Less traditional, more open classroom environments which
ostensibly create opportunities for student agency and choice are typically
construed as “weak framing”.
Bernstein’s model as useful in describing the multiple and complex
relationships between knowledge and its interactional, discursive framing,
between what Vygotsky (1972) refers to as the “intrapsychological” domain
of complex, scientific thought and the “interpsychological” domain of social
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and discourse relationships between human subjects. However we use
Bernstein as a point of depature, not accepting apriori his analytic moves or
claims about how particular combinations of classification and framing have
either cognitive, social or linguistic effects and consequences. For example,
we do not presuppose that the configurations of “child-centred” versus
“subject-centred” or “teacher-centred” pedagogy will have the same
configurations or effects that Bernstein theorized. These we treat as
empirical questions for subsequent analysis and theoretical questions that
may require other models of curriculum and pedagogy, discourse and
interaction to solve. Further, the coding scheme features items which
deliberately aim to test new hypotheses about teaching and learning. In what
follows, we first elaborate the concept of classification, bringing different
theories of knowledge, discipline and field into play. Second, we expand the
concept of framing to describe mediating interactional structures around
student texts and artifacts.
On classification
The Singapore coding scheme moves away from an attempt to code “higher
order thinking”. In the Queensland study, “higher order thinking” proved to
be an extremely high inference as an observational construct. In that study,
coders offered a holistic ranking of classrooms with 30 plus students over a
single lesson of 30-50 minutes duration. To do so, they had to ‘infer’
whether and to what extent the student cohort was engaged in ‘higher order
thinking’, a educational phenomena where there is little consensus on
definition, let alone observation as an empirical phenomena.
By adoption a focus on knowledge and curriculum, the Singapore model
codes the representation and structuring of knowledge. That is, the focus is
on how teachers and curriculum materials ‘present’ knowledge. Trained
observers with disciplinary knowledge of the syllabus, then observe and rate
the knowledge represented. Assessment of matters of student cognition and
‘uptake’ are left to the other ‘panels’ of the core program, which survey
students’ views on the teaching and learning, curriculum, work requirements
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(panel 2) , their performance on conventional assessment measures (panel
1), and their performance on the very artifacts constructed in the lessons in
questions (panel 5).
In this way, the Singapore scheme examines the discourse representations of
knowledge (print, oral, visual) in the units, lessons and phases in question.
The various scales are based on different models of knowledge and
intellectual work. These include measures of epistemological sources of
knowledge, disciplinarity, depth of disciplinary concepts, taxonomic levels
of knowledge, technical metalanguage, knowledge reproduction and
construction, and levels of critique.
Bernstein’s concept of classification leaves untouched fundamental debates
on the nature of knowledge, on the emergent issues around what might
count as discipline and discourse, on discipline specific epistemologies, and
how these might connect or presage discipline specific pedagogical
sequences (e.g., propositional arraying of moves, turns and phases). The
original idea was that pedagogy could be marked out on a binary continuum
from weak to strong framing, that school knowledge is either characterized
by disciplinary or sub-disciplinarily partitioned knowledge, cordoned off by
field and convention, or a less overtly boundaried knowledge. Such debates
go back to the binaries between discipline and ‘integration’ raised by Dewey
(1902) over a century ago, debates that feature internationally in reforms
around project and task-based curriculum.
What they fail to do is to consider the internal logic and structure of
discipline/discourse
as
a
key
analytic
problematic.
While
the
aforementioned coding schemes take cognition and pedagogy as generic and
field-independent,
the
Bernsteinian
framework
tends
to
treat
knowledge/discipline/discourse as generic. Our view is that knowledge has
field/discipline/discourse
specific
structures,
logics,
strategies
and
modalities of expression (e.g., Hacking, 1996; Johnasson, 19xx). If and
where this is the case, the vertical/horizontal axes of strong or weak
classification doesn’t deal with whether and how knowledge construction in
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biological science might be different than that of history, for example. These
issues are raised by Halliday and Martin (1996), who argue that different
generic, textual modes are discipline and field specific, and provide
examples of technical lexis, syntactic and text-propositional conventions of
different fields of knowledge.
Our hypothesis here is that just as fields have specific genres, registers, and
propositional logics – differing standpoints and epistemologies (cf. Harding,
1996) – they might also have different optimal and conventional pedagogic
moves or interactional sequences and strategies. Part of what we propose
below is the empirical study of how different interactional frames actually
constitute knowledge/fields differentially, and which sequences of
‘weaving’
not
just
between
Bernstein’s
implied
disciplinary/multidisciplinary binary, but also shuttling between levels and
kinds of knowledge around artifacts optimally construct knowledge for
students.
On framing
Bernstein’s horizontal axis describes the interactional ‘framing’ of the
selected and classified knowledge. His emphasis is the actual ostensive
sources of agency at work, creating a continuum between student-centred
and teacher-centred curriculum knowledge. In this regard, his model
attempts to show how classrooms generate different epistemic stances to
knowledge. Framing refers to the social organization of the classroom; that
is, how the social interaction of teacher/student discourse and behaviour
creates a mediating environment for working with ideas, knowledge and
texts, using a range of semiotic tools and artefacts. Its emphasis, then, is on
the classroom as a mediating environment for the construction of artefacts
and knowledge.
… The strength of Bernstein’s approach to framing is that it focuses on what
we might term ‘epistemic source’ – but in the assumption that it is teacher
or student centred, it narrows the description of epistemic stance, choice and
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source of authoritative knowledge, and has little focus on the artefactual
sources of knowledge (e.g., textbooks, media, worksheets). To narrow this
to student or teacher is to ignore the textual/artefactual character of
knowledge and also to narrow the question of instructional medium and
modality. Further, following on from Anyon (1980), part of the powerful
hidden curriculum of social class is the differential production of epistemic
stances and ‘attitudes’: that is, students acquire differential senses of the
authoritative sources of knowledge (e.g., where legitimate and authoritative
knowledge comes from, and one’s relative agency or passivity in its
production).
Framing can be viewed in sociocultural terms as the interactional social
relations around artifacts. So seen it can be connected much more
specifically to issues around the ‘dimensionality’ of knowledge, both in
terms of issues of depth, technical metalanguage, criticisability, epistemic
source and so forth. As well its analysis can entail the systematic
propositional moves, “shuttling” between kinds and levels of knowledge,
constitute ‘field’, ‘discipline’ and ‘discourse’. In this way, our conception of
framing takes definitions of teaching and pedagogy beyond scaffolding – to
be deliberately orchestrated movement between levels and types of
knowledge. That is, a new focus of this coding scheme is on how teachers
and students shift between kinds and levels of knowledge across phases,
lessons and units. It is our hypothesis that this phenomenon, which we term
“weaving” might indeed be one ‘difference that makes a difference’ in
classrooms.
Generally speaking, SCS_2 accepts this framing of the problem of knowledge in the
classroom. However, we have extended it in various ways, particularly in the 3rd pass (from
Scale #18 on), in order to get a better grip of the intellectual quality of knowledge work in the
classroom. Consequently, we have extended old coding categories and added new ones, with
a stronger and expanded focus on the epistemic nature of the knowledge work undertaken in
the classroom, the cognitive demands of knowledge tasks in the classroom, the epistemic
norms of knowledge work in the classroom, the cultivation of epistemic virtues, and, above
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all, the character of classroom talk, both in whole class and small group contexts . We discuss
the rationale for these in some changes later in the Coding Manual.
CODING PROCEDURE
Observe. DO NOT over-think or over-read. Only report what is observed, (what do you see
the teacher doing? what do you see the students doing?), not what you like or prefer. Refer
back to this manual frequently – especially if you find yourself wavering in a decision
between two or three coding categories. You will need to watch the entire video a minimum
of three times (at least once for each pass) or more is better for accurate coding. Please watch
and code the video for every 3-minute intervals: if the whole lesson is 60 minutes you will
need to watch it in 20 segments of 3 minutes. Watch the video as many times as needed to
supply all required information and feel confident in your coding.
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FIRST PASS: FRAMING
1. FRAMING
Please do not insert any spaces between letters or numbers.
1.1. School name. Input the code for the school. E.g. Woodlands Primary=S4, Tao Nan
1.2. Stream. Input the code for the stream of the class. E.g. EX=Express, NA=Normal,
ST=Standard
1.3. Subject. Input the subject. E.g. English=EL, English Literature=Lit, Maths or
Elementary Maths=MA, Additional Maths=AM
1.4. Teacher’s name. Refer to the Schedule for Teacher Codes. E.g. Mrs Jone of Senkang
Secondary= T3, Mdm Tavi of Bukit View Primary=T1
1.5. Lesson number. Input the lesson number in a sequence of the lessons that are observed
by the researchers. E.g. Lessson 2= L2
1.6. Date. This refers to the date of observation (DDMMYY). E.g. 31st Jan, 2010=31-1-10;
6th April 2010= 6-4-10
1.7. Total number of lessons in the unit. Input the total number of lessons for the unit. E.g.
8 lessons in the unit=L8. In the event that the total number of lessons is unknown, put a dash
(-)
1.8. Start time of lesson. This time refers to the video timing. Code the time when the
teacher gives the salutation/greeting. If there is no salutation/greeting taking place, look out
for other cues (E.g. clapping, “Class, are you ready”) that signals the start of the lesson.
1.9. Finish time of lesson. This time refers to the video timing. Coding ends the moment the
teacher thanks the class/walks out of the class. If the teacher does not thank the class or walk
out of the class, look out for other cues (E.g. students leaving the class, “See you tomorrow.”)
that signals the end of the lesson.
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2. LESSON TOPIC/S AND LEARNING OBJECTIVE/S
The purpose of this scale is to identify whether the teacher explicitly states the lesson topic,
learning objective(s) and the rationale for the topic and the lesson. This scale indicates the
mode of articulation of the topic and lesson learning objective(s), and the mode of
articulating the rationale for the lesson topic/s and learning objective(s).
2a. Lesson Topic/s
2.1. Announcing lesson topic/s. Teacher’s announcement of which topic the class is going to
learn in this lesson- E.g. the teacher says, “Today we are going to learn Pythagoras’
theorem.” Or it may be in the form of a question by the teacher to the class, E.g. “What do
you think we are going to do today?” Then the students respond and the teacher confirms
what the students say.
0= No announcement of lesson topic
1=Announcement of lesson topic
2.2. Mode of articulating lesson topic/s. How the teacher communicates the lesson topic/s.
Enter the numeral only from the given descriptors. Note: Multiple responses are OK (eg: 1,
3)
0=Nil,
1=written (E.g. handouts, worksheets);
2=oral;
3=displayed on the whiteboard (E.g. written or projected);
4=combination of any of 1, 2, or 3.
2.3. Stated teacher rationale for the lesson topic/s. Teacher’s explicit explanation of the
rationale for teaching and learning the topic, i.e. why the topc is being taught. E.g. when the
teacher says, “What you’re doing in this topic will be helpful for you in PSLE”, then this may
be coded as 2. Enter the numeral only from the given descriptors. Note: Multiple responses
are OK (eg, 1, 3, 6)
0= Nil;
1= Intrinsic Value of Learning - Knowledge or learning is valuable in and of itself;
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2=Institutional Performance - Reasons related to school performance, E.g., test exam,
overall performance;
3=Disciplinary Knowledge - To improve understanding of the subject or to be a
practitioner of a field or discipline, E.g., Science, and Maths. Prerequisite knowledge;
4=Functional Use - For use in society, at work, and in everyday communication, etc;
5=Moral and Ethical Values - To make student a better person. May be related to
family, religious and cultural values;
6=National Interest - For the good of the nation, state, government, economy.
2.4. Mode of articulating rationale for lesson topic/s. How the teacher communicates the
rationale for the lesson topic/s. Enter the numeral only from the given descriptors. Note:
Multiple responses are OK (eg, 1, 2, 3)
0=Nil;
1=written (E.g. handouts, worksheets);
2=oral;
3=displayed on the whiteboard (E.g. written or projected).
2b Lesson Learning Objective/s
2.5. Stated teacher learning objective/s for lesson (detail and explicitness). Teacher states
the lesson learning objective/s and how the teacher articulates the learning objectives or
goals, i.e. the detail and explicitness of teacher’s statement of the learning objective(s). E.g.
“These are the learning goals for today” (in this case, minimal detail). “You must first know
what is a right-angled triangle and when to apply it and how to manipulate the formula to find
the unknown side. “ (in this case, some detail). Whether it is “minimal detail”, “some detail”
or “substantial detail”, it is largely based on our judgment. Enter the numeral only from the
given descriptors.
0=no mention of lesson learning objective/s;
1=mention without detail of the criteria and standards;
2=mention with minimal detail;
3=mention with some detail;
4=mention with substantial detail.
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2.6. Mode of articulating lesson learning objective/s. How the teacher communicates the
lesson objective/s. Enter the numeral only from the given descriptors. Note: Multiple
responses are OK (eg: 1, 3)
0=Nil,
1=written (E.g. handouts, worksheets);
2=oral;
3=displayed on the whiteboard (E.g. written or projected);
4=combination of any of 1, 2, or 3.
2.7. Stated teacher rationale for lesson learning objective/s. Teacher’s explicit explanation
of the rationale for achieving the lesson objective/s, i.e. why the work is being done. E.g.
when the teacher says, “What you’re doing now will be helpful for you in PSLE”, then this
may be coded as 2. Enter the numeral only from the given descriptors. Note: Multiple
responses OK
0= Nil;
1= Intrinsic Value of Learning - Knowledge or learning is valuable in and of itself;
2=Institutional Performance - Reasons related to school performance, E.g., test exam,
overall performance;
3=Disciplinary Knowledge - To improve understanding of the subject or to be a
practitioner of a field or discipline, E.g., Science, and Maths. Prerequisite knowledge;
4=Functional Use - For use in society, at work, and in everyday communication, etc;
5=Moral and Ethical Values - To make student a better person. May be related to
family, religious and cultural values;
6=National Interest - For the good of the nation, state, government, economy.
2.8. Mode of articulating rationale for lesson learning objective/s or topic/s. How the
teacher communicates the rationale for the lesson goal/s. Enter the numeral only from the
given descriptors. E.g. 0=Nil; 1=written (E.g. handouts, worksheets); 2=oral, 3=displayed on
the whiteboard (E.g. written or projected). Note: Multiple responses are OK (eg, 1, 2, 3)
2c. Recapitulation/Summary/Conclusion
2.9. Recapping/summarising lesson content. Teacher recaps/summarises the lesson content
and how the teacher articulates it.
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0=no mention of recapping/summarising lesson content;
1=mention without detail of the criteria and standards;
2=mention with minimal detail;
3=mention with some detail;
4=mention with substantial detail.
2.10. Mode of articulating recapitulation/summary/. How the teacher recaps/summarises
the lesson content. Enter the numeral only from the given descriptors. Note: Multiple
responses are OK (eg: 1, 3)
0=Nil,
1=written (E.g. handouts, worksheets);
2=oral;
3=displayed on the whiteboard (E.g. written or projected);
3. INSTRUCTIONAL ACTIVITIES: CLASSROOM ORGANIZATION
Classrooms are relatively recent innovations in education, dating from the early 19th century,
as industrializing countries sought relatively cheap and efficient ways of teaching large
numbers of poor and working class children basic literacy and moral development (Hogan,
1992). Initially, classrooms were not age graded: this only happened when school officials in
many countries, including the US, Australia, and England, began to view classroom as means
of assessing, sorting and selecting students in a standardized way from around the middle of
the 19th century. Nor were they characterized by simultaneous instruction: that only happened
when school systems introduced a common syllabus for all students at a particular level of
academic development. Technically, we might think of classrooms as sites of social
(including pedagogical) action by social actors in particular institutional settings defined by
specific organizational practices and institutional norms, rituals, and patterns of social
interaction and meaning making (for example, with respect to knowledge building and
identity formation).
The purpose of this scale is to determine common activity types that students are engaged in
during the lesson.
3a Whole class activities
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3.1.Teacher-dominated talk. Teacher does most of the talking if not all of it. However, it
could include some occasional IRE. The teacher’s talk may focus on exposition of new
material, or elaboration of new or old material, or repetition of old material (the instructional
equivalent or analogue to memorization in the Chinese learner paradox literature). We do not
need to code here for this level of detail: rather, we are coding for the form of the classroom
activity (teacher talk, IRE) rather than the substance which we will capture in later codes.
3.2. IRE. Initiate, Response, Evaluate. Conventionally, this has been understood to be an
iterative process with multiple, rapid fire IRE sequences. Here we will code predominantly
IRE or IR-IR-IRE. For example:
Teacher:
Class:
What is the meaning of interrogatives? Can anyone tell me? A clue.
Look at this smiley face, what is he doing?
Thinking.
Class:
Asking.
Teacher:
Asking, ok Alvin says asking. Nichole?
Student:
People who investigates.
Teacher:
Ok, my question is what is the meaning of interrogatives.
Student:
People who solve a thing.
Teacher:
Ok, people who solve a thing.
(Excerpt from Core 2 pilot study “P5CreativeEng101109.mov”)
3.2.1. Cued Elicitation. The teacher signals explicitly what the right answer or response is.
For example, in the context of teaching phrasal verbs the teacher asks “what is the definition
of a phrasal verb?” then says “A phrasal verb is a verb plus a what? The word begins with P
and ends with N”. E. g. C2_S2T2_EL_SD_L1_COM_ST_30-6-10, the 2nd interval (between
3:00 – 6:00). We will code categorically for its absence or presence (0,1)
3.3. Whole class rote memorisation/drill and practice. The whole class focuses on the
drilling of facts and their commitment to memory. Includes chanting or other repetitive forms
of expression.
3.4. Whole Class Elicitation (including IDRE), Discussion and Dialogue. Teacher initiates
an extended whole class T_S_S discussion of idea, concept, story using a range of strategies
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to open up discussion (E.g., waiting time, holding back on evaluation, open ended follow up
questions, extension or redirection moves). Can include IDRE exchanges in which teacher
encourages students to discuss possible responses together in pairs before giving a considered
response, followed by teacher evaluation (Mercer & Dawes, 2008). Including substantive
and open ended questions and brainstorming. Discussion is free flowing, and at best, can
develop into genuine dialogue (see #11) in which teacher encourages students to make
connections between ideas or responses
and directs conversation so that it maintains
momentum or moves forward and becomes cumulative. Here it is not necessary to distinguish
between a mere discussion and dialogue (but see #11). Someone (teacher or student) might
record or note student contributions verbally or on whiteboard. Teacher may request and
record or note students’ contributions verbally or on whiteboard, less explicit evaluation of
teacher connections between comments, ideas, and redirection.
3.5. Guided exploratory performances of understanding. Typically, the teacher invites a
student to come to the white board and work out a solution (solving a mathematics problem,
parsing a sentence) in front of the class with promptings from the teacher or other students in
the class. These are real time performances of understanding (Perkins), unlike #3.8 below
which focuses on more staged performances of understanding that students have had time to
prepare beforehand. As such, guided exploratory performances of understanding are similar
to forms of “guided discovery” instructional strategies.
3.6. Whole class demonstration. Teacher demonstrates how to work with a teaching or
learning aid E.g. protractors, dictionary, thesaurus.
3.7. Whole class activity (including role playing, drama, watching video, reading out
aloud). Teacher initiated and guided whole class game, activity, includes video watching.
Can involve 2 or more students doing something for or in front the class. E.g. reading a play,
role playing. Dramatic or semi-dramatic activities in which students “read out” from a text or
“act out” a scenario. If the students are simply reading from a text, without any attempt to act
it out or provide characterization, code for “choral reading’ if in unison or “other”. A reading
can count as “role play” if dramatization is done and/or expressiveness is highlighted (E.g.
dramatic choral reading). Can be T led or in groups (Silver & Pak, 2009).
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3.8. Prepared performances of understanding. Students report back to class on individual
or group work, perform a demonstration, do a presentation to class or some other
performance of understanding (Perkins) on work or task that they have had time to complete
before the presentation or performance of understanding (unlike #3.5 above). Can include a
demonstration at whiteboard, show and tell; presentation of students’ writing or text. Can
include OHT presentations; formal presentations; presentation of results from experiments.
May include some feedback or answer checking but the dominant focus is students reporting
their work (usually with student(s) at the front of the room to display work produced).
Always to the whole class.
3b Pair or group work activities
3.9. Independent Pair Work. Students sit together and work on their own tasks (usually
identical or parallel task) but occasionally share ideas, solutions and/or information.
3.10. Cooperative Pair Work. Students work together on a shared task usually to achieve a
shared, common solution or outcome (E.g., the completion of a fill-in-the-gap exercise or
brainstorming activity where ideas are gathered and recorded on paper).
3.11. Student self-initiated pair or group work. Teacher instructs the students to engage in
the activity individually, however the majority of the students form pair or group to complete
the activity. Teacher allows it to happen.
3.12. Pseudo group work (PGW). Students sit together in “groups” but work individually
rather than interdependently on a common or shared task. That is, students work together in
groups but not as a group. There is a very big difference. Under these circumstances there are
no inherent task demands for students to do otherwise; they can quite easily accomplish the
set work, alone. Indeed, Galton and Hargreaves (2009) note, after reviewing the incidence of
group work internationally, conclude that “classroom group work is still a neglected art.
While pupils often sit in groups, presumably for social reasons, they rarely work together as a
group” (p. 1).
3.13. Unstructured Group Work (UGW). Students are assigned by the teacher to “work
together” but without explicit instructions by the teacher regarding role differentiation or
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division of labor within an assigned task. Nor do students decide among themselves on a
division of labour. That is, students do not merely work in a group but work together as a
group – but not very well. Very often, as a consequence, participation in the task is not well
organized or structured and often unequal: one or two students tend to dominate or do most
of the work while others “free-load.” But the inequality of participation is not a defining
feature of unstructured group work as such: what is important (and defining) is the lack of
group structure/role differentiation, and it is with respect to this feature of UGW that you
should code for.
3.14. Collaborative Group Work. In collaborative group work students work together in a
stepped and role-differentiated way towards the achievement of a common goal in a shared
task. That is, students work together as a group and not merely together in a group.
The key features of collaborative group work then are two: (1) a common, shared goal, and
(2) role differentiation (or what Galton and others term social interdependency) — an explicit
division of labour — in which distinct roles [time-keeper, note-taker, library searcher, etc.]
are allocated within the assigned task. Where forms of collaborative group work differ is in
how the roles are allocated – by the teacher or by agreement by the students themselves. In
effect, one is a form of teacher-regulated collaborative task structure, whereas studentregulated group work characterizes the other.
We shall refer to these, respectively, as
teacher-directed collaborative group work (TDCGW) and student-directed collaborative
group work (SDCGW).
Researchers have also suggested that collaborative group work is also characterized by
additional features beyond shared goals and role differentiation (social interdependency).
Mercer and Littleton (2007) suggest, for example, that “collaboration [cooperation] means
something more than children working together in a tolerant and compatible manner. When
we describe children as collaborating or being engaged in collaborative learning we mean
that that participants are engaged in a coordinated, continuing attempt to solve a problem or
in some other way construct common knowledge. Crucially, we see collaboration as
involving a coordinated joint commitment to a shared goal, reciprocity, mutuality and
continued (re)negotiation of meaning” (p. 25). Drawing on Rogoff (1990) and Wertsch
(1991), Mercer and Littleton (2007) argued that the kind of coordinated activity characteristic
of collaborative group work depends upon the students establishing and maintaining
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“intersubjectivity” – in effect, “establishing a shared conception of the task or problem” and
requiring the continual maintenance of intersubjectivity as they progress through activity”
(pp.31-32).
Mercer and Littleton (2007) also emphasize that productive collaborative group work
depends on two critical factors: (1) good task design, and (2) understanding talk. With respect
to task design, they emphasize that “group tasks should be designed such that learners need
to work together on them” (pp.31-32). Consequently, group task designs cannot be too simple
– otherwise there is no need for to work together collaboratively – or too complex, causing
students to struggle to create meaning and understanding. Good group designs are ones “that
requires resources that no single individual possesses” and requires the students to work
“interdependently and reciprocally”. Typically, open-ended, challenging tasks are more
effective in facilitating productive interaction than more closed tasks focused on finding one
right answer. With respect to the quality of social relationships in the group, Mercer and
Littleton (2007) report research that has found that a sense of trust and mutuality” or
“relational closeness” is strongly associated “with the sharing of ideas, exchanging points of
view and a collective approach to challenging tasks.” We pursue this issue further in our
discussion of the codes for classroom interaction below.
Other researchers have characterized collaborative group work slightly differently. Kagan
(1994), for example, suggests that cooperative group work is characterised by four other
basic principles: positive interdependence (gains for one student are associated with the gains
of the others), individual accountability, equal participation and simultaneous interaction.
Similarly, Johnson and Johnson (1999) identify five normative features of cooperative
activity: (1) positive interdependence; (2) face to face interaction among students; (3)
individual accountability; (4) instructing students in appropriate interpersonal and small
group skills; and (5) group processing. [There are many variations of CGW: Good and
Brophy (2003), for example, discuss group investigation, Jigsaw 1 & 2, Teams-GamesTournament, and Student Teams Achievement Divisions. See Kagan (1994) for an exhaustive
review of the many varieties. See also Saphier, Haley-Speca, & Gower (2008). Galton
(2007) emphasizes the normative value of collaborative group work – in particular, its
importance in developing an understanding of “social interdependence” in working together
collaboratively to complete a common task (E. g. students have to act out chapter in a story,
deciding who does what and which bits to select, etc). For some researchers, the sum of
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learning is greater than its individual parts in collaborative group work. For Mason (1970),
for example, cooperative group work is designed to "open up the minds of members of a
collaborative team to each other and to the possibilities that lie beyond the reach of any of the
individuals" (p. 112).
Galton (2007) distinguishes between collaborative and cooperative work and argues that
while cooperative tasks emphasize individual accountability (tasks in which pupils work
independently on their own task as a contribution to a common goal (E. g. each pupil makes
their own drawing for a common collage; pupils investigate different sources of information
to contribute to a shared report) – collaborative work emphasizes social interdependency
(“where pupils work cooperatively to complete a common task – E. g. each pupil has to act
out a chapter in a story”) we think this is a bit of a stretch and not strong enough to support
the weight of the distinction.
A number of scholars have reviewed the relative efficacy of group work (see DarlingHammond, Barron, Pearson, & Schoenfeld, 2008; Galton, 2007; Galton & Hargreaves, 2009;
Good & Brophy, 2003; Hattie, 2009; Johnson & Johnson, 1999; Mercer & Littleton, 2007;
Rohrbeck, Ginsburg-Block, Fantuzzo, & Miller, 2003) and within this Gillies (2003, 2004,
2007, 2008) focused on cooperative group work with strategic questioning. DarlingHammond, et al. (2008) for example, reports that “small group inquiry approaches can be
extremely powerful for learning,” but that “to be effective, they need to be guided by
thoughtful curriculum with clearly defined goals, well designed scaffolds, on-going
assessment, and rich informational resources” (p.13). They also report that the near unanimity
of meta-analyses of the positive effects of small group work given certain supports and
resources and the utility of small group work for developing 21st century skills (a key concern
of ours). Similarly, Mercer and Littleton (2007) and Good and Brophy (2003) report that the
design of cooperative or collaborative tasks, the provision of group rather than individual
rewards, and effective scaffolding, are especially critical for successful cooperative group
work. Good and Brophy (2003) emphasize that collaborative group work is “increasingly
popular” among teachers because of their “potential for engaging students in meaningful
learning with authentic tasks in a social setting” that allow “students to construct knowledge”
(p.276), and they also have a sensible and balanced review of the pluses and minuses of
group work. Hattie’s (2009) meta-analysis of 800 meta-analyses similarly reports very
significant effect sizes for small group work over individual work. Again, Gillies and Haynes
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(2010) reported that “students develop better capacities for problem solving and reasoning
and obtain higher learning outcomes when they are able to interact with others, share ideas,
challenge perspectives, and discuss alterative propositions before reaching agreement” (p.2).
Finally, Galton and Hargreaves (2009) demonstrated that the incidence and intellectual
quality of classroom dialogue increases much faster in small group work environments
compared to whole class contexts, but has other benefits as well: “group work … not only
produces higher levels of cognitive discourse and better social relationships among pupils; it
also improves pupil relationships with the teacher and that can provide additional time for
teaching” (p.4). Yet despite the strength of these research findings, there is still remarkably
little use made of group work in many countries, including Singapore. In England, for
example, research undertaken by Kutnick et al (2007) suggests that “teachers use groups
relatively infrequently” (cited in Galton & Hargreaves, 2009, p. 1). Mercer and Littleton
(2007) also report research findings that underscore how infrequent students work as a group
and not just simply in a group.
For coding purposes, we will code two versions of collaborative group work: teacher directed
group work and student-directed collaborative group work, depending on who decides on the
division of labor within the group:
3.14.1. Teacher-directed collaborative group work: When the teacher decides on the
division of labor within the group.
3.14.2. Student-directed collaborative group work: When the students decide on the
division of labor within the group.
3.15. Inter-group Interaction. Competitive or collaborative exchanges between groups.
3c. Individual Activities
3.16. Individual seatwork. Students are working individually at their seats with teacher
present and available for consultation. E.g. Working individually on worksheets. If teacher
leaves the room with students unattended or students are left to do their own work while the
teacher does something else (mark books) and ignores the students code “3.21 No
interaction”.
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3.17. Individual instruction to student. Teacher either stands in front of the class or moves
around from place to place, giving them instructions/advice.
3.18. Individual mobility. Individual students walk around room talking to other students or
groups.
3.19. Test taking. Students take tests, quizzes or examinations. It can be oral/written or
formal/informal.
3.20. No interaction; silent time. No interactions between teachers and students. E.g.
Teacher leaves the room with students unattended or students are left to do their own work
while the teacher does something else (mark books) and ignores the students. See Galton on
this.
3d. Laboratory work
3.21. Lab work. Students do laboratory work. E.g. a listening
3.21.1. Individual Lab Work
3.21.2. Group Lab Work.
3e. ICT Mediated Learning
3.22. Information and Communication Technology. Students use information and
communication technology (ICT) to complete a task or demonstrate the achievement of a
learning goal. E.g.
0=None;
1=Internet for communication (Email, MSN, Forums, Chat);
2=World Wide Web, Locating information;
3=WWW using information (with modification);
4=WWW using information (without modification, cut-n-paste);
5=WWW validating knowledge claims/evaluating information;
6=creating information (make a website, contribute to a wiki etc),
7=Software (Tutorials, E-Learning), 8=Exploratory tool use (Microsoft Excel,
Geometer’s Sketchpad)
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4. RESOURCES/TOOLS: TEACHERS
Resources are a key feature of the pedagogical system in classrooms (see Cohen, Raudenbush
and Hill). The purpose of this scale is to determine the resources and tools used by the
teachers to assist them in delivering the lesson.
4.1. Printed texts. Materials from CPDD/commercial/academic texts. Examples: textbooks,
newspapers and journal clippings.
4.2. Printed workbook/worksheets. Supplementary materials from teachers/publishers that
come together with the textbooks to be used for practice. Does not include student completed
materials.
4.3. Instructional materials. Teacher-produced materials for a specific instructional
purpose; games (matching, Bingo, Coordinates) and puzzles.
4.4. Assessment Materials. Materials from CPDD/SEAB/Private publishers (printed) and
tests/exam papers set by the teachers (teacher-produced) that are used to assess students’
understanding in a particular topic.
4.5. Software. Can be commercially produced or teacher-.produced Examples: electronic
slideshows (PowerPoint), game on a CD-ROM.
4.6. Internet. Anything accessed/used a networked (online) computer. Includes email, chat
and other pages/resources on the World Wide Web (websites, social media (Facebook,
Twitter, MySpace) and learning portals.
4.7. Static presentational device. Equipment or device that are already stationed in the class.
Examples: whiteboard, markers, overhead projector (OHP), visualiser.
4.8. Digital/Dynamic presentation device. Equipment or device that allows the teacher to
manipulate, arrange or move the words/objects/symbols that are shown on the screen.
Example: Smartboard/interactive whiteboard (IWB).
4.9. Manipulatives. Objects used physically (with the hands) to help understand a concept.
Usually involve organising, rearranging or changing something. For example, Cuisenaire
rods, geoboards, talking chips and word cards.
4.10. Props/ Realia. Props (properties) are objects or articles most commonly used in plays
and films. Examples of educational props include masks and puppets. Realia are real life
objects (as opposed to those that are fabricated) used to stimulate/add authenticity to learning.
For example, plants, animals, money, keys, telephone etc.
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4.11. Media. Materials in the form of video clips, audio (spoken voice, songs), photographs,
charts, graphs, posters.
4.12. Mathematical apparatus. Examples are rulers, compass, protractors, calculators etc.
4.13. Student. Teacher uses student(s) to assist other student(s) in learning.
4.14. Student material. Student completed/ongoing materials used by the teacher as an
instructional material.
4.15. Others. Coders to specify resources/tools that are not found above.
5. RESOURCES/TOOLS: STUDENTS
The purpose of this scale is to determine the resources and tools used by the students to assist
them in learning.
5.1. Printed texts. Materials from CPDD/commercial/academic texts. Examples: textbooks,
newspapers and journal clippings.
5.2. Printed workbook/worksheets. Supplementary materials from teachers/publishers that
come together with the textbooks to be used for practice. Does not include student completed
materials.
5.3. Instructional materials. Teacher-produced materials for a specific instructional
purpose; games (matching, Bingo, Coordinates) and puzzles.
5.4. Assessment Materials. Materials from CPDD/SEAB/Private publishers (printed) and
tests/exam papers set by the teachers (teacher-produced) that are used to assess students’
understanding in a particular topic.
5.5. Software. Can be commercially produced or teacher-.produced Examples: electronic
slideshows (PowerPoint), game on a CD-ROM.
5.6. Internet. Anything accessed/used a networked (online) computer. Includes email, chat
and other pages/resources on the World Wide Web (websites, social media (Facebook,
Twitter, MySpace) and learning portals.
5.7. Static presentational device. Equipment or device that are already stationed in the class.
Examples: whiteboard, markers, overhead projector (OHP), visualiser.
5.8. Digital/Dynamic presentation device. Equipment or device that allows the teacher to
manipulate, arrange or move the words/objects/symbols that are shown on the screen.
Example: Smartboard/interactive whiteboard (IWB).
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5.9. Manipulatives. Objects used physically (with the hands) to help understand a concept.
Usually involve organising, rearranging or changing something. For example, Cuisenaire
rods, geoboards, talking chips and word cards.
5.10. Props/ Realia. Props (properties) are objects or articles most commonly used in plays
and films. Examples of educational props include masks and puppets. Realia are real life
objects (as opposed to those that are fabricated) used to stimulate/add authenticity to learning.
For example, plants, animals, money, keys, telephone etc.
5.11. Media. Materials in the form of video clips, audio (spoken voice, songs), photographs,
charts, graphs, posters.
5.12. Mathematical apparatus. Examples are rulers, compass, protractors, calculators etc.
5.13. Student material. Student completed/ongoing materials used by the teacher as an
instructional material.
5.14. Others. Coders to specify resources/tools that are not found above.
6. TEACHER COMMUNICATION: TAXONOMY
This scale is a preliminary look at teacher talk rather than student talk. We code additional
aspects of teacher talk in later scales. The codes in this scale may address an individual
student, group or the whole class. We also look at student talk in later scales.
Educational researchers agree that talk is critical to effective learning. Alexander (2008), for
example, observes that:
Of all the tools for cultural and pedagogical intervention in human development and learning,
talk is the most pervasive in its use and powerful in its possibilities. Talk vitally mediates the
cognitive and cultural spaces between adult and child, among children themselves, between
teacher and learner, between society and the individual, between what the child knows and
understands and what he or she has yet to know and understand. Language not only manifests
thinking but also structures it, and speech shapes the higher mental processes necessary for so
much of the learning that takes place, or ought to take place, in school.
It follows that one of the principal tasks of the teacher is to create interactive opportunities
and encounters that that directly and appropriately engineer such mediation.
Yet, though most educators subscribe to this argument in broad terms, and classrooms are
places where a great deal of talking goes on, talk that in an effective way and sustained way
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engages children and scaffolds their understanding is much less common than it should be.
Teachers rather than learners control what is said, who says it and to whom. Teachers rather
than learners do most of the talking. And, as many UK and US researchers have consistently
found, one kind of talk predominates: the so-called ‘recitation script’ of closed teacher
questions, brief recall answers and minimal feedback that requires children to report someone
else’s thinking rather than to think for themselves, and to be judged on their accuracy or
compliance in doing so... (Alexander, 2008: 92-93).
6.1. Organizational talk/work. This refers to pre-task activities or activities during the
course of the lesson that are necessary in order for a task to be completed, E.g. instructions on
how to proceed with a piece of work, distribution of materials or arrangement of students into
groups. Talk about non-curriculum activities should not be coded here.
6.2. Regulatory talk/work/gesture. Discipline, behaviour management. The teacher tries to
control the whole class or a particular student. E.g. the teacher reminds student(s) to pay
attention. This can include non-verbal actions E.g. blowing of whistle, gestures or staring at
student(s).
6.3. Pastoral Care. This codes for pastoral talk or concern shown by the teacher with respect
to student(s) well-being. E.g. checking on student who is sleeping whether student is ill/tired.
6.4. Curriculum. Any teacher talk about the actual content or skills to be taught. This
includes assessment related talks E.g. the content and format of examinations.
6.5. Non-Curriculum. Digressive off-topic talk by the teacher. E.g. When the teacher talks
about co-curricular activities or about fund raisings etc. Teacher may address a student
individually, E.g. “How did you spend your weekend?” This does not include student
background chatter.
6.6. Downtime. Interruption to the flow of events due to announcement, external visitor,
power outage, fire drill or uncontrollable student behaviours, teachers do not give students
things to do. This refers to the time where no productive activities occur.
7. ACTIVITY TYPE: THE SOCIAL ORGANIZATION OF CLASSROOM LIFE
The organizational and existential demands of classrooms renders teaching situations
inherently problematic, messy, non-routine, uncertain, unstable, unique, indeterminate,
unpredictable, reflexive, fluid, non-standardized and irreducibly agentic (Waller 1935;
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Bidwell 1965; Darling Hammond, 1997, Rowan 1995; Doyle 1979, Stenhouse 197?;
Richardson and Placier, pp. 914, 921; Erickson, 1996). Darling Hammond, for example,
describes the conventional research image of the teaching situation in the following way:
“Studies of teaching … describe it as complex world characterised by simultaneity,
multidimensionality, and unpredictability. In a classrooms competing goals and multiple
tasks are negotiated at breakneck pace, trade-offs are continually made, unanticipated
obstacles and opportunities arise. Each hour of every day teachers must juggle the need to
create a secure supportive environment for learning with the press for academic achievement,
the need to attend to individual students and the demands of the group, and the challenges of
pursuing multiple strands of work so that students at varying places in their learning move
ahead and none are left behind. These realities contravene the bureaucratic view of teaching
as straightforward work aimed at a limited of present and simple goals and objectives,
organized into a set sequence of activities and lessons used in more or less the same fashion
for all students within and across classrooms, and delivered to students without ‘regard for
persons.’” (Darling Hammond, The Right to Learn, 1997, pp. 69-70; see also 71-72)
Critically, teaching situations vary considerably within a school and between schools. Some
classrooms within a school, and many schools within a country, will be more or less routine,
predictable, stable, and standardized. But in the main, teaching situations vary – and they
matter.
The purpose of this scale is to classify the type of activity being done in lesson, out of lesson
or instruction given by the teacher. The scale differentiates between activity types in which
students engage in class. The form of classroom activity is a key indicator of the social
organization of the classroom.
7.1. Classwork. This refers to the work being done only during lesson time. It includes:
Written (long or short answer, Pen and paper, On computer, Alone, On the board, In group),
Oral (To teacher, to one/two student, to group, to class, Discussion, Quiz, Debate,
Presentation), Listening (to teacher, to student), Reading (Silently, Aloud student’s own text,
Aloud textbook, Text/Material, Alone, In group), Colouring/Drawing, Dancing, Musicmaking, Reflection/Quiet time, Working with apparatus (visual aids), Silent interactions, No
interaction between student and teacher.
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7.2. Homework (minor assignment). The teacher should use the term “homework”. E.g. 1=
Assignment with explanation (with/out performance criteria): The teacher should give
explicit elaboration/clear instructions on how the homework should be done. This may also
include defining subject related terms, E.g. ratio, adjectives and instructional terms, E.g. state,
describe, analyse. The teacher may or may not give a rubric to assess students’ work, E.g.
explaining how marks are given; 2= Assignment without explanation: The teacher does not
give any of the explanations above; 3= Review homework: The teacher goes through or
checks answers of homework given previously.
7.3. Major project or assignment. The teacher should use the term “project” or terms
associated with project. It could be group or individual work. More time and effort than
homework (E.g. Model working), spans more than one class period or lesson. It could be
done in-class, out of class or both.
7.4. Teacher Test/assessment. Engagement in any formal assessment (E.g. taking a test, a
mock test, or a spelling/dictation). The teacher should indicate that the activity is an
‘assessment’ or a ‘test’. A test is a form of assessment designed to measure a specific quality
or trait, E.g. students’ knowledge of a particular grammar item. Score/rewards/feedback may
or may not be given/assessment as learning (the intrinsic value of the learning experience);
there should be no communication among individuals or groups. It could be in the form of
pen and paper, online test, students writing answers on the board or a game involving
competing individuals/groups. Assessment performs a formative function when information
received in the form of feedback, written or oral, assists teachers and students in adjusting
their learning strategies and goals. Assessment performs a summative function when the test
determines the amount of knowledge the students have in a particular topic/topics. The test
can be done in-class, out of class (E.g. online test) or both.
7.5. Student peer assessment. Students do a formal assessment of fellow students’
performance.
7.6. Self-assessment. Student does a formal assessment of his/her own performance.
8. SUBJECT SCOPE OF ACTIVITY
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School subjects are epistemic, developmental and political constructions reflecting the
organization and structure of their base disciplines, variable understandings of cognitive
development, and a range of political, bureaucratic and ideological commitments of
curriculum developers and/or ministries of education. Considered as the deep structures of
school curricular formations, disciplines are not just collections of topically related
propositions. Broadly speaking, we propose to define a discipline as a public, variably
integrated and relatively coherent (if contested) body of knowledge (facts, concepts,
propositions, analytical relationships, arguments, models, theorems) and historically specific
institutionalized practices, procedures, skills, norms, dispositions, identities and attachments
focused variously on the explanation, prediction, interpretation, representation, expression,
understanding or control of some aspect of human experience (Hogan 2007). Indeed, Michael
Oakeshott (1962) describes disciplines as public but formal “conversations” about our
experience of nature, others and ourselves, and education as an initiation into, and learning to
participate effectively in, these disciplinary conversations. Disciplinarity then is a measure of
the degree to which a particular organization of knowledge (E. g. school subjects) exhibits
features of a discipline. Some forms of knowledge exhibit high degrees of disciplinarity –
university based academic disciplines, for example. Other forms (including school subjects)
have reduced levels of disciplinarity. Yet others have little or none. All disciplinary
knowledge, however, has the following critical features: arrays of interrelated facts and
concepts (although the tightness and density of conceptual networks varies considerably
across disciplines, from high in mathematics and physics to low in history and literary
studies); an epistemic orientation (explanation, interpretation, expression, representation,
prediction); procedures for generating knowledge claims; public criteria and standards for
establishing the epistemic authority of knowledge claims; and institutional practices and
procedures focused on the generation, representation, validation, communication and
deliberation of knowledge claims according to domain specific (although often contested)
public epistemic criteria and standards. These features constitute a formal “anatomy of
disciplinarity” (Hogan, 2007a). Formally then, disciplines are more or less coherent and
contested bodies of propositional knowledge, conceptual networks, epistemic orientations
(explanation, interpretation, prediction, narrating, prescribing), knowledge practices
(generating knowledge claims, validating or justifying knowledge claims according to
appropriate epistemic criteria and standards, representing and deliberating knowledge claims
and communicating knowledge claims) and epistemic dispositions, virtues and identities
institutionalized in distinctive domain specific epistemic communities. That is, disciplines
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constitute distinctive epistemologies, as well as contexts for and criteria for displays of
masterful practice, as part of their accumulated and evolving histories. We would expect sites
of disciplinary acculturation, therefore, such as classrooms, to display distinctive features
across differing disciplines, reflecting these differences of proposition, procedure and
disposition. Drawing on cognitive apprenticeship and socio-cultural learning theory, our
orientation then is to consider the disciplinary setting of school work as a collection of
acculturation processes focused on immersion in disciplinary practices, with varying degrees
of distinctiveness at different points along the school years, rather than to expect that ‘good’
teaching and learning in one disciplinary setting will constitute comparably ‘good’ in another
(Guo, Freebody and Hedberg, 2004, DCL handbook). In a later scale in the third pass, we
will measure the disciplinary features of classroom tasks more directly.
8.1. Single. Activity requires only use of a single subject to perform, understand or enact it.
8.2. Several subjects. Activity requires use of more than 1 subject to perform, understand or
enact it. Subjects may not be integrated within the activity, ie students are not required to
engage in multidisciplinary thinking. E.g. activity uses English Language and Social Studies
content, but does not explicate the connections between these 2 subjects.
8.3. Knowledge integration across subjects. Activity requires use of more than 1 subject to
perform, understand or enact it. Subjects are integrated within the activity and students are
required to engage in multidisciplinary thinking. E.g. activity uses English language and
Social Studies content, and requires students to connect and use both the contents explicitly.
9. TEXT PRODUCTION
What do we mean by text? We can attempt to understand text from a linguistic perspective.
In the simplest sense, text means language that is functional. By functional, we simply mean
language that is doing its job in some context, as opposed to isolated words or structures.
Thus, a text is a product of its environment. The language may be spoken or written, or any
other medium of expression that we like to think of. The important thing about the nature of
text is that it is really made up of meanings, which have to be expressed, or coded in words or
structures that in turn have to be expressed over again (recoded) in sounds or in written
symbols. In other words, the meaning-making of the originator of the text has to be coded
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into something in order for it to be communicated. Thus, a text is essentially a semantic unita product of a continuous process of choices in meaning that can be represented through
multiple mediums (Halliday & Hasan, 1985). Thus, text is both an instance of the process and
product of social meaning in a particular context.
In the classroom, the student makes meaning of his/her environment. Simply stated, the
student forms certain understandings based on the various inputs in the classroom context.
When these understandings find an output or external representation, we say that text is
produced. How meaning is represented is relative to the mode and thus, the choice of the
mode has a profound effect on the text produced. Students may represent text through various
modes such as written, oral, pictorial, graphical, symbolic or in artistic forms. Sometimes,
text production may be multi-modal involving the integration of more than one mode to form
a composite ‘whole’.
It is important to note the difference between the mode and medium of representation when
coding for multi-modal text production. For example, when a student writes a fraction, say
2/3, it is an instance of symbolic text production through the written medium. However, if the
student were to represent the fraction by drawing a model as well, it would be production of
multi-modal text in the symbolic and graphical modes. A student who sings emotive lyrics to
depict his Monday morning blues is producing text in the musical mode through an auditory
medium. On the other hand, if he were to describe his feelings in words as well as sing a
song, he would be producing a multi-modal text in the oral and musical modes.
Examples of English text types:
Written: story writing, summary write-up
Oral: reciting a poem, describing an experience in detail
Graphical: mind-map, concept map
Symbol: punctuation marks
Pictorial: picture, drawing, illustration
Music/dance: singing a song
Acting/Role play: a short class skit, role play
Gesture: Waving a hand, nodding the head, facial expressions (to express their
emotions/moods)
Manipulative: Show (a tangible object) and tell session
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Multimodal: A poster including words in the heading, pasted pictures,
drawings, and some bar graph statistics
Examples of Mathematics text types:
Written: steps to solve a problem, a number or word statement
Oral: describing verbally a math concept, say a Pythagoras theorem
Graphical: drawing models, graphs, diagrams, pie charts or shapes
Symbol: %, +, -, <, >
Pictorial: drawing
Music/dance: a lyrical song to remember number of days in a month
Acting/role play: a class drama, say on the life of Archimedes
Gesture: motioning with hands to divide into two groups
Manipulative: use of abacus, blocks or rods
Multimodal: Writing a fraction, making a model to show it and
articulating verbally what it represents
9.1 Student Text Production. The purpose of this scale is to determine various modes for
student text production in the classroom. Enter the numeral only from the given descriptors.
Scale metric: 1=Written, 2=oral, 3=graphical, 4=symbol, 5=pictorial, 6=music/dance,
7=acting/role play, 8=Gesture, 9=manipulative, 10=muti-modal
9.2 Extended or Sustained Student Text Production: Research studies in Singapore have
shown that text produced by students in the classroom, both at the primary and secondary
levels, is limited in length and complexity. A dearth of sustained and extended text
production that is favourable to a further building-up of ideas, has been a noteworthy feature
of student work. This is especially evident in the written and verbal text produced by students
in the classroom. The assignments set for students are mainly worksheets with a predominance of Multiple-choice questions, Fill in the blanks, Matching of columns. Such
exercises do not provide much scope for students to generate original, creative, complex or
elaborate responses. The oral text produced by students in class clearly illustrates a strong
inclination towards utterances that are mainly one-word answers, or at best a group of words
loosely strung together. Quite understandably, this limited written and oral text production
becomes especially evident in English rather than the Mathematics classroom.
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For the purpose of our present Core2 project, it would be ambiguous and even inaccurate to
set a definitive arbitrary marker for extended or sustained text production. The dilemma lies
on several fronts- the domain specific attributes of English and Mathematics, the obvious
variations in student abilities at the Primary 5 and Secondary 3 levels, as well as variations in
performances of pupils across different streams- Normal Academic, Standard and Express.
After much discussion and deliberation, it was decided that for coding purposes in the
domain of English, Written and Oral text produced should be at least a sentence long in order
for it to be to coded as extended or sustained text production. One-word answers or
incomplete, incoherent sentences do not indicate extended text production though they may
be indicative of complex cognitive processing. The point is that though the meaningful short
answer may have been generated after considerable understanding, the output, i.e. the text
produced is not an adequate reflection of that understanding in terms of length, elaboration,
complexity, or sophistication of ideas.
For other modes of text production in English, RAs would need to exercise their discretion
whether a given text had sufficient elaboration, length or complexity of ideas for it to be
coded as extended text production. For example, a pupil who merely draws a circle to
represent the earth would have produced text of a symbolic nature. The same text could be
considered extended if further details had been furnished, say shading three-quarters of the
circle and clearly stating the % composition of land and water bodies on earth. A student who
draws a political satire cartoon shows extended text production. However, shaking the head
disapprovingly and use of some hand gestures to indicate dissatisfaction with the political
system is not an example of producing extended text. A pupil who fills in some words or
phrases in a mind-map in which the framework is pre-supplied by the teacher is not
producing extended text. However, if the pupil comes up with an original structure or format
to represent some key ideas or concepts, it would be regarded as an example of extended text
production.
Scale metric: 1=Written, 2=oral, 3=graphical, 4=symbol, 5=pictorial, 6=music/dance,
7=acting/role play, 8=Gesture, 9=manipulative, 10=muti-modal
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9.3 Joint-Text production. The purpose of this scale is to ascertain instances of text
production by both teacher and student as co-producer. Enter the numeral only from the given
descriptors. Scale metric: 1=Written, 2=oral, 3=graphical, 4=symbol, 5=pictorial,
6=music/dance, 7=acting/role play, 8=Gesture, 9=manipulative, 10=muti-modal
9.4. Text reproduction. The purpose of this scale is to ascertain instances of text
reproduction by students. Enter the numeral only from the given descriptors. Scale metric:
1=Written, 2=oral, 3=graphical, 4=symbol, 5=pictorial, 6=music/dance, 7=acting/role play,
8=Gesture, 9=manipulative, 10=muti-modal
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SECOND PASS: FRAMING INSTRUCTIONAL ACTIVITIES
10. CHECKING FOR BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING
This scale assesses knowledge students already possess through their past experiences. It is
always teacher initiated.
10.1. Checking for prior activities. When the teacher checks with the class on
activity/activities done during previous lesson(s). Checking, in this case, can refer to
teacher’s questioning the students E.g. ‘Do you remember we discussed how internet is
different from books from groups?’ or simply stating a statement E.g. ‘Last week we did a
group work exercise and discussed how the internet is different from books.’
10.2. Checking for prior content knowledge. When the teacher checks with the class on
knowledge learnt in prior lesson or unit of work related to the new lesson. The teacher checks
through strategic questioning on actual content knowledge E.g. ‘Do you remember the
difference between internet and books?’ as compared to how they gained the knowledge E.g.
‘Do you remember last week we did a group work exercise and discussed how the internet is
different from books?”
10.3. Checking for prior relevant knowledge. When the teacher asks questions which are
not about the topic but facilitate understanding of the lesson contents. E.g. the lesson is about
fairy tales and the teacher asks the class ‘How many Harry Potter books are there in print
now?’
11. CLASSROOM INTERACTION: WHOLE CLASS DISCUSSION
A long line of classroom researchers have emphasized the collective character of the
classroom (i. e. Cohen, Raudenbush, & Ball, 2000; Darling-Hammond, et al., 2008; Erickson,
1996; Richardson, 2003). Erickson (1996), for example, emphasizes that “teachers and
students interact in classrooms, they construct an ecology of social and cognitive relations in
which influence between any and all parties is mutual, simultaneous and continuous. One
aspect of this social and cognitive ecology is the multiparty character of the scene – many
participants, all of them continuously on task albeit working on different kinds of tasks, some
of which may be at cross purposes. Although teachers in group discussions may attempt to
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enforce a participant framework of successive dyadic teacher-student exchanges, often the
conversation is more complicated than that” (p.33).
This scale focuses broadly on the social organization of classroom talk in whole class
discussions. See scale #19-21 for a deeper probe of the intellectual quality of whole class
discussion. Scale #12 focuses on the social organization of small group work, and scale #2224 on the intellectual quality of small group work.
11a. Explicit teacher instruction
There is some evidence that explicit instruction in the social norms regulating classroom
discussion and in the nature of the questions that foster rich “exploratory” talk supports
development of understanding talk and student learning (i. e. Galton, 2007; Gillies & Haynes,
2010; Mercer & Littleton, 2007).
11.1. Explicit teacher instruction of social norms/protocols of classroom discussion.
Teacher provides explicit instruction in appropriate rules, conventions or protocols of
classroom talk. Includes listening, speaking norms (conversational norms/rules) Behavioural
norms within a dialogue. Include reminders of established norms. Examples: “Don’t shout”,
“Take your turn”, “Listen carefully or properly”, “No talking when I’m talking” (see Galton,
2007; Gillies, 2008 for further details). Scale metric: We code for the presence or absence of
explicit teacher instruction. 0= Absent, 1=Present.
11.2. Explicit teacher instruction in “strategic questioning” and “understanding or
exploratory talk” more broadly. Successful class work that promotes deepening of student
understanding (or what Alexander, 2001, terms "cumulation")
is facilitated by careful
teacher instruction and modelling of “strategic questions” that facilitates “exploratory talk”
(Barnes, 1993) or “understanding talk.” Gillies and Haynes (2010), for example, suggest that
“[t]eachers induct children into ways of thinking and learning by making explicit how to
express ideas, seek help, contest opposing positions, and reason cogently” (p.3). When they
do, they help “generate new ways of thinking and creating knowledge.” (p.3) Indeed,
“explicit instruction appears to be critical in the successful application of reasoning and
problem-solving skills… In short, it appears that students need to be taught how to engage in
reasoned argumentation and teachers play a key role in explicitly teaching these skills if they
are to be used effectively in small group work” (p.2). This includes teaching them the kind of
talk and questions that clarifies ideas, mediates or scaffolds learning, and moves the argument
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forward, paraphrases to assist learning, prompts, questions that challenge and scaffolds
students’ learning, summarizing student work or key ideas so far in the group’s work and
heuristics that will help them understand a text or solve a problem. For example, in EL, they
might teach them comprehension strategies, or what kind of questions to ask to prompt higher
order thinking and deeper understanding: E.g. Review questions (“Describe in your words”),
Probing Questions (“Tell more about...”), Hint questions (“Have you considered...”),
Comparative Questions (“How are X and Y the same but different?”) and Self monitoring
Questions (“Have we covered all the ideas we need to?”) (Gillies, 2007, p. 7). In mathematics
for example, in the context of problem solving, the teacher might ask the question “Why does
this procedure work for this problem but not for that problem? In what ways are these two
problems different? And similar?” Scale metric: We code for the presence or absence of
explicit teacher instruction. 0= Absent, 1=Present.
11b. Normative Structure: Whole Class Interaction
The focus here is on the social relations of talk or the implicit norms that regulate and
constitute the formal social features of classroom talk. We will code for the intellectual
quality of classroom talk later in scale #23. The research evidence is that, as Mercer and
Littleton write (2007) that effective dialogue depends on the participants having a shared
understanding of, and commitment to, the dos and don’ts of effective communication. “These
normative conceptions operate as implicit sets of rules for behaving in particular kinds of
situations, which participants normally take for granted: they are ground rules for
conversation” (p.34).
11.3. Positioning of Discursive Authority. Location of discursive authority in
conversation/dialogue. The default value is 0.
1= If the teacher leads the discussion by setting the questions and/or does most of the
talking; (top down/hierarchical)
2= If one or more students lead the discussion by setting the questions and/or does most
of the talking (bottom up/democratic)
3= If discursive authority is mixed or shared between teachers and students. (mixed,
negotiated)
11.4. Wait time/thinking time. Many scholars (i. e. Alexander, 2001; Brophy & Good,
1973; Galton, 2007; Nystrand & Gamoran, 1991) has strongly indicated that teachers tend not
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to give students sufficient thinking time to answer questions but instead insist on immediate
answers to their (“test”) questions. Consequently, we want to code for the number of
occasions teacher waits for more than 5 seconds after questioning before asking a follow-up
question. Note Alexander (2001) terms this “thinking time” and links it to Nystrand and
Gamoran’s (1991) distinction between “test” questions and “authentic” questions. Coders
should ignore ‘follow-up questions’ that are essentially the same questions as the initial
question (i. e. the teacher repeats that same question again). However, if the teacher rephrases
the question (e. g. adds more detail, clarifies the question), then the clock should reset. Scale
metric: The number of times the teacher waits 5 seconds after questioning. 0=0 number of
times, 1=1 or 2 times, 2= 3 or 4 times, 3= more than 4 times.
11.5. Inclusivity. Inclusivity is indicated by the number of students participating in
classroom discussion. Importantly, dialogue is not necessarily characterized by extensive
participation. Thus, it is an mportant item to observe for in whole class interaction,
particularly when the teacher tends to nominate the ‘better’ students who are likely to provide
the correct answers, or substantial responses. Doing so prevents other ‘less-obvious’ students
from attempting to participate in the interaction. Coders should keep an eye out if certain
students are always nominated. [NOTE: this needs to be noted in field notes of the class].
Scale metric: The number of students participating in classroom discussion. 1= one or two,
2= three to five, 3= six to ten, 4= more than ten.
11.6. Reciprocity. Reciprocity is a specific form of collective talk and is evident when
teachers and students listen to each other, share ideas and consider alternative viewpoints and
do so in a respectful manner (although strictly speaking, mutual respect is not a requirement
of reciprocity). Alexander (2001) distinguishes between talk that is collective and talk that is
reciprocal: collectivity is evident when teachers and students address learning tasks together
as a class. However,we think reciprocity is the more demanding and useful of the two criteria
and we should code for its presence rather than for collectivity. (In any case, conceptually
collectivity is implicit in or entailed by reciprocity). Michaels , O’Connor, and Resnick
(2001) describe talk that is collective and reciprocal as a form of “accountable” talk—
specifically talk that is “accountable to the learning community” (p.1). At its best, when it
leads to classroom talk that assumes the dimensions of “dialogue” (Alexander, 2001), it is
talk that “attends seriously to and builds on the ideas of others; participants listen to and learn
from each other, grappling with ideas together” (Michaels, O'Connor, & Resnick, 2008, p.
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286). Reciprocity does not necessarily involve mutual respect – antagonists in combatitive
exchanges often show plenty of reciprocity but no respect for each other. Conceptually then
reciprocity merely requires that participants in a conversation listen to each other attentively.
However, because we suspect that it will be hard to code separately, we have added mutual
respect as an additional normative dimension to our conception of reciprocity by stipulating
that it exhibits mutual respect. Scale metric: We code for the presence or absence of
reciprocity. 0=Absent, 1= Present
11.7. Disrespect. Indicated when the student and teacher don’t listen to each other
respectfully (interrupting each other), talk over each other, call each other names, use abusive
language of any kind or ignore student responses.
11.8. Supportive Environment. Classroom interaction is supportive when teacher is patient
or considerate (E.g. in extended wait time waiting for the student to answer the question or
when they think the student does not know the answer asking someone else in order not to
create an awkward moment or embarrass the student), or when students articulate their ideas
freely, without apparent fear or embarrassment over making wrong answers, and they help
each other to reach common understandings. Students appear willing to take risks or make
errors without being dismissed, ridiculed or laughed at by teacher or other students. Teachers
encourage students to say what they think and do not dismiss or reject their comments out of
hand. Trust – a key measure of social capital—therefore is at the heart of a supportive
learning environment, and facilitates learning by reducing the transaction costs of exploratory
talk. (Note that support is the third of Alexander’s principles of dialogical teaching).
12. CLASSROOM INTERACTION: SMALL GROUP WORK
In this scale the focus is on the social organization of small group talk. Later, in scale #24, we
will explore the intellectual quality of small group knowledge talk. This scale is only used
when students are organized in small group work and not otherwise.
In their highly influential work on pupil talk, Barnes and Todd (1977) argue that pupils learn
to treat knowledge claims as contestable and negotiable – a key feature of disciplinary
knowledge work – when they are engaged in open, extended discussions and argument with
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their peers independent of the “visible control” of their teacher and that this allows them to
take a more active and independent ownership of knowledge: “Our point is that to place the
responsibility in the learners hands changes the nature of that learning by requiring them to
negotiate their own criteria of relevance and truth. It schooling is to prepare young people for
responsible adult life, such learning has an important place in the repertoire of social
relationships which teachers have at their disposal” (p.127). When this happens properly,
knowledge is made publicly accountable – relevant information is shared effectively,
opinions are justified and explained, and these examined critically by other participants in the
conversation (See also Bennett & Dunne, 1992; Galton & Williamson, 1992; Kumpulainen &
Wray, 2002; Mercer & Littleton, 2007).
Mercer and Littleton (2007) observe that “traditionally, talk between learners in the
classroom has been discouraged and treated as disruptive and subversive. Even in childcentred approaches that stress the autonomy of children, the significance of talk has tended to
be downplayed in favour of individual action. Although ideas have changed to some extent in
recent years, pupil-pupil talk is still regarded with unease by many teachers” (p.24). Yet the
research on the value of students working – and talking – together, is quite unequivocal,
although the educational benefits depend significantly on whether students are merely
working in groups together or working as a group. Unfortunately, the evidence is that
students only rarely work together as a group generating productive cumulative talk although
they might often be asked to work together in a group, and that effective group work requires
careful planning and set up by the teacher. More often than not, as Mercer and Littleton
(2007) suggest “most of the interactions recorded were not task focused, productive or
equitable” (p.58).
.
12a. Teacher Management of Small Group Work
12.1. Group Size. Small (=<4) or large (>4).
12.2. Explicit teacher instruction of social norms to regulate group work. Teacher
explains (or reinforces) to class or group the rules and norms of group work: E. g. “listen
to each other,” “help each other,” “take turns, “work together,” “share ideas,” “set rules for
making decisions”, “be respectful to others,” “don’t shout each other other down,” etc (see
Galton, 2007, pp. 97-102). Teacher instruction in rules and norms of group work includes
teacher providing instructions on how a group activity is to be conducted, such as
providing roles for each student or who each student should interact with within the group.
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See also Gillies and Haynes (2010) for a detailed discussion of the importance of explicit
instruction in group-work norms.
12.3. Explicit teacher instruction in “strategic questioning” and “understanding
talk” more broadly. Successful class work that promotes deepening of student
understanding (or what Alexander terms “cumulation”) is facilitated by careful teacher
instruction and modelling of “strategic questions” that facilitates “exploratory talk” or
“understanding talk” (Barnes, 1993). Gillies and Haynes (2010), for example, suggest that
“Teachers induct children into ways of thinking and learning by making explicit how to
express ideas, seek help, contest opposing positions, and reason cogently” (p.3). When
they do, they help “generate new ways of thinking and creating and knowledge.” (p.3)
This includes teaching them the kind of talk and questions that clarifies ideas, mediates or
scaffolds learning and moves the argument forward, paraphrases to assist learning,
prompts, questions that challenge and scaffolds students learning, summarizing student
work or key ideas so far in the group’s work and heuristics that will help them understand
a text or solve a problem. For example, in EL, they might teach them comprehension
strategies, or what kind of questions to ask to prompt higher order thinking and deeper
understanding: Eg: Review questions (“Describe in your words”), Probing Questions
(“Tell more about...”), Hint questions (“Have you considered...”), Comparative QUestions
(“How are X and Y the same but different?”) and Self monitoring (“Have we covered all
the ideas we need to?” (Gillies & Haynes, 2010). Scale metric: We code for the presence
or absence of explicit teacher instruction. 0=Absent, 1= Present.
12.4. Active Teacher Management of Group Work. See Galton (2007) on
“maintenance” work that the teacher does to keep the group (or members of the group) on
task. Gillies and Haynes also identify six categories of teacher verbal behaviour that
teachers use to maintain control and manage group work. These behaviours include
demonstrating control (instructing, directing, checking, monitoring) – where the teacher
goes from group to group, quickly, and just checks that students are doing what they are
supposed to do, and doing it correctly. It is still a form of teacher management, but not in a
way that engages students further in their discussion of the task at hand; disciplining (e.g.
reprimands directed at students); encouraging (eg. praises students, facilitates student
interaction); questioning students about their work in the group; and maintaining learning
(i.e. helps students, refers to technical issues on completing the task). Each of these
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indicators should be coded separately in Studio Code and discourse analysis; for the Excel
coding, a simple aggregate Likert Scale will be sufficient. This scale attempts to measure
the intensity or frequency of active teacher management of group work (cf. active or direct
teaching in whole class contexts). A teacher that simply walks around and says little would
be scored 0 or 1; a teacher that sits at their desk while students work would be scored 0; a
teacher that moves from group to group, assesses where they are, and actively summarizes
or scaffolds group work would score a 3.
12b. Normative Structure of Student Talk in Small Group Work
We will use a Likert Scale to capture the degree to which small group work reflects the
following criteria (these overlap in part with the norms for whole class discussion).
12.5. Inclusivity. The number of students who engage in or dominate the work of the
group. Scale metric: The number of students who engage in or dominate the work of the
group. 1= 1 student dominates, 2= 2 students dominate, 3=3 students actively participate,
4= 4 or more students actively participate
12.6. Reciprocity. Reciprocity is a specific form of collective talk and is evident in small
group contexts when students listen to each other, share ideas and consider alternative
viewpoints and do so in a respectful manner (although strictly speaking, mutual respect is
not a requirement of reciprocity) (see Alexander, 2001; Michaels, et al., 2008on talk that is
“accountable to the learning community”). Scale metric: We code for the presence or
absence of reciprocity. 0=Absent, 1=Present
12.7. Impatience/Disrespect. Indicated when the student and teacher don’t listen to each
other respectfully (interrupting each other), talk over each other, call each other names, use
abusive language of any kind or ignore student responses.
12.8. Supportive Environment. There is evidence of trust and mutual respect in that
students show a willingness to take risks, to try out new ideas, to admit that they don’t
know, to think out aloud, not pretend they know the answer when they don’t. Scale metric:
We code for the presence or absence of supportiveness. 0=Absent, 1=Present
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12.9. Shared Decision Making. Students develop group rules together (both rules about
talking and listening, and decisions about procedures, task differentiation). Scale metric:
We code for the presence or absence of shared decision making. 0=Absent, 1=Present
12.10. Maintaining Focus. Students give one another reminders that they need to stay on
task and continue to work as the teacher has asked. Scale metric: We code for the presence
or absence of students maintaining focus. 0=Absent, 1=Present
12.11. Informal S-S support in group work. Students give each other informal help on
their respective tasks; advice, demonstration, telling them the answer, where to find
information, etc (see Galton, 2007). It also includes instances when a student moves from
their own-group to other-group, to see what they are doing. So it’s not just intra-group
support but inter-group support. Scale metric: We code for the presence or absence of
Informal S-S support in group work. 0=Absent, 1=Present
13. MONITORING
The purpose of this scale is to identify the ways in which the teacher monitors student
learning. In principle, teachers should use this information to adjust their teaching
(differentiated instruction) and provide feedback to students about the progress of their
learning (formative assessment or assessment for learning).
Teachers use a range of techniques to monitor student learning. We use some of these below.
Questioning (both closed ad open ended) is also a key technique for monitoring student
understanding; however, we will code teacher questions as part of classroom interaction,
below.
13a. Type
13.1. Supervisory monitoring. Teacher focuses mainly on the learning activities such as
whether students are complying with given instructions for that activity. E.g. Teacher stands
in front of the classroom or moves around and checks whether the students are on-task.
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13.2. Formative monitoring. Teacher seeks to establish or determine the level of student
understanding or skill in a learning task. Formative monitoring can be at the individual, group
or class level. Individual or group monitoring occurs when the teacher moves from student to
student or group to group, listens to student talk, asks questions of them or checks their
work. Teacher can also use record-keeping. E.g. carrying notebooks in which s/he writes
comments and grades as s/he moves around the classroom.
13b. Focus
13.3. Individual. Teacher moves to an individual student to establish or determine the level
of students’ understanding or skill in a learning task.
13.4. Group. Teacher moves to a group to establish or determine the level of students’
understanding or skill in a learning task.
14. FEEDBACK
Reflection upon one’s own teaching, casual observation in a classroom, or systematic
analysis of instruction all indicate that one persistent and pervasive behaviour engaged in by
teachers during the teaching-learning act is verbal feedback behaviour. This behaviour refers
to those oral remarks of teachers that reflect on the adequacy or correctness of the pupil’s
solicited or initiated statements in relation to subject matter development (Storch &
Wigglesworth, 2010). Besides verbal feedback, teachers use written symbols or comments;
gestures or facial expressions to provide feedback to students. The types of feedback teachers
use, the types of pupil response given, how frequently teachers use feedback, the purpose of
the part of the lesson in which the feedback occurs all have a considerable effect on pupils’
learning (Zahorik, 1968). Feedback is one of the most widely used assessment techniques in
the classroom and teachers’ feedback is a substantial indication of what, how much, and how
well their students are learning.
On one end of the assessment continuum is the assessment of learning that gives a summative
judgment of students’ performance. This is the most traditional form of assessment and is
essentially about a student being right or wrong.
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In its most basic form, assessment of learning is an evaluative feedback by which the teacher
endorses or recognizes a good learning performance or highlights a pupil’s incorrect
response. E.g. the teacher says “Yes. That’s right!”, “Keep it up!” or “No, what you said is
wrong!” It can also be an explicit correction that clearly indicates what the student said is
wrong and the teacher may then provide the correct answer to the pupil. For e.g. when a pupil
pronounces the word ‘intermediate’ incorrectly as ‘intermedit’ the teacher says, “No, you
don’t say ‘intermedit’, say ‘intermediate.’ E.g. the pupil says “Smoking should be ban.” and
the teacher says, “You mean ‘Smoking should be banned.’ Yeah?” E.g. the teacher gives
evaluative feedback to a pupil’s good written work by putting a tick mark.
The teacher may provide prescriptive reformulation feedback i.e. the teacher recasts the
pupil’s incorrect utterance without indicating or pointing out that the student made an error.
Such recasts minus the error are sometimes also referred to as “paraphrase” (Lyster & Ranta,
1997). E.g. when the pupil says, “You should go see doctor”, the teacher immediately
reformulates the correct form of the sentence “You should go see the doctor.”
Further ahead on the assessment continuum, is detailed corrective feedback that enables
learners to notice their errors and, subsequently, to produce the correct forms (Storch &
Wigglesworth, 2010). Students receive a detailed error explanation from the teacher. For e.g.
the teacher uses may use the editing symbol ‘sp’ to signal a wrong spelling in the pupil’s
written performance. E.g. the teacher draws attention to grammatical or phonological errors
in the pupil’s utterance. Ferris (2002) suggested that such corrective feedback leads to more
extensive engagement as it calls upon learners to identify the nature of the error, attempt to
supply the correct form and use their own knowledge of grammar and word meanings to offer
suggestions and counter suggestions. Heift (2004) defined learner uptake as learner responses
to corrective feedback. The teacher’s detailed corrective feedback encourages learners’ repair
(Lyster & Ranta, 1997) and pupils’ attempts to correct their mistakes become evident.
Teacher feedback to students is important because it helps students understand their learning
progress: what it is that they do or do not understand or can do. This is particularly true if
teachers provide formative feedback “designed to highlight each student’s strengths and
weaknesses and provide them with feedback that will further their learning” (Earl, 2003 cited
in Cohen, 2008). Formative feedback is at the heart of assessment for learning strategies and
without it, it is very hard for students to design strategies to improve their learning and
develop “meta-cognitive wisdom” (Galton, 2007). The teacher is not merely a judge of
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students’ performance but a critical link who provides the information necessary for students
to move up the learning ladder. Students become better learners as teachers diagnose where
students may have fallen short, why this might be the case and what can be done about it.
At the other end of the continuum, is assessment as learning when students personally
monitor their learning and use the feedback from this monitoring “to make adjustments,
adaptations, and even major changes in what they understand” (Earl, 2003 cited in Cohen,
2008). Teachers reflect on their teaching strategies and make adjustments to achieve their
learning goals. Assessment as learning indicates a high level of uptake and long-term
retention of teacher feedback by learners through extensive engagement with the feedback.
Quite understandably, assessment as learning would not be evident over the course of lesson
or even a unit. Thus, we will code for assessment of learning (evaluative, prescriptive
reformulation, and detailed corrective feedback) and assessment for learning (formative
feedback) only.
We have divided the feedback scale into two components: who is the audience for the
feedback, and what type of feedback is given.
14a. Feedback audience
14.1. Feedback to individual students individually. How often the teacher addresses an
individual
student
individually
and
provides
evaluation
to
his/her
responses/behaviours/performance.
14.2. Feedback to groups. How often the teacher addresses a group and provides
evaluation to their responses/behaviour/performance.
14.3. Feedback to whole class. How often the teacher responds to any performance of
learning (whether by an individual student, a group or the class as a whole) to the class as a
whole (i. e. when the audience is the whole class, and not just an individual student).
14.4. Student to student feedback. How often students respond to any performance of
learning (whether by an individual student, a group or the class as a whole) when the
audience is the whole class, and not just an individual student or group. Can be teacher or
student initiated.
14b. Feedback types
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Assessment of learning
14.5. Evaluative feedback. Teacher/Student uses evaluative language, E.g. “excellent”,
“good”, “well done” without any explanation, detail or guidance for future learning.
Teachers alternatively might nod or shake their head to indicate their approval or rejection
to the given response. Teacher repeats student response/statement to reinforce the class’s
recognition of in/correct answer. Teacher endorses when the response is correct or
highlights the mistake when the response is incorrect.
14.6. Prescriptive reformulation feedback. Teacher/Student reformulates student’s
incorrect answer, response without any explanation or elaboration of what was wrong with
the student’s response.. E.g. Student says “I go to zoo yesterday.” and teacher corrects the
student “I went to the zoo yesterday.”
14.7. Detailed corrective feedback. Teacher/student gives detailed responses that draw
pupils’ attention to the errors in their verbal or written performance. The teacher’s editing
and correction engages the pupil and leads the pupil to the correct or desired response.
Pupils’ attempts to change/correct their current work and improve their learning
performance become evident.
Assessment for learning
14.8.Formative feedback. The teacher explains and elaborates upon the strengths and
weaknesses in the pupil’s learning performance. Pupils use the teacher’s detailed feedback
to improve not only their performances but also their learning strategies Formative feedback
may not be easily evident during a lesson and coders would need to look for evidence of
learner uptake, i.e pupils’ adjustment of learning strategies in order to code for formative
feedback.
15. LEARNING SUPPORT
“Learning Support” is a broader term than the well known metaphor of “scaffolding,” a term
invented by Bruner (1966) and later developed by Wood et al (1976) to describe the role
teachers (or adults/experts generally) could play in helping children or novices work out
problems for themselves in what Vygotsky termed the “zone of proximal development”
(ZPD) in specific, tightly-defined, learning situations in which an adult or more
knowledgeable peer controls or manipulates “those elements that are initially beyond the
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learners capacity, thus permitting him to concentrate upon and complete those elements that
are within his range of competence” (Woods et al., 1976, p90). The idea of a pedagogical
scaffold is analogous to the idea of using scaffolding around a building when it is under
construction (or under repair) in order to provide a safe environment for the workers. In
classrooms, scaffolding usually involves the teacher providing (expert) assistance based on
the perceived needs of students as they work on activities. Generally speaking, scaffolding
captures, as Mercer and Littleton (2007, p.15) put it, “the sense in which, through
encouragement, focusing, demonstrations, reminders and suggestions, a learner can be
supported in mastering a task or achieving understanding.” Not all help that a teacher gives a
student, however, is necessarily scaffolding. The essence of scaffolding is the “sensitive,
supportive intervention” of a more expert or competent person “in the progress of a learner
who is actively involved in some specific task, but is not quite able to manage the task alone”
without a little bit of support from the teacher or more competent peer (Mercer and Littleton,
2007, p.18). For example, a teacher might encourage pupils to improve their vocabulary by
learning how to describe an object and might offer the pupils cue cards with words such as
colour, shape and size printed on each of them; in describing an object the pupils are
expected to say something about colour, shape and size. It is important, however, to scaffold
in a way that allows children to be inventive and creative, and not restrict their agency to
figure out the problem for themselves. That is, scaffolds should not over-determine the
outcome (after Galton, Learning and Teaching in Primary Schools, p.73). Critically, however,
scaffolding should be temporary. That is, as students become better able to work
independently in solving problems and undertaking activities, the scaffolding can be
gradually withdrawn or relocated to other areas of learning. Effective scaffolding, therefore,
is temporary and constrained, reducing “the scope for failure in the task while encouraging
efforts to advance” (Mercer and Littleton 2007, p.15).
This construction of scaffolding is interesting theoretically but very difficult to capture in
measurements of classroom work at the phase, lesson and even unit level. A learning support
is an intervention (a resource, an idea, a suggestion, a proposition) by a teacher that is
intended to assist learners in the successful completion of a task or activity. Our scale
identifies the type of support, guidance and direction a teacher provides in two ways: (i)
before an activity begins (planned and fixed) and/or (ii) as an activity is being done
(contextual / flexible). Obviously both kinds of learning support might be present. We will
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examine the covariance of the scores to construct a picture of how teachers use learning
support.
15.1. Planned and fixed. Teacher has decided in advance the kind of support needed by
students to enhance students’ grasp of the content and thus, to enable them to complete a
stated learning activity (irrespective of whether it is needed or not). This kind of support may
vary and can include logistical guidance (E.g. Teacher shows students how to reference
material in the school library), procedures (E.g. Teacher gives guidance about how to utilise
available resources, materials and tools) or strategies (E.g. Teacher gives guidance about
alternative strategies or approaches that assist the students).
15.1.1. Logistical learning support. Teacher gives explicit guidance about how to use
available or necessary tools and resources in the completion of an assigned task/activity. For
example: “This is how you use a protractor to measure angles”, “This is how to look up
words in a dictionary”. We will code categorically for its absence or presence (0,1).
15.1.2. Procedural learning support. Teacher gives explicit guidance to students about how
to do an assigned task/activity usually before it begins. For example: “Follow these steps
when doing a quadratic equation” or “Class, remember that when writing a narrative essay,
make sure you have these parts: plot, character(s), setting, climax, resolution and coda”. We
will code categorically for its absence or presence (0,1).
15.1.3. Strategic learning support. Teacher gives explicit guidance in alternative solutions,
strategies or options to aid planning and decision making usually before a task/activity
begins. For example: “When you get stuck in reading comprehension, first try guessing the
meaning of unknown words from the context (paragraph) in which they appear”, “Check the
validity of the material on that Website before using it” or “If you can’t solve the problem by
drawing models, then try algebra”. We will code categorically for its absence or presence
(0,1).
15.2. Contextual and flexible. Teacher monitors and talks to students either working
individually or in groups about their work. During this talk the teacher supplies logistical,
procedural or strategic support on a needs (just-in-time) basis in order to enhance their grasp
of the content and thus enable their completion of the given task/activity. This kind of support
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is inherently contingent and is usually based on how well students are progressing (or not) in
a given activity.
15.2.1. Logistical learning support. Teacher gives explicit guidance about how to use
available or necessary tools and resources in the completion of an assigned task/activity. For
example: “This is how you use a protractor to measure angles”, “This is how to look up
words in a dictionary”. We will code categorically for its absence or presence (0,1).
15.2.2. Procedural learning support. Teacher gives explicit guidance to students about how
to do an assigned task/activity usually before it begins. For example: “Follow these steps
when solving a quadratic equation” or “Class, remember that when writing a narrative essay,
make sure you have these parts: plot, character(s), setting, climax, resolution and coda”. We
will code categorically for its absence or presence (0,1).
15.2.3. Strategic learning support. Teacher gives explicit guidance in alternative solutions,
strategies or options to aid planning and decision making usually before a task/activity
begins. For example: “When you get stuck in reading comprehension, first try guessing the
meaning of unknown words from the context (paragraph) in which they appear”, “Check the
validity of the material on that Website before using it” or “If you can’t solve the problem by
drawing models, then try algebra”. We will code categorically for its absence or presence
(0,1).
16. LOCUS OF EPISTEMIC AUTHORITY
Teachers implicitly adopt an epistemic stance towards the locus or location of epistemic
authority – where does epistemic authority lie in particular exchanges in this classroom? Is
epistemic authority, positional, procedural or artefactual? Does the teacher implicitly or
explicitly suggest to students that epistemic authority lies in what the teacher declares, no
matter what other sources say? Or does s/he privilege different sources of authority (The text?
Hard scientific evidence?) that trump all other sources of knowledge claims? This is a key
feature of the epistemic climate of the classroom. In general, we would expect that the default
epistemic stance will be that the locus of epistemic authority is the teacher’s word, unless the
teacher explicitly refers to/uses another source. The following categories are not mutually
exclusive. The default code is nil.
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16.1. Textbook. (Artefactual). This includes any books that are recommended by the school
authorities as part of the syllabus. E.g. Teacher tells the students to refer to page 78 of the
textbook for the answer.
16.2. Other printed materials. (Artefactual). This refers to any other text materials that the
teacher distributes. E.g. Handouts, worksheet, newspaper. This does not include religious
text.
16.3. Digital tool. Artefactual. This includes social medium (E.g. Facebook, discussion
forums), DVD/VCD, radio and television. E.g. Teacher asks students to refer to the digital
tool for instructions on how to proceed in a task.
16.4. Teacher. Positional.
16.5 Teacher Appeal to secular or religious authority. Positional. Teacher refers to
quotations from people of authority or from religious text, E.g. “The principal
said…”
(secular), “The Pope said…”, “The Koran says…” (religious).
16.6 Teacher Appeal to Evidence. Procedural. Teacher refers to another source of
knowledge to back up her claims. E.g. “I read it in a scientific journal,” or “I saw it on the TV
news last night,” or “I saw it with my own eyes.” Essentially the teacher is asking the student
to trust the veracity of the knowledge claim make. This is different from #16.7 where the
teacher explicitly employs, or appeals to, domain specific procedures to establish or prove the
veracity of the knowledge claim rather than a general vernacular claim to truthfulness or
veracity.
16.7 Teacher Appeal to Domain-specific procedures. Procedural. The teacher makes
explicit appeal to a domain specific procedure – experiment or observation in science, rules
of logical entailment in mathematics, hermeneutical principles of interpretation in English.
16.8. Expression of opinion by individual student, group or class. Student opinion without
appeal to procedural norms, evidence and standards. The teacher accepts students’ opinion as
the authority even though it is not accompanied with evidence.
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16.9. Expression of judgment by individual student, group or class. Student judgment
with appeal to procedural norms, evidence and standards. The teacher accepts students’
opinion as the authority when accompanied with evidence.
17. STUDENT AGENCY/CO-REGULATION
The purpose of this scale is to measure the extent to which the teacher offers opportunities to
students to exercise autonomy over the conditions of their learning. Student agency is
important because of its role at the individual level in developing the capacity for
metacognitive self regulation and at the organizational level, for facilitating the organization
of the classroom as a co-regulated learning community (on this, see Dylan Wiliam in
Keeping Learning on Track). Cazden points out in her chapter in Mercier and Hodgkinson
(Exploring Talk in Schools) that a form of student agency – discursive and epistemic
agency—is also supported when the teacher permits or encourages articulation and discussion
of alternative perspectives in the classroom (ie., epistemic pluralism, coded separately in
scale #26)
17.1. Classroom norms/procedures. Students help establish classroom rules. E.g. Students
voluntarily suggest that they will take turns to help out the teacher to setup the projector
every week.
17.2. Learning goals. Students set up their own learning goals for the lesson. E.g. Students
voluntarily suggest the learning objectives that they would like to achieve for the day or next
lesson.
17.3. Learning activities/instructional activities. Students decide on the specific
tasks/activities that they would like to do. E.g. Teacher asks students, “Do you want to read
this book again or discuss about this book?” and students decide toread the book.
17.4. Topics. Students help choose the topic to be taught by teacher. E.g. Students ask
teacher to go over Chapter One of the textbook.
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17.5. Lesson structure and sequence. Students help decide the organization of the lesson
and how the tasks/activities are sequenced. E.g. Teacher asks “Do you want to watch a video
clip first or do worksheet?” and students decide to work on the worksheet first
17.6. Design of Assessment tasks. Students are involved in developing tasks in which they
should be assessed. E.g. Students suggest that their project should be assessed through a
group presentation.
17.7. Assessment criteria and standards. Students help decide what learning aspects of the
topics/activities/tasks that they should be evaluated on. E.g. Students decide that the quality
of the PowerPoint slides and the clarity of the speaker should be assessed in a group
presentation.
17.8. Resources. Students have a say in what resources are needed.
17.9. Discursive and Epistemic agency. Students have an opportunity to discuss and debate
alternative perspectives, explanations, reasons for an argument or position in a learning
environment that supports epistemic pluralism.
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THIRD PASS – INTELLECTUAL QUALITY OF CLASSROOM KNOWLEDGE
WORK
18-25. CLASSROOM TALK IN WHOLE CLASSROOM DISCUSSIONS OR
SMALL GROUP WORK
Broadly, the purpose of this group of scales is to assess the degree to which teachers
develop or scaffold a form of classroom talk that Alexander terms “dialogue”— a form
of classroom talk that purposively builds student understanding over the course of the
lesson in a process that Alexander exhibits evidence of reciprocity and “cumulation.”
The process of cumulation is at the heart of “knowledge building,” “knowledge
generation” or “constructing knowledge.” Alexander suggests that dialogue involves
purposively working towards achieving a common understanding or shared meaning
through structured, sequenced, chained, cumulative questioning and discussion that
focuses on exploring and developing meaning, understanding and reasons, guides and
prompts, reduces choices/narrows possibilities, minimizes risk and error, and expedites
the handover of concepts and principles. What is crucial is that the sequence facilitates
development of meaning and understanding and deepens or moves forward the
argument, story or explanation—that there is evidence of steady development and
deepening of student understanding over the course of the lesson which constructs a
shared dialogue about the issue, story, explanation, puzzle. Consequently, “cumulation”
occurs when “teachers and students build on their own or others ideas and chain the
claims into coherent lines of thinking and enquiry” (p105). Unless cumulation occurs,
classroom talk remains “discussion” rather than “dialogue.” Indeed, Mercer and
Littleton (2007, p.41-42) in their analysis of Alexander’s account of dialogical teaching
emphasis three key features:

Questions are structured so as to provoke thoughtful answers

Answers provoke further questions and are seen as the building blocks of
dialogue rather than its terminal point

Individual teacher-pupil and pupil-pupil exchanges are chained into coherent
lines of enquiry rather than left stranded and disconnected
More broadly, Mercer and Littleton (2007, 42) emphasize four features of dialogical
teaching:
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
Students are given opportunities and encouragement to question, state points of
view and comment on ideas and issues that arise in lessons

The teacher engages in discussions with students which explore and support the
development of their understanding of content

The teacher takes student contributions into account in developing the subject
theme of the lesson and in devising activities that enable students to pursue
their understanding themselves, through talk and other activity

The teacher uses talk to provide a cumulative, continuing, contextual frame to
enable students involvement with the new knowledge they are encountering.
Importantly, teacher questions are a critical feature of classroom dialogue. There is a
place for both open and closed questions in good pedagogy: it is just that good teaching
depends on ensuring that there teachers ask a sufficient number of open ended questions
– and ask them at strategic moments – in order to develop or move a dialogue on.
Mercer and Littleton (2007, 53) point out, for example, that teacher questions in a
classroom “are a natural and necessary part of classroom dialogue, and the relative
extent to which teachers use questions does not distinguish very good teachers from
those who are less effective.” What matters is the kind of question teachers ask and how
well they use questions to support or scaffold a dialogue with students that advances
student understanding. They report that the most effective teachers are those who
“regularly use dialogue to find out what students already know, to support and guide
and the children’s activity, to monitor their engagement with the progress of a topic and
to assess the development of their understanding. They also encourage more active and
extended participation in dialogue on the part of the students. They use dialogue to
effectively establish and maintain a collective [ZPD] for the duration of an activity…”
In reporting the results of their own research of how student-teacher dialogue promotes
student learning, Mercer and Littleton (2007, p.40; see also 44, 47) report that the most
effective teachers had the following characteristics:
1. They used question and answer sequences not just to test knowledge, but also
to guide the development of understanding. These teachers often used
questions to discover the initial levels of pupil understanding and adjusted
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their teaching accordingly, and asked “why” questions to get pupils to reason
and reflect about what they were doing
2. They taught not just ‘subject content’ but also procedures for solving
problems and making sense of experience. This included teachers
demonstrating the use of problem solving strategies for children, explaining to
children the meaning and purpose of classroom activities, and using their
interactions with students as opportunities for encouraging children to make
explicit their own thought processes.
3. They treated learning as a social, communicative process… These teachers
used questions more for encouraging pupils to give reasons for their views,
organizing interchanges of ideas and mutual support amongst pupils and
generally encouraging pupils to make a more active, vocal role in classroom
events.
From a measurement perspective, dialogue is a very general concept: for coding
purposes we need quite concrete and specific indicators of dialogue. To develop these,
we have to draw on Douglas Barnes and his notion of “working on understanding” in
what he calls “exploratory talk.” For Core 2, we will term this kind of classroom talk
“understanding talk” (UT). For Core 2, UT is indicated by evidence of one or more
forms of classroom exchange: clarifying meaning, inviting alternative perspectives or
solutions, offering reasons and explanations, making connections and establishing
relationships and discussing epistemic standards. When there is evidence in a classroom
of UT or engaging in meta-talk (talking about talk), we have an instance of dialogue.
The key claim here is that classroom talk is a form of “discussion” (or what we will
term “sharing talk”) rather than “dialogue” unless there is evidence of reciprocity,
purposefulness and cumulation that suggests deepening understanding. However,
while we might be able to identify evidence of reciprocity and even cumulation at the
phase level, its more likely that we will not be able to conclude that we have seen
evidence of purposefulness until the end of the lesson.
[Note Alexander’s intellectual debt to Mikhail Bakhtin. For a very useful discussion of
some of the broader conceptual and normative issues attached to the idea of “dialogue,”
see Burbeles (Dialogue in Teaching: Theory and Practice, 1993), Burbeles and Bruce
(2001) and, especially, Lefstein (2006) for a critique of romantic and idealistic
constructions of “dialogue.”]
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Our earlier research suggests that dialogical or understanding talk is likely to be quite
rare in Singapore. Rather, we are much more likely to find evidence of “performative
talk”—talk (questions, responses) that focuses on getting the right answer (Barnes
terms this “presentational” talk). We are also likely to find evidence of sharing talk,
particularly in primary school.
Because of its cumulative character, the existence of dialogue is more likely to be
evident at the lesson rather than the phase level. Consequently, we will code for
evidence of dialogue at the lesson level only; at the phase level, we will focus on
indicators of understanding talk only.
Lefstein (2006) provides a useful account of what happens when teachers abandon their
role as a teacher and become a “facilitator” instead, essentially abandoning (or at least
suspending) both their pedagogical and epistemic authority that is necessary for
purposeful, cumulative dialogue to occur, and identifies the key functions that a teacher
needs to perform in order for this to happen:
“Consider, for instance, replacing the “teacher” role with that of “facilitator”. The
facilitator retains teacherly authority to allocate turns, but abrogates
epistemological authority by not participating in the dialogue as a contributor of
content (cf. Ranciere, 1991). While this solution may be appropriate to certain
settings (E.g. dispute settlement), in schooling it becomes problematic. In the
school context, a teacher’s ignorance or refusal to contribute to the discussion (“in
order to give everyone else a chance”) seems contrived. Facilitation thus suggests
to pupils that “now we are engaged in a frivolous exercise” – otherwise, the
teacher would say what she or he thought.” / So, instead of trying to eliminate the
teacher’s role, the question is how the teacher’s role and pupil roles can be
structured in order to allow dialogue to unfold. The various functions teachers
and/or other participants may be called upon to fulfill include:

Establishing (and preserving) conditions for dialogue, including
introducing and asserting appropriate communicative norms and rules;

Opening up content (see discussion of curricular content and objectives
below);

Maintaining the flow, direction and cohesion of the conversation;
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
Encouraging broad participation, and insuring fairness in access to the
floor;

Probing others’ thinking;

Protecting “weak”—either socially and/or academically – pupils;
Undermining own content authority by bringing dissenting voices into the
classroom (see Burbules, 1993: 33-4);
Exemplifying in own actions dialogic dispositions, such as sensitivity,
humility, respect, reasonableness and openness;

Inviting pupil criticism of and participation in the way the dialogue is
directed.
Note that these tasks often conflict with one another, and teachers are called upon
to navigate between inherent role conflicts and dialogical tensions. For example,
opening up curricular content may involve denying pupils the floor and
interrupting lengthy speech. Protecting pupils’ social needs may involve not
probing their thinking (in public). Moreover, tasks involving teacher direction of
dialogue may be antithetical to maintaining its flow.” (Lefstein 2006)
In coding classroom talk, what unit of analysis is selected is very important. For our
Excel coding, except for #18 and #23, we have decided to code teacher questions and
student responses separately. When we switch to coding with Studio Code, we shift the
unit of analysis to T-S exchanges more broadly and look closely at the pattern of
interaction during classroom talk. For now though, given the complexity of coding for
exchanges rather than questions and responses separately, we will stick to coding them
separately for five of the six scales (#19, #20, #21, #22 and #24). For the scale #23, we
will focus on S-S exchanges as a whole in small group settings.
#18: The Structure of Classroom Talk
#19: Teacher questions in whole class discussions (except #18.1)
#20: Student responses in whole class discussions
#21: Student questions in whole class discussions
#22: Teacher Questions/Talk in small group work
#23: Student talk in small group work
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#24: Student questions, if any, to their teacher while doing small group work.
We have developed a six-part taxonomy of classroom talk that we will employ in each
of the scales above:

Organizational Talk

Disputational Talk

Performative Talk

Sharing Talk / Discussion

Understanding Talk / Dialogue
One of the great risks of coding classroom talk in this way in order is that in doing so
we will decontextualize the talk and ignore much of the implicit purposes or latent
functions of classroom talk beyond engaging in knowledge talk, meaning making and
deepening understanding, including “the maintenance of social identities, expressions
of power and solidarity, emotional ties amongst speakers, and so on” (Mercer and
Littleton 2007, p.62). Coding then might well result in a troubling loss of meaning, and
meaning making exchanges, since these latent properties help shape the meaning
making that takes place in a conversation. However, coding for these additional
properties is extremely difficult, if not impossible, and we need to focus our efforts on
the reasonably explicit meaning making that takes place with respect to the knowledge
work underway in the classroom and the ostensible focus of the talk.
1.
Organizational Talk. Organizational talk happens when teachers and student
discuss the organisation of the phase and/or lesson, framing of activities,
instructions, set up, moving of bodies, space, what’s coming next, transitions,
school/classroom administration, upcoming school events, etc. Setting up of
equipment, tidying of classroom. These are not understanding or exploratory
questions. Rather, they are operational task-specific questions, especially in the
individual context: E.g. “Do we put the date in the top right-hand corner?’ “Do I
begin on a new page?” Should we file this entry in our English Journals?.
2.
Disputational Talk. Mercier and Littleton (2007) describe disputational talk as
“talk characterized by disagreement and individualized decision making. There are
few attempts to pool resources, to offer constructive criticism or make suggestions
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(p.58). Disputational talk is also characterized by short exchanges consisting of
assertions and counter-assertions (“yes, it is,” “no its not,” “I’m right and your
wrong,” “No, I’m right and your wrong,” “You don’t know what you are talking
about,” etc etc). Disputational talk is unlikely to be found in teacher led whole class
discussions and far more likely to be found in poorly structured and weakly normed
small group work rather than whole class discussion. However, just to be sure, we
have included it in all forms of exchange where students might possibly engage in
disputational talk.
3.
Performative Talk. Performative talk (or in Mercer’s terms “presentational” talk)
is talk that focuses on the use of closed questions by the teacher to test student
knowledge and/or understanding and the efforts of students to give the right answer
(a performative demonstration of knowledge). Closed questions are questions that
have a single right answer. Closed questions typically focus on propositional
knowledge and are typically located in IRE sequences and are characteristic of
pedagogies that focus on transmission and reproduction. In effect, it is talk
dominated by the logic of transmission and reproduction.
4.
Sharing Talk (Discussion). Sharing talk is classroom talk in which a teacher opens
up discussion to alternative perspectives and students respond by stating their
position but do not respond to, or build on, previous statement of belief. That is,
sharing talk lacks two key features of understanding talk/dialogue – reciprocity
and cumulation. Instead, the talk consists of a sequence of statements by students
in which they state their beliefs but do not particularly respond to or engage the
arguments of other students in a way which moves the discussion forward in a
cumulative fashion. It is as though the students are talking in parallel worlds rather
than sharing a common discursive space. Sharing talk generally happens when the
teacher asks a sharing question that is essentially an invitation for someone else to
offer an opinion or state a belief (“What do others think?”) rather than to develop
the argument further or deepen understanding, explore an idea, evaluate reasons or
evidence. Students typically respond with statements of belief or position —“I
think that ….””I believe that …” “My view is that ….”—and do so in a way that
essentially ignores what previous students have said. Again, critically, in sharing
talk, there is little or no evidence of reciprocity and cumulation. Rather, the focus is
more likely to be on expanding participation and inclusivity rather on exploring
issues in a systematic, purposeful way that leads to deepening understanding.
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Sharing talk is distinctive of what Alexander terms “discussion” rather than
“dialogue” which requires “reciprocity,” “purposefulness” and “cumulation.”
It is important to note that while sharing talk does not constitute dialogue, it can
often lead to the development of a dialogue in the class (RAs will need to judge
exercise discretion whether sharing talk develops into dialogue.) Often, however,
teachers are content to simply encourage – or allow—classroom talk that lacks
reciprocity, purposefulness, conceptual development and cumulation either because
they
want
(for
a
range
of
possible
reasons)
to
encourage
greater
inclusivity/participation or they have little or no idea of how to transform a
discussion into a dialogue. In those forms of sharing talk the teacher essentially
abandons discursive authority and suspends epistemic judgment, making little or no
effort to shape student talk into dialogical talk. Sharing talk is likely to be coindicated by #2 value in scale #11.3
5.
Understanding Talk (Dialogue). Understanding talk is talk that goes somewhere
conceptually by focusing on developing student understanding or meaning
making. In particular, UT shows signs of purposefulness, reciprocity and above
all, cumulation. Unlike Performative Talk, it is likely to begin with a teacher
asking an open question – questions that do not have a single right answer but
allow students to interpret, explore, explain alternative answers or viewpoints in
“exploratory talk” (Barnes). For example: “What do you mean?” “Why do you
think that?” “Good: Have you considered X instead?” “If that is the case, how
come so and so happens?” “I don’t get that. What do you mean?” “Is X an
example of something of what you are saying?” “If you changed X in your
statement (where X is one element in the statement) would you get the same
result?” “Is X like Z?” (where Z is an analogy). “Can you explain that in more
detail?”2 Understanding talk happens when teacher student exchanges focus on
exploring ideas, encouraging discussion, deepening meaning, developing
understanding in an environment that is epistemically respectful, tolerant and
principled. Usually, but not necessarily, UT happens when teachers use
2
Note Galton (1999) classified teacher questions in terms of how teachers reacted to student
responses (accepting alternative answers) rather than to the epistemic nature of the question (open,
closed). See Hardman in Mercer and Hodgkinson, 136. See also Nystrand on “uptake questions” that
incorporate student responses into follow up question (Hardman 142-143). See also Wells in Mercer
and Hodgkinson, 173, on importance of open questions to exploratory dialogue, and Sohmer,
Michaels and Resnick (2009) on “accountable talk”.
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appropriate open questions to scaffold the talk by asking students to clarify,
connect, explain or justify knowledge claims.
While the taxonomy of classroom talk below does not prescribe a necessary
sequence or logic of forms of talk from sharing talk to epistemic talk, the taxonomy
is putatively hierarchical, ascending from sharing talk to epistemic talk. (Whether
this proves to be true will be a matter of empirical analysis later). Understanding
talk is particularly evident when the teacher invites (and students respond) students
to engage in “learning talk” (Alexander, Essay, 135) that employs “learning verbs”:
to share, to clarify, to narrate, to explain, to question, to analyze, to speculate, to
imagine, to explore, to evaluate, to argue, to justify, to discuss, to negotiate, and so
on. Importantly, as we see below, these are not cognitively or epistemically equal
and should be differentiated accordingly (cf Alexander). Nystrand’s comment that
“what ultimately counts is the extent to which the instruction requires students to
think, and not just report someone else’s thinking” (Alexander, Essay, p.135) is an
important indicator of UT.
More broadly, UT is a key component of, and crucial to, a pedagogy that focuses
on
“knowledge
building”
(Berieter
and
Scardamalia),
knowledge
generation/knowledge construction rather than knowledge transmission and does so
in a way that recognizes that the knowledge needs to be accountable to relevant
public, epistemic standards of proof, truth, reliability, validity, reasonableness, etc.
(See Michaels and Resnick on accountable talk; or Mercer, The Guided
Construction of Knowledge, p.77ff). Mercer and Littleton (2007, pp. 66) also
emphasize the broader social relevance and utility of what they term “exploratory”
(=understanding) talk. It represents, they suggest, “a distinctive social mode of
thinking – a way of using language which is not only the embodiment of critical
thinking, but which is also essential for successful participation in educated
communities of discourse (such as those associated with the practice of law,
science, technology, the arts, business administration and politics). Exploratory talk
therefore typifies language that embodies certain principles, notably those of
accountability, of clarity, of constructive criticism and responsiveness to wellargued proposals…”
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We will broadly code understanding questions and responses separately rather than
as unitary exchanges that will be the focus when we turn to coding in Studio Code.
We will code for seven types of understanding talk:
i.
Clarifying Talk
ii.
Procedural Talk
iii.
Connecting Talk
iv.
Explanatory Talk
v.
Epistemic Talk
vi.
Framing Talk
vii.
Reframing Talk (aka “weaving” or “shuttling” talk)
i. Clarifying Talk. Clarifying talk is a form of “exploratory” (Barnes) classroom talk
that happens when teachers ask particular kind of questions that invites students
to clarify what they mean in an earlier statement. This can happen, for example,
when a teacher restates what a student has just said (“so let me see if I’ve got
your thinking right: Your saying that XXX? right” with space for student to
confirm; when a teacher asks a student to restate or expand their responses to
earlier question (“I’m not sure I understand you: Could you say that again?”
“What do you mean?” “Describe in your own words”); when a teacher asks a
student to restate what another student has said (“Ee Ling, what do you think
Peter means?” “Could you repeat that in your own words”). It is talk that seeks to
probe deeper in order to get conceptual clarity about the meaning of an idea,
claim or statement. Michaels and Resnick (107) identify a range of indicators of
clarifying talk, including various forms of “revoicing.” Clarifying talk is at the
heart of what Barnes terrmed “exploratory talk” and is typical of conceptual
knowledge work (#20).
ii. Procedural talk. Procedural talk is talk that focuses on how students complete a
process or task specific to a discipline, subject or area of study. It can refer to
quite general procedural issues – methods of inquiry, particular methodologies,
genres of work – or, more narrowly, to task-specific scripts, rules, procedures,
strategies, algorithms, heuristics involved in solving a problem or doing
knowledge work. Procedural questions are generally how rather than why or what
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questions. In Mathematics, for example, where there this generally a lot of
procedural talk, procedural talk is often promoted by a question from a teacher to
students (“What’s the standard procedure, algorithm or rule for solving this kind
of problem?” “Are there alternative procedures for solving this kind of problem?”
“Are there better procedures for solving this problem?”) or by a procedural
question from a puzzled student to a teacher (eg. “I don’t understand how to
solve this problem?” “What’s the best way to solve this problem?”). In English,
on the other hand, procedural talk often begins with directives about the correct
and clear application of grammar rules and text structures often irrespective of
context, purpose or audience. Subsequently, it may (but not always) develop into
questions that ask students to consider alternative approaches to undertaking a
context-specific task (E. g. “What’s the most effective way of organizing an essay
on a topic of this kind for this kind of audience?” "What’s the standard rule for
positioning verbs and propositions?” “How does an adjective qualify a verb?”
“How do the literary devices of plot, character, imagery, setting, theme and
narrative structure help us to understand a play”). Importantly, both in
Mathematics and English, procedural talk is often closely associated with
conditional knowledge – that is, knowledge of when to use specific procedures
or algorithms. Thus, procedural talk often includes talk about when as well as
how. Likewise, in both Mathematics and English, conceptual knowledge is
often closely linked to procedural knowledge: knowing what procedure or rule to
apply and when to apply it presumes some measure of conceptual understanding
of the problem – otherwise one would not know what procedure or rule to use
and when to use it and the choice of procedure or rule a student uses would be
more or less random. Moreover, research on the development of expertise
suggests that gaining procedural proficiency not only (and even necessarily)
reflects some level of conceptual understanding but can also enhance or deepen it:
for example, knowing how and when to do X (where X is a procedure) can help a
student understand the relationship between X and Y (where Y is another
procedure suitable for solving a different of problem) and therefore the conceptual
differences between different kinds of problems – that is, conceptual knowledge.
Consequently, although we want to maintain the distinction between conceptual
knowledge and procedural knowledge, for taxonomic purposes we will consider
procedural talk an aspect of understanding talk rather than an alternative category
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of talk. Indeed, we suspect that one important reason that East Asian students do
as well as they do in international assessments is that because the level of drill and
practice requires the use (and therefore choice) of different procedures and to
some extent adaptations of such procedures they have (rather than simpler
memorization, as some advocates of East Asian pedagogy argue) enhances
conceptual understanding and expertise.
iii. Connecting Talk. Connecting talk is a relatively strong form of “exploratory”
classroom talk in which teacher asks students to make connections, explore
relationships with other concepts, to think of counterexamples, to explain away
counterexamples
(“Good: have you considered X?” “Is X an example of
something of what you are doing?” “Is X an example of something of what you
are saying?” “If you changed X in your statement (where X is one element in the
statement) would you get the same result or meaning?” “What if you changed X
to Y?” “What other solutions are there to this problem?” “Could we solve this
problem differently?” “Is it possible to improve, expand or build on this solution /
statement /argument in some way?” “Can we represent/state this problem
differently?” “How are X and Y the same but different?”. Students respond
appropriately. Can be highly iterative. Can be closely linked to either clarification
questions or explanation questions but does not necessarily involve either. Nor
does it necessarily have to be rigorous (indeed for the teacher to insist on rigor
might well inhibit students from taking risks and trying ideas out). Connecting
talk is typical of conceptual knowledge work (#26.3). When connecting talk is
talk that moves back and forward between ordinary, everyday vernacular
understandings and language, on the one hand, and technical, abstract, domain
specific (disciplinary) talk on the other, the connecting talk ought to be coded as
“reframing talk.” (See below).
iv. Explanatory Talk. Explanatory talk is a relatively demanding form of classroom
talk in which teacher asks students to give reasons or explanations for the initial
statement (“Susan: why do you think that?” “Richard: what evidence do you for
that claim?” How did you arrive at that conclusion?”), or asks students to evaluate
the adequacy or strength of another student’s statement (“Jennifer: do you agree
or disagree with what Helen has said and why?” “Paul: How strong is Peter’s
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explanation or reasoning?”). Explanatory talk is a key indicator or what Michels
and Reznick term “talk that is accountable” (accountability talk) to the standards
of “rigorous thinking” or reasoning in which the teacher emphasizes the
importance of “logical connections and the drawing of reasonable conclusions.”
In addition, we might think of explanatory talk as talk that is “accountable to
knowledge” (Michaels and Resnick) in that it is “talk that is explicitly based on a
body of knowledge that is public or accessible to the group as a whole” (in other
words, it is not a mere expression of personal opinion). In talk that is accountable
to knowledge then, “speakers make an effort to get their facts right and make
explicit the evidence behind their claims or explanations.” Explanatory talk is
typical of conceptual knowledge work (#26.3) (See Mercer and Littleton, 2007,
pp.63-64 for a discussion).
v. Epistemic Talk. Epistemic talk is an even more demanding form of classroom
talk in which the teacher discusses or asks students to identify and discuss the
domain specific epistemic criteria and standards or norms to be used to establish
the truth value, rigor, validity, reliability, authenticity, aesthetic quality or
reasonableness of a knowledge claim (“Peter, how would you know that that
statement is true?” “Is there sufficient evidence to believe X?” “What makes this
a reasonable claim?” “what makes a poem affecting”) and students attempt to do
so. In the natural science, epistemic talk focuses on the reliability and validity of
the evidence (data) used to establish the truth value of a statement or knowledge
claim. In mathematics, epistemic talk focuses on the logical rules of entailment
that mathematicians use to establish the validity and rigor. In English, epistemic
talk focuses on the criteria and standards used to interpret a text and make
meaning, or to convey meaning in some form of text production. Epistemic talk is
different from explanatory talk in that it focuses not on the causal argument as
such but on the criteria and standards we use to evaluate the adequacy of the
causal argument (or any other kind of argument). Epistemic talk is typical of
epistemic knowledge work (#26.5).
vi. Framing Talk. Framing talk is talk typically undertaken by the teacher when s/he
steps back from an ongoing substantive conversation or anticipates an imminent
conversation to frame, interpret, situate or explain the classroom talk that has
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preceded or will follow ("so what we been talking about is this…," "what we are
going to talk about is this…") not at a topical level but at a conceptual, procedural
or epistemic level.
Framing talk can also include what is essentially meta-talk
that occurs when the teacher steps back from the on-going talk and is classroom
talk in which the teacher asks questions or makes a statement about the nature of
the talk that has happened in the classroom. This might involve, for example, the
teacher stepping back from a series of exchanges and asking students to think and
talk about the nature of their talk, whether it is going around and around in circles
or making progress towards understanding (Pierce and Gilles in Mercer and
Hodgkinson, Exploring Talk in Classrooms, 51). Or the teacher might identify
problems or difficulties that the students have had as a consequence of the nature
of the way they were talking (i. e. not listening to each other, not building on each
other’s arguments). Note from DK: “There was this teacher I observed in a
project work lesson. Groups presented their project suggestions, and the teacher
gave a lot of clarifying and critique questions, forcing the students to engage hard
with his queries. He then said, “Do you see what I’m trying to do here? I’m not
trying to tekan (Malay for ‘make your life miserable’) you with all my questions
okay, I’m trying to get you to talk things through and explain things much more
clearly now, because this is still not assessed and this is your and my chance to
surface any misconceptions or misunderstandings you might have now, before it’s
too late”. The teacher here provides a rationale for the nature of the talk that has
occurred in the lesson, so that students will know that (a) he’s not trying to be
hard on them (b) he’s trying to get them to think in depth about what they are
doing, through talk.”
vii. Reframing Talk. Reframing talk is talk that moves back and forward between
vernacular talk and more abstract, technical, domain-specific disciplinary talk.
Generally it is purposively orchestrated by the teacher in order to enhance the
ability of students to translate their ordinary everyday understandings into more
abstract, technical and generalizable language distinctive of disciplinary talk. As
such, it is a particular form of what Luke and Cazden termed “weaving,” ,
Freebody termed “shuttling” and Halliday called “shunting.” In general, we
would expect an effective teacher to work backwards and forwards between
vernacular and technical talk in order to ensure that students’ prior knowledge and
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understandings are engaged, made explicit and challenged: if these are not
engaged and challenged, it is hard for students to develop new conceptual
understandings of the topic. Indeed, we might think of reframing talk is a form of
“connecting” talk that does not so much focus on making connections within a
specific grammar (vernacular or disciplinary) but across grammars (vernacular
and technical). In both cases, over time, connecting and reframing talk is talk that
builds understanding. Courtney Cazden gives a good example:
For example, I observed a high school physics lesson on freezing
and melting that engaged all the students in lively small group work,
but all the classroom talk stayed at the textbook level of abstract
formal principles throughout the class period. The principle to be
learned, repeated many times by individual students and chorally by
the class at the end, was (according to my memory) that states of
matter do not change as temperature is changing, but that when the
states do change, temperature stays the same. In the absence of any
physics course in my own education, this idea was counter-intuitive,
and I could only make sense of it by considering what must happen
to water in the ice-cube trays in my freezer. Evidently, the water
does not start to solidify as the temperature drops, while during the
actual freezing the temperature remains constant. That is still
counter-intuitive, but at least I can begin to think constructively and
maybe engage in further learning with the help of this familiar
image, as I could not do with only the principle stated in formal textbook language, no matter how often repeated. (Examples such as this
may well have been discussed in this class before or later within this
unit.)
At the end of the same morning, Allan Luke reported in glowing
terms the social studies lesson he had observed in the same school.
As I remember his report, the topic was family and population
policy. Across the phases of a single lesson, the teacher skillfully
wove together discussion of Singapore’s official housing policy,
students’ everyday experiences of living in various family
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configurations, and a mini-lecture with interpolated IRE questions on
how to use statistics on population demographics to construct a
“population triangle.” In this lesson, the students were starting to
connect personal knowledge, elicited in small group work, with
critical consideration of national social policy, and with the
acquisition of a specific social science technique for data analysis.
Each was undertaken in a distinctive “phase”, a distinctive physical
and interactional arrangement.
Cazden and Luke emphasize that the cognitive significance of “weaving” as an activity
of potential knowledge generation and critique is two-fold:
First, it can contribute to the public voicing by students, and the
equally public validation of relevance by the teacher, of students’
more local, common sense, ideas and identities from their individual
and personal or social and cultural experiences. In short, weaving
makes connections by building on and transforming the familiar.
Second, weaving should support students in understanding
relationships of similarity and difference between the known and the
new—understanding that is essential, according to current learning
theory (Bransford et al, 1999) for the deepest understanding and
most flexible use, including reasoned critique, of the official school
curriculum. In short, it contributes to unlocking and making
accessible the unfamiliar.
Cazden also explores the genealogy of the concept of weaving in the work of
Vygotsky, Bakhtin and Bernstein. This is an important analysis and will be useful to
our analysis of classroom talk later on in Core 2. For now though I want to focus on
the contribution that recent work on the “grammaticality” of knowledge developed
by researchers building on Bernstein’s late work before he died. In particular, they
distinguish between two features of grammaticality. The semantic gravity of
knowledge refers to the degree to which meaning is dependent on context and can be
either strong or weak. The semantic density of knowledge refers to the degree to
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which meaning is condensed within symbols -- a term, a concept, a phrase, an
expression or a gesture, for example. Grammaticality thus measures the strength of
the ontological (or empirical) referents of knowledge and “the capacity of a theory or
language to progress through worldly collaboration”: strong grammars have strong
empirical referents (for example, physics and mathematics), while weak grammars
have weak ontological referents (for example, sociology and English). Disciplines
generally have low semantic gravity and strong semantic density because they are
preoccupied with conceptual depth and generalizability. Indeed, while this is very
much an epistemic strength of disciplinary knowledge, it poses a major pedagogical
challenge to teachers seeking to develop student disciplinary understandings. It is
this context that we might think of reframing talk as talk designed to help students
move from local common-sense grammars that generally have high semantic gravity
and weak semantic gravity to disciplinary forms of knowledge that have, low
semantic gravity and strong semantic density.
It is important to note that there are some features of classroom talk – notably those
associated with classroom dialogue -- that might not be apparent at the phase level.
Consequently, we have created separate scales for a small number of emergent
properties of classroom talk that are likely to be more apparent at the end of an
activity cycle (whole class discussion, small group work) or even not until the end of
the lesson itself: whether the talk shows evidence of reciprocity, purposefulness and
cumulation, whether the classroom talk was asymmetrical or symmetrical
(egalitarian) in character, whether the teacher helped scaffold or provide learning
supports, and whether the talk was divergent or convergent in character during the
activity or lesson. We have created separate sheets to capture these emergent properties
at the level of activity and lesson. The activity level codes should be coded immediately
after the coding of phases during course of the activity.
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18. Whole Classroom: The Interactional Structure of Classroom Talk.
Whole class interactions have a structure: that is to say, someone talks to someone else.
Typically, a teacher talks with one, two or more students in a series of exchanges.
Alternatively, two or more students engage in classroom talk. Accordingly, we can
generate a relatively simple and straightforward five-element taxonomy. Within any
one phase of a lesson, more than one kind of interaction can take place: in effect, the
interactions are not mutually exclusive at the phase level.
18.1. The teacher and the same one student engage in iterative exchanges (T-S1-TS1 –T-S1-T-S1).
18.2. The teacher and two students engage in iterative exchanges (T-S1-T-S2 –T-S1T-S2 etc).
18.3. The teacher and more than two students engage in iterative exchanges (T-S1-TS2–T-S3-T-S4-T-S2 etc).
18.4. Iterative discussion/understanding talk between 2 students in whole class
setting with limited active teacher management or intervention in the talk (S1S2–S1-S2-S1-S2 etc).
18.5. Iterative discussion/understanding talk between more than 2 students in whole
class setting with limited active teacher management or intervention in the talk
(S1-S2–S3-S1-S4-S2-S1 etc).
19.
WHOLE-CLASS
CLASSROOM
COMMUNICATION:
TEACHER
ELICITATION
This scale focuses on teacher elicitation in whole class exchange using the taxonomy of
classroom talk described above. Each indicator is scaled 0 (absent – the default) or 1
(present).
19.1. Organizational Talk: Teacher Statements or Questions
19.2. Performative Talk: Closed Questions
19.3. Sharing Talk: Sharing Questions
19.4. Understanding Talk: Clarifying Questions
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19.5. Understanding Talk: Procedural Questions
19.6. Understanding Talk: Connecting Questions
19.7. Understanding Talk: Explanatory Questions
19.8. Understanding Talk: Epistemic Questions
19.9. Understanding Talk: Framing Questions
19.10. Understanding Talk: Reframing Questions
20. WHOLE-CLASS CLASSROOM COMMUNICATION: STUDENT RESPONSES
This scale focuses on student responses to teacher questions in whole class exchanges.
It directly parallels the indicators for teacher questions. It is scaled 0 (absent – the
default) or 1 (present)
20.1. Organizational Talk
20.2. Performative Talk
20.3. Sharing Talk
20.4. Understanding Talk: Clarifying Responses
20.5. Understanding Talk: Procedural Responses
20.6. Understanding Talk: Connecting Responses
20.7. Understanding Talk: Explanatory Responses
20.8. Understanding Talk: Epistemic Responses
20.9. Understanding Talk: Framing Responses
20.10. Understanding Talk: Reframing Responses
21. WHOLE-CLASS CLASSROOM COMMUNICATION: STUDENT QUESTIONS
Students don’t just respond to teacher questions – they also ask questions of the teacher
as well. Our focus here then is to map the frequency and type of questions students ask
of their teacher in whole class discussion. Dennis Kwek comments that this scale is
important because it captures students efforts to engage in exploratory or understanding
talk when they ask “questions that seek to clarify, explore or critique ideas or concepts
that emerged in the classroom talk. The focus of these questions are on (a) greater
definition or clarity of ideas/concepts, (b) further critique or connections of
ideas/concepts”. As before, the scale is 0,1 for each phase during a lesson.
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21.1. Organizational Talk: Student Questions
21.2. Performative Talk: Closed Questions
21.3. Sharing Talk: Sharing Questions
21.4. Understanding Talk: Clarifying Questions
21.5. Understanding Talk: Procedural Questions
21.6. Understanding Talk: Connecting Questions
21.7. Understanding Talk: Explanatory Questions
21.8. Understanding Talk: Epistemic Questions
21.9. Understanding Talk: Framing Questions
21.10. Understanding Talk: Reframing Questions
22. SMALL GROUP WORK: TEACHER QUESTIONS/TALK
This scale focuses on teacher questions or elicitation in small group work using the
taxonomy of classroom talk described above. Each indicator is scaled 0 (absent – the
default) or 1 (present).
22.1. Organizational Talk
22.2. Performative Talk: Closed Questions
22.3. Sharing Talk: Sharing Questions/Talk
22.4. Understanding Talk: Clarifying Questions/Talk
22.5. Understanding Talk: Procedural Questions/Talk
22.6. Understanding Talk: Connecting Questions/Talk
22.7. Understanding Talk: Explanatory Questions/Talk
22.8. Understanding Talk: Epistemic Questions/Talk
22.9. Understanding Talk: Framing Questions/Talk
22.10. Understanding Talk: Reframing Questions/Talk
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23. SMALL GROUP WORK: STUDENT TALK
Sharing talk (identity statements, positional talk) and understanding talk between them
are likely to dominate small group work. As before, the scale is 0,1 for each phase
during a lesson
23.1. Organizational Talk
23.2. Performative Talk:
23.3. Sharing Talk
23.4. Understanding Talk: Clarifying Talk
23.5. Understanding Talk: Procedural Talk
23.6. Understanding Talk: Connecting Talk
23.7. Understanding Talk: Explanatory Talk
23.8. Understanding Talk: Epistemic Talk
23.9. Understanding Talk: Framing Talk
23.10. Understanding Talk: Reframing Talk
24. SMALL GROUP WORK: STUDENT QUESTIONS TO THEIR TEACHERS
During small group sessions students often ask teachers to come to their group to
answer particular types of questions that they have. This scale reports the kind of
questions that they ask their teacher. Again the scale is 0,1.
24.1. Organizational Talk: Student Questions
24.2. Performative Talk: Closed Questions
24.3. Sharing Talk: Sharing Questions
24.4. Understanding Talk: Clarifying Questions
24.5. Understanding Talk: Procedural Questions
24.6. Understanding Talk: Connecting Questions
24.7. Understanding Talk: Explanatory Questions
24.8.Understanding Talk: Epistemic Questions
24.9. Understanding Talk: Framing Questions
24.10. Understanding Talk: Reframing Questions
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25. STUDENT QUESTIONING: KNOWLEDGE FOCUS
Not only do students ask different kinds of exploratory or understanding questions (#21,
#23, and #24), they also ask questions about different kinds of knowledge claims. We
use the same taxonomy here as we did in #216 The first code (#25.1) though focuses on
context and parallels #18: whether the questions are asked in the context of whole class
work, small group work or individual work.
25.1. Context. (1) whole class discussion, (2) small group work, (3) individual work.
25.2. Factual questions. Student questions focus on episodic or propositional
knowledge (dates, events, facts, names, equations, definitions, and algorithms. E.g.
0=Nil; 1=Student to teacher; 2=student to student.
25.3. Procedural questions. Student questions focus on scripts, strategies, algorithms,
heuristics, norms/genres for generating knowledge claims. See 26.2 Procedural
(including conditional) Knowledge. E.g. 0=Nil; 1=Student to teacher; 2=student to
student.
25.4. Conceptual questions. Student questions focus on conceptual knowledge. This is
knowledge that is rich in relationships, patterns, networks and connections between
ideas rather than discrete bits of information. See 19.3. Conceptual Knowledge. E.g.
0=Nil; 1=Student to teacher; 2=student to student.
25.5. Epistemic Questions. When students ask questions (or make statements that
invite a response) about the criteria or standards of truth, reliability, validity,
reasonableness. E. g. “How do we know something is true?” “Just because its in a book
doesn’t make it true.”
25.6. Meta-cognitive Questions. Students ask questions about how to learn more
effectively. Eg. “I don’t appear to be able to learn this properly. How should I go about
learning it?” “What’s the best way of learning or remembering Y?”
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25.7. Rhetorical Questions. Students ask questions about how to communicate orally
or in writing more effectively. E. g. “How is writing a journal entry different from
writing a composition?” “Can I use hand gestures in my oral presentation to the class?”
“How do I write a speech that can make an emotional appeal to my audience?” “May I
use the flashback strategy in my essay?” “What can I write to make a good first
impression on the reader?”
25.8. Hermeneutical Questions. Students ask questions about how to interpret a text
properly. E. g. “What does this story mean?” “How can/should I interpret this
story/text?
25.9. Moral Questions. Students ask questions about moral issues: (1) questions what
is the good (eg, what makes a life good?) (2) questions about the right (how one should
behave towards others, nature of justice or fairness, equality, liberty)etc. And this
example from Dennis: “Why not we just leave the plates on the food court tables? After
all, if we don’t do that there will be no jobs for the older people!” (actual critique of
teacher’s comment that Singaporeans should be more gracious in food courts!).
25.10. Aesthetic Questions. Students ask questions about what makes something
pleasing, beautiful, pleasant. E. g. “Why is this piece of music/picture beautiful?”
26. EPISTEMIC FOCUS OF KNOWLEDGE WORK (TASKS)
In scale #26 we turn from the analysis of the intellectual quality of classroom talk in
#19-25 to a focus on the epistemic nature of the knowledge tasks that teachers set for
the students in the class. In #27, we will focus on the cognitive demands of the
knowledge task. In developing scale #26, we have drawn on the taxonomy of
knowledge developed by Anderson and Krathwohl et al – factual knowledge,
conceptual knowledge, procedural knowledge and metacognitive knowledge. But we
have also expanded their taxonomy by adding new categories: epistemic knowledge,
moral knowledge, aesthetic knowledge, rhetorical knowledge, and hermeneutical
knowledge. The risk in doing this is that the distinctions between these forms of
knowledge are not always clear-cut and that we will therefore be creating quite artificial
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categories of knowledge that are hard to distinguish. This in turn could well result in
increased measurement error. But we think the distinctions are sufficiently meaningful
and clear to be adopted. Knowledge claims associated with each of these forms of
knowledge entail distinctive epistemic criteria for their validation or verification. More
broadly, from a disciplinarity perspective, they are closely associated with domain
specific procedures for generating, representing (or expressing), communicating,
deliberating and validating knowledge claims (although not necessarily in that order).
As we saw earlier, these epistemic issues are crucial to establishing the disciplinarity of
the knowledge work that is being undertaken by the relevant social actors (in this case
students in classrooms).
26.1. Factual knowledge. Focus on episodic or propositional knowledge (dates, events,
facts, names, equations, definitions, algorithms, and etc).
26.2. Procedural (including conditional) knowledge. Procedural talk is talk that
focuses on how students complete a process or task specific to a discipline, subject or
area of study. It can refer to quite general procedural issues – methods of inquiry,
particular methodologies, genres of work – or, more narrowly, to task-specific scripts,
strategies, algorithms, heuristics involved in solving a problem or generating knowledge
claims. Procedural questions are generally how rather than why or what questions.
Importantly, in both Mathematics and English, procedural talk is often closely
associated with conditional knowledge – that is, knowledge of when to use specific
procedures or algorithms. Thus, procedural talk often includes talk about when as well
as how. Likewise, in both Mathematics and English, conceptual knowledge is often
closely linked to procedural knowledge: knowing what procedure to apply and when to
apply it presumes some measure of conceptual understanding of the problem –
otherwise one would not know what procedure to use and when to use it. Otherwise
what procedure a student chooses to use would be more or less random. Moreover,
research on the development of expertise suggests that gaining procedural proficiency
not only (and even necessarily) reflects some level of conceptual understanding but can
also enhance or deepen it: for example, knowing how and when to do X (where X is a
procedure) can help a student understand the relationship between X and Y (where Y is
another procedure suitable for solving a different of problem) and therefore the
conceptual differences between different kinds of problems – that is, conceptual
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knowledge. Consequently, we have decided to consider procedural talk an aspect of
understanding talk rather than an alternative category of talk. Indeed, I suspect that one
important reason that East Asian students do as well as they do in international
assessments is that because the level of drill and practice they have (rather than simple
memorization, as some advocates of East Asian pedagogy argue) enhances conceptual
understanding and expertise.
In English, an example of procedural knowledge is rule-based grammar (Lefstein,
2009) which constitutes the ability to express oneself ‘correctly and clearly’ by learning
the rules of grammar. Rule-based grammar is not connected to any other context other
than the grammatical issue being explored. Another example is knowledge of how to
structure an essay with the reference to the plot, paragraphing, punctuation etc. In
English Literature, determining the poetry form- whether it is a ballad, ode, arcostics,
sonnet, blank verse etc; identifying the rhyming sheme of a poem are examples of
procedural knowledge.
In Mathematics, “procedural knowledge consists of knowledge of (a) the formal
symbol system of mathematics and (b) rules, algorithms or procedures used to solve
mathematical tasks” (Hiebert and Lefevre quoted in Putnam, Lampert and Peterson p.
83). Solving a particular kind of problem, strategies, algorithms, heuristics,
norms/genres for generating knowledge claims constitute procedural knowledge in
Mathematics. Putnam, Lampert and Peterson insist that at least in mathematics
“conceptual competence” or conceptual knowledge depends on an understanding of
procedural knowledge: “in some cases, procedural knowledge must form the basis for
conceptual understanding.” (p.84). On the other hand, in the study by Rittle-Johnson &
Alibali (1999), teaching children the concept behind mathematical equivalence
problems, rather than a procedure for solving them, was most effective at promoting
flexible problem-solving skill and conceptual understanding. Research evidence in
Mathematics suggests that conceptual understanding plays a role in generation and
adoption of procedures. For E.g. children who have a better understanding of place
value are more likely to successfully use the borrowing procedure for multi-digit
subtraction (Cauley, 1988; Hiebert & Wearne, 1996 cited in Rittle-Johnson & Alibali,
1999).
26.3. Conceptual knowledge. Conceptual knowledge focuses on the meaning of
concepts and relationships between them E.g., tree and forest, light and gravity,
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revolution and nationalism, sincerity and authenticity, square and triangle, etc etc.
Conceptual knowledge thus includes semantic knowledge – the meaning of words –
but also,
critically, focuses on relationships, patterns, networks and connections
between ideas rather than propositional knowledge (discrete bits of information or
factual knowledge). Conceptual knowledge is most evident when teachers focus on
meaning making by engaging in understanding talk – by asking them to clarify the
meaning of what they say (as in “What do you mean?” “Do you mean X or Y?”), or to
make connections between concepts (“What is the relationship between X and Y?”
“You say X but what about Y?”). Generally speaking, students need to gain some
measure of conceptual knowledge of an idea if they are to achieve understanding of
the idea, apply it creatively to new situations, interpret a text (or painting), develop an
explanation of something or communicate meaning in some way.
Conceptual
knowledge
in
English
involves
making
meaning
of
content
(“interpretation,” “comprehension,” “understanding”) and communicating (conveying,
telling, writing, reporting, describing, explaining, expressing, persuading) the meaning
of the knowledge learnt. A Mind-map or Concept-map is often used to enhance
conceptual understanding of pupils. An English teacher may read a text with the pupils
and then help them to see how the different parts fit through a series of ‘What?’ ‘How?’
‘Who?’ ‘When?’ ‘Why?’ questions that link to the central theme or idea. In a grammar
lesson, an English teacher imparts concepts- types of words, phrases and clauses, the
Subject-Verb-Object order etc. to enable pupils to make meaning of the English
language.
In Mathematics, conceptual knowledge focuses on both the meaning of concepts
(“what is a square?” “What is a triangle?”) and relationships between concepts. Thus
Hiebert and Lefevre to the effect that “conceptual knowledge is knowledge that is rich
in relationships... a connected web of knowledge, a network in which the linking
relationships are as prominent as the discrete pieces of information” (quoted Putnam,
Lampert and Peterson p.83). Importantly, however, Putnam, Lampert and Peterson
insist that at least in mathematics “conceptual competence” or conceptual knowledge
depends on an understanding of procedural knowledge: “procedural knowledge must
form the basis for conceptual understanding” (p.84). However, other researchers have
taken a different view. For example, while Rittle-Johnson and Alibali (1999) suggest
that procedural knowledge and conceptual knowledge lie on a continuum and cannot
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always be separated. Still, the two ends of the continuum represent different types of
knowledge. They highlight the causal, bidirectional and iterative relationship between
conceptual and procedural knowledge. Increase in one type of knowledge can lead to
gains in the other type, which in turn may lead to further increases in the first. But
although they recognize that conceptual and procedural knowledge influence one
another, they go on to suggest, contrary to Putnam, Lampert and Peterson, that
conceptual knowledge has greater influence on procedural knowledge than the reverse.
Children who received conceptual instruction led to better transfer performance than
procedural instruction. Anderson & Krathwohl (2001) argue similarly that ‘conceptual
knowledge and deep understanding can help individuals as they attempt to transfer what
they have learned to new situations.’
Whatever the case, what we expect is that in Singapore there is generally a stronger
focus on procedural knowledge than on conceptual knowledge.
26.4. Epistemic knowledge. Epistemic knowledge is knowledge of domain-specific
criteria and standards that allows individuals (“epistemic agents”) to distinguish
“knowledge” from mere information, opinion or belief by appeal to domain specific
criteria - truth, reliability, validity, coherence, authenticity, clarity, reasonableness,
principled, disinterested, goodness, or beauty - that establishes the public authority of
the knowledge claim. The production and verification of knowledge (as opposed to
mere opinion or belief) requires “secure” public or at least inter-subjective epistemic
“principles of determination” (Anderson and Valente) that identify the conditions,
standards or criteria by which we establish the truth, value, reasonableness or public
authority of knowledge claims that arise from attempts to generate knowledge claims or
validate knowledge claims. Epistemic knowledge therefore is a necessary prerequisite
for epistemic rationality where this should be understood in a general sense to include
either conventional epistemological, mathematical or scientific notions of rational and
justified belief or humanist models of reasonable and principled belief (see Stephen
Toulmin, Return to Reason, 2001).
What is crucial to either rational belief or
reasonable belief is the centrality of reasons, principles or criteria and standards that are
recognized as legitimate grounds for establishing a belief as a form of knowledge.
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Epistemic knowledge in mathematics focuses on knowledge of the nature of
mathematical knowledge and how this knowledge is justified. It includes:
a) Language. Knowledge that mathematics is a language made up of (in our
case) English supplemented by mathematical symbols, notations, diagrams, terms,
concepts,
definitions,
axioms,
statements,
analogies,
problems,
explanations,
methods(procedures), proofs, theories. “Class, when you learn mathematics, it is like
learning a language that includes English, but more than that. In mathematics, we use
many symbols to mean something. For example we use + and when we place two
numbers on either side of the + (plus) sign, we mean to add the two numbers together.
The equal sign “=” is very interesting and very important in our study of mathematics.
When we put two objects on either side of the equal sign, we mean that the two objects
are equal in quantity.”
b) Accepted Statements. In mathematics there are many statements that we
have come to accept. In your study of mathematics, you will come across many such
statements. For example Pythagoras Theorem – the sum of squares of two shorter sides
is equal to the square of the longest side in a right-angled triangle. In mathematics, we
can only accept such statements as true if we are able to justify or you understand how
to justify them. This leads us to accepted reasonings.
c) Accepted Reasonings. How do you know if a mathematical statement is true
or not? You need to be able to justify them through explanations (informal proofs) and
formal proofs. So how do you know if a reasoning is accepted or not? If you make a
mathematical statement, whether it can be accepted or not, requires you to first
convince yourself that the statement can be true. This, you do by giving plausible
reasons why it can be true. For example, if I say, in a triangle, the sum of any two sides
is longer than the third side. By checking this out by measuring lengths of two sides of a
triangle and comparing to the third side and doing this for a number of triangles.
Finding out this is true for a number of triangles is not convincing enough especially if
you are trying to convince others. If you are to convince others, you need a more
general triangle, i.e. your “proof” should not be based on particular dimensions of a
particular triangle. Suppose, you are able to “prove” to your class, how do you know if
the steps you took to prove it are acceptable? This is where, in learning mathematics,
you are also learning what mathematicians, over the course of thousands of years have
debated and have a set of what criteria to use to assess whether certain reasonings are
acceptable or not. Thus, to prove a particular statement, we need to proceed from what
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we currently know or agreed that we know and then through a series of logical steps we
try to get to the statement that we want to prove. Each of these “logical” steps must
have been deduced from the prior statement or other agreed upon statements (accepted
statements). The same goes when we solve problems in schools, from one step to
another, the latter step is true because the prior statement is true. For example if we say
2x + 1 = 5 then 2x + 1 - 1 = 5 -1 so 2x =4 and so x = 2. Now when we say x = 2, what
have we done to get to this statement? We started with 2x + 1 = 5. Thus, we are
assuming 2x + 1 = 5 is true. Therefore, if this is true, then in the second step we are
saying that I can subtract 1 from one side of the equation provided of course I subtract 1
from the other side of the equation as well. Now, is this convincing enough for you? If
it is not, then we need to seek recourse to some physical objects or a drawing to
illustrate this. In mathematics, each of the step that you take requires “proof” or
convincing and you need to explain your argument. Finally, therefore the structure of
establishing “mathematical truths” in many cases require starting from an acceptable
statement P and then I explain that from P I can get another statement Q, from Q I get
to R, until finally I get to my destination say Z.
In English, epistemic knowledge centres on knowledge of the principles, criteria and
standards necessary to support or justify forms of knowledge production (propositional
or non-propositional) in English. It constitutes what Petroksy, McConarchie and
Mihalakis term “disciplinary literacy” which they suggests “means learning to read,
write, and reason as a junior member of a discipline’s community. It means
understanding what counts within the discipline as a good as a good question, evidence,
problem, or solution. It means crafting arguments in the ways that members of the
discipline do: for example, articulating understanding and documenting analyses of
texts, writing as an investigative reporter does, forming and warranting interpretations
within and across texts, and interpreting texts from different perspectives”
(McConarchie and Petrosky, Content Matters, 132). Thus, on the one hand, epistemic
norms come into play when students attempt to generate new knowledge by interpreting
texts or using language in either written or oral form in order to express, convey,
describe or convey meaning in conformity with public rules of interpretation,
testimony, evidence, grammar, spelling, punctuation, vocabulary norms etc and the
appropriateness and effectiveness of the tools, medium and genres of writing and
expression they use to communicate meaning to others. On the other hand, epistemic
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criteria also come into play when students are asked to evaluate or justify knowledge
claims by others using established or reasonable rules of interpretation, testimony,
evidence,
grammar,
spelling,
punctuation,
vocabulary
norms
etc
and
the
appropriateness and effectiveness of the tools, medium and genres of writing and
expression used to communicate meaning.
26.5. Rhetorical knowledge. Conventionally understood, rhetoric is the art of using
language to communicate effectively. On this account, successful rhetoric requires both
knowledge and skill. From this perspective, rhetorical knowledge is knowledge of how
to use language (in its broadest sense) to convey or communicate meaning in a
transparent, clear, logical and effective way (its principle modern meaning) and/or how
to persuade others of the validity, value or reasonableness of an argument or perspective
(its classical meaning) that assumes some understanding of how different audiences will
respond to speech or text (see J. Guillory, “Literary Studies and the Modern System of
the Disciplines” in Anderson and Valente, Disciplinarity at the Fin de Siecle, p.22).
However, since the 1970s, studies of the social and contextual nature of language use
and, more broadly, discourses, has expanded the understanding of rhetoric as essentially
a form of procedural knowledge to an understanding of rhetoric as a medium of
knowledge production. As one source puts it, during the course of the 1970s and 1980s,
"the search for a social theory of writing became broadly interdisciplinary. Composition
scholars studied not only writing but all aspects of language use, which they regarded as
actually creating knowledge, not merely disseminating it. These interests have been
shared with scholars in history, literary criticism, philosophy, psychology, sociology,
and speech communication. Scholars in all these fields sought an account of
discourse—language in use—that acknowledges the power of rhetoric to help create a
community's worldview, knowledge, and interpretive practices… Literary-critical
theories of the role of the reader in making meaning also discuss the establishment of
interpretive practices. Stanley Fish describes readers as participants in interpretive
communities, which are defined by their agreement on the conventions of discourse.
Fish's work suggests a method for analyzing the conventions a writer must learn to enter
the academic discourse community. No taxonomy of such conventions has appeared,
although studies of a number of fields have exposed much about disciplinary
conventions. More recently, studies of writing in various disciplines have revealed and
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analyzed the social creation of disciplinary knowledge through discourse." (The
Bedford Bibliography for Teachers of Writing).
The contemporary approach to rhetorical knowledge in English courses focuses on the
rules of grammar which makes children aware of key grammatical principles and their
effects, increases the range of linguistic resources open to them when they write, and
makes them aware the effects of different choices on the rhetorical power of their
writing. (Lefstein, 2010). On this understanding, language use is socially dependent:
certain grammatical constructions or word uses are appropriate in one context but not
another. A teacher who points out that certain expressions used when sitting around the
dining table at home though grammatically correct, may be inappropriate in certain
formal contexts, aims to generate rhetorical awareness in her pupils (Murdick, 1996).
Writing an argumentative essay to cater to a particular audience is an exercise in
rhetoric. In English Literature, when the teacher highlights the rhetorical structures in a
poem, for E.g. metaphor, personification, irony etc, it is an attempt to impart rhetorical
knowledge to pupils. Using voice or gestures to convey meaning, or focusing on the
conventions of a particular genre are examples of rhetoric in English.
Thus, a rhetorical analysis involves pupils examining ‘not only what authors
communicate but also for what purposes they communicate those messages, what
effects they attempt to evoke in readers, and how they accomplish those purposes and
effects’. Teaching rhetorical analysis has the potential to help students develop the
rhetorical awareness and meta- knowledge about their writing that can help them
transfer their learning about writing to new contexts and tasks (Graff 2010).
Note that in 2001, the MOE for the first time introduced a focus on literacy
development, not just linguistic proficiency, with the aim of enabling students to ‘make
structural and linguistic choices to suit purpose, audience, context and culture (Ministry
of Education 2001: 3 cited in Rubdy & Tupas, 2009).
In Mathematics, rhetorical knowledge is also important and different from
procedural knowledge. For example, the concept of Mathematical Equivalence is the
principle that the two sides of an equation represent the same quantity. A teacher in a
Singapore Math classroom corrected a student who wrote “9=p” by saying that it is
better to write it as “p=9”. Obviously, the teacher was aiming for rhetoric-presenting the
answer in a more suitable format. In a math classroom, when the teacher talks explicitly
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about rules for writing out the solution of a problem or the template for presenting a
problem, it is rhetorical knowledge. Using diagrams or symbols to convey meaning
visually is an example of rhetoric in Math. A Singapore Math teacher dramatized the
Japanese Samurai’s ‘right-hand swipe rule’ to demonstrate the ‘shoe-lace’ method for
finding out the area of a figure, given the co-ordinates of the various points. He was
imparting rhetorical knowledge to enable pupils to ‘see’ how the formula works.
26.6. Metacognitive /self regulative knowledge. Knowledge of how one learns
(Galton: “metacognitive wisdom”). Knowledge of effective strategies, heuristics, that
“works” for the student. Focus on monitoring and developing learning strategies.
26.7. Hermeneutical knowledge. Knowledge of the conventions, protocols, models of
the interpretation of texts, images, representations. E.g. interpreting play, artwork,
poem, popular culture/icon, advertisements, and news stories.
26.8. Moral knowledge. Focus on examination of explicit moral/ethic text. E.g.
Looking at Bible/Koran; or developing informed and principled judgments about what
is the good (what is valuable/worthwhile) or what is the right thing to do (moral rules
E.g. the ten commandments, respect for others, obey the laws, being a good citizen) or
moral and civic obligations and duties. Coveys moral, civic knowledge and judgment.
Can overlap other categories above.
26.9 Aesthetic knowledge. Focus on nature of, and learning about, aesthetic claims,
expressions, representations; can overlap other categories above. In Math - The
knowledge of how certain equations or theories in Maths can represent beauty. E.g.
painting, buildings, urban environments, scriptures, poem, play, novel.
27. COGNITIVE NATURE OF STUDENT KNOWLEDGE WORK (TASKS)
Whereas in #26 we focused on the epistemic nature of the knowledge work or claims
associated with specific learning tasks in the classroom, here we focus instead on the
cognitive nature or, more precisely, the cognitive demands of the task. That is, we
focus here on whether the learning task requires students to acquire new information
(and if so how), to engage in routine reproduction, to engage in drill and practice, to
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undertake various kinds of understanding tasks, to engage in knowledge production
tasks, or to think about the epistemic criteria appropriate to validate particular kinds of
knowledge claims. It is clear that these are cognitive activities emphasizing cognitive
agency as reflected in the necessity to use active verbs to denote activities rather than
nouns describing particular forms of knowledge. To simplify the coding work, we have
drawn on the cognitive taxonomy that Anderson and Krathwohl developed, but have
both simplified and extended their taxonomy. We have simplified it by grouping
knowledge tasks into two broad categories that directly parallels the taxonomy of
classroom talk we used earlier in scales #19-24: (1) knowledge acquisition and
performative tasks, and (2) understanding and knowledge production tasks. Each of
these two categories are internally differentiated and in this way we have extended
Anderson and Krathwohl’s taxonomy in several directions.
27.1. Knowledge Acquisition and Performative Tasks. Acquisition and
Performative Tasks are knowledge tasks that focus on knowledge acquisition,
memorization, recalling, repetition and reproduction. Knowledge acquisition tasks
(as opposed to knowledge production tasks) do not involve the use of domain
specific procedures or practices to generate, represent, validate, communicate or
deliberate knowledge claims. Instead, they focus on receiving information from
others or gathering / collecting information from a (putatively) authoritative
knowledge source (library, book, internet, etc). Critically, unlike understanding
tasks, there is little or no attention to the conceptual meaning or to the network of
concepts within which it is embedded or connected to. Performative Tasks focus
on either recalling old information, engaging in routine procedural tasks without
reference to underlying concepts or meaning, or drill and practice tasks. Like
knowledge acquisition task above, performative tasks are generally characterized by
lack of attention to conceptual knowledge or understanding. (See Putnam, Lampert
and Peterson (77-78) on computational skills in mathematics and computational
errors as incorrect but rule governed performances or algorithms)
Note: For the Excel coding exercise, we will code dichotomously for absence or
presence within each phase (0,1). Later, using Studio Code, we will code in a way that
discriminates more discreetly by counting instances of each kind of cognitive task
throughout the lesson to get a more detailed picture of the cognitive work of the lesson.
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27.1.1. Gathering new information. Acquiring new information by listening to the
teacher, by reading a textbook, doing a library search, or doing an internet search. New
information is defined as “new information” introduced at the start of or during each
lesson.
27.1.2. Remembering or reviewing old information. Recalling, remembering or
recalling old information from long term memory.
27.1.3. Performing Routine Procedural or Decoding Tasks. Engaging in
routine procedural tasks (mathematics) or decoding tasks (English grammar) with
little or no attention to the meanings or connections that underlie the procedures
or words being used. The task requires students to focus on producing the correct
answer rather than on developing understanding, comprehending meaning or
providing an explanation or justification. (Boston and Smith). In Mathematics,
this cognitive profile is characteristic of routine problem solving tasks that make
or require little or no reference to broader conceptual meaning. In English, this
cognitive profile is characteristic of routine decoding or phonic tasks
(words/parsing sentences) but with minimal attention to meaning, comprehension,
context or genre. See Putnam, Lampert and Peterson for discussion of routine
problem solving in mathematics, particularly discussion of generic and specific
heuristics. Eg. In Maths, students are asked to “complete the square” to solve a
quadratic equation. In English, students are simply asked to articulate the spelling
of a word from the text.
27.1.4. Repetition work. Tasks that focus on practice of procedures or
committing facts, procedures, definitions to long term memory in order to
facilitate “retention” or “remembering” knowledge. Drill and practice, choral or
individual repetition. Can also include revising knowledge and skill already learnt
in earlier lesson. Eg. In Maths, students are asked to answer a series of questions
to simplify some algebraic fractions by cross-multiplying the denominators.
27.2. Understanding and Knowledge Production Tasks. Unlike acquisition and
performative tasks that focus on the accumulation, operationalization and reproduction
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of information, understanding tasks focus on meaning making, developing a deeper
conceptual understanding of new or existing knowledge (what Alexander terms
“restructuring knowledge”), and more broadly, on the use of domain-specific
disciplinary procedures to generate, represent, validate, communicate and deliberate
knowledge new to students. Where performative tasks tend to reflect an understanding
of the curriculum as a collection of school subjects and teaching as the transmission and
reproduction of knowledge, understanding tasks reflect a far stronger disciplinary
orientation to the curriculum and a view of teaching focused on developing student
capacities to engage in complex knowledge construction.
a. Understanding tasks range from tasks that focus on helping students develop a
better conceptual understanding (meanings, patterns, relationships, connections,
coherence) of old or new information, to tasks that focus on the use of domain-specific
disciplinary procedures to generate, represent, validate, communicate and deliberate
knowledge new to students. Understanding tasks are generally indicated by
understanding talk – seeking clarification, making connections, and offering
explanations. Putnam, Lampert and Peterson (esp pp. 67-87), for example, emphasize
that understanding in mathematics involves development of “knowledge structures” or
schema that facilitates the ability to develop representations of mathematical
relationships and to making connections between types of knowledge. Understanding
tasks in mathematics therefore involve activities that focus on “abstracting, applying,
convincing, classifying, inferring, organizing, representing, inventing, generalization,
specializing, comparing, explaining, patterning, validating, proving, conjecturing,
analyzing, counting, measuring, synthesizing, and ordering.” (p.96)
Cognitively speaking, students understand “when they are able to construct meaning
from instructional messages, including oral, written and graphic communication.
Students understand when they build connections between the new knowledge to be
gained and their prior knowledge. More specifically, the incoming knowledge is
integrated with existing schemas and cognitive frameworks” or used to actively
reconstruct existing frameworks (Anderson and Krathwohl, p.63). Similarly, Wiggins
and McTighe suggest that “To understand is to make connections and bind together our
knowledge into something that makes sense of things (whereas without understanding
we might see only unclear, isolated, or unhelpful facts). But the word also implies
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doing, not just a mental act: a performative ability lies at the heart of understanding …
To understand is to be able to wisely and effectively use – transfer – what we know, in
context; to apply knowledge and skill effectively, in realistic tasks and settings. To have
understanding means that we show evidence of being able to transfer what we know.
When we understand, we have a fluent and fluid grasp, not a rigid, formulaic grasp
based only on recall and ‘plugging in” (Wiggins and McTighe, Understanding by
Design, 2005, pp. 7-8). In effect, understanding involves meaning making,
understanding concepts (i.e. conceptual knowledge) and the exercise of cognitive
agency. See also Gordon Wells 83ff for a discussion of knowing and understanding,
and Richard Mason, Understanding Understanding, for an epistemological take on the
issue. Anderson et al also point out (p.63) that in principle, understanding tasks attempt
to develop an understanding of “meaning in order to promote transfer of learning:
requires students not only to remember but to make sense of and be able to use what
they have learned.”
We will code for two important forms of relatively straight forward understanding tasks
(we discuss these in more detail below):

Comprehension and knowledge manipulation tasks

Procedural tasks with connections (including application tasks).
27.2.1. Comprehension / Knowledge Manipulation Tasks. In mathematics, for
example, a range of tasks that focus on comprehension or knowledge manipulation
tasks focus on developing understanding of existing knowledge:

Interpreting, representing and/or explaining meaning of existing information
(clarifying, paraphrasing, translating) texts, symbols or relationships, including
representing knowledge in different ways (textually, symbolically, digitally,
visually, diagrammatically);

Exemplify or categorize information in alternative ways;

Summarize information (abstract, generalize, synthesis);

Infer conclusions or implications from given information (concluding,
extrapolating, predicting);

Comparing and contrasting information (mapping, matching, identifying
similarities and differences);

Analyzing information (differentiation, organizing).
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(For a broader discussion, see Anderson et al ch. 5, and Putnam, Lampert and Peterson
on understanding as representation (67-71), understanding as development of or
adjustment of knowledge structures as schema (71-82). Note especially their discussion
of importance of representation in mathematics 68-71).
E.g. In Maths, students are asked to interpret a bar graph in the light of a given
scenario. Graph shows the number of books borrowed on each day of the week in 3
libraries. Questions centre around identifying the day of the week with the highest
number of books borrowed and the average number of books a library transacts.
Students can also be asked to summarise the information in words in order to make a
case to enlarge a particular library, say.
E.g. In English Literature, teacher introduces a poem of nature by Wordsworth.

Students interpret the poem’s rhyming scheme

Students exemplify or categorise information in the poem by linking with
figures of speech - Personification, Simile and Hyperbole

Students write an abstract or a brief summary of the poem.

Teacher points out the imagery skill and asks students what they can infer or
conclude about the poem/poet.

Teacher introduces other poems of nature – by Wordsworth or other poets and
asks students to compare and contrast. Students point out similarities and
differences about poetic styles/ features of the poems.

Teacher enables students to analyse information -asks pertinent questions about
the poem’s theme/title/setting/emotions etc.
E.g. In English Language, teacher introduces Situational writing- a Formal Letter

Pupils explain, interpret, and represent information through a Concept Map or
Mind Map- ideas linked to and arranged around the central theme (formal
letter). Possible links to key concept: Who? What? Why? Purpose- Mini-FairWhen? Where?

Pupils categorise or exemplify the content in alternative ways –
write
information in letter as abrochure or pamphlet

Pupils summarise format and content and generalize layout of formal letters
greeting, salutation, address or paragraphing etc.
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
Pupils asked to infer- what formal letter writing implies.

Teacher presents an Informal Letter- Pupils compare and contrast Formal and
Informal letters and highlight similarities and differences.

Pupils analyse the Formal Letter and generate another based on a different
theme.
27.2.2 Procedural Tasks With Connections (including Application Tasks).
Procedural tasks that require students to make connections to concepts, prior
knowledge, real world contexts, disciplinary knowledge (technical or abstract
knowledge). These are forms of understanding tasks that involve applying a known
procedure to an unfamiliar task or context in a way that requires conceptual
understanding, judgement and analysis as well as conditional knowledge and
procedural knowledge. In effect, such tasks require knowledge transfer. Boston and
Smith emphasize that tasks of this kind focus student attention on the use of procedures
for the purpose of developing deeper understanding of key concepts and ideas, or
focuses their attention on the broad pathways or procedures that have a close
connection to underlying conceptual ideas but are not so specific that they can be
applied mechanically but rather require interpretation and judgment. What is crucial
here, as Putnam, Lampert and Peterson insist, is that these tasks focus on
“understanding as making connections,” particularly between conceptual and
procedural knowledge, and between formal and informal knowledge (83-87). Such
tasks may or may not involve extended (>2 para) written text production. Eg. In Maths,
use the concept of LCM as used in adding fractions with different denominators to
simplify algebraic fractions with different denominators. Here students have learned the
procedure to deal with ordinary fractions.
b. Knowledge Production tasks are explicit disciplinary forms of understanding tasks
that employ, or attempt to employ, some combination of domain specific disciplinary
practices or procedures to generate, represent, validate, communicate and deliberate
knowledge claims. These knowledge claims constitute knowledge that is new to
students. Thus, they go well beyond both whereas many classroom tasks involve
recalling or reproducing old information, or acquiring new information in way that does
not involve the use of standard disciplinary knowledge practices, knowledge production
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tasks are rich understanding tasks (understanding tasks on steroids) intended to develop
new and deeper understandings that go beyond comprehending existing information, or
manipulating information in ways designed to improve conceptual understanding and
make connections. Knowledge production tasks thus, are scaled down disciplinary tasks
that employ disciplinary practices—procedures, norms and standards—to generate,
represent, communicate, validate/justify and deliberate knowledge claims. In engaging
in knowledge production tasks, students actively generate knowledge that is new to
them, and they do so by being tasked to engage in some form of inquiry project work,
or group or class deliberation that requires explicit reference to domain specific or
disciplinary conventions or norms. We get a sense of knowledge production tasks, for
example, in Anderson and Krathwohl’s emphasis on tasks that involve “creating
knowledge: generating (hypothesizing), planning (designing), producing/constructing
knowledge.” Similarly, Putnam, Lampert and Peterson focus on three areas of “doing
mathematics” from a disciplinary perspective: problem solving (using relationships
among quantities and shapes to solve problems, and relying on generic or domain
specific heuristics to do so); mathematizing (building quantitative models of nonquantitative relationship), and mathematical argument: developing or generating “new”
propositions in mathematics, and establishing their truth by using conjectures and
proofs and by appeal to standards.
Berieter and Scardamalia have been key architects of an approach to knowledge
production tasks that they term “knowledge building.” “Knowledge building differs
from the other approaches by emphasizing conceptual artefacts (theories, designs,
plans, histories, etc) as products, tools, and objects of inquiry... Activities such as model
building, conducting experiments, and producing reports are carried out in service of a
broader effort to produce some innovation or advance a knowledge frontier…In
educational applications, students are engaged in design in all phases and at all levels of
the knowledge-building enterprise: defining problems, advancing initial ideas, using
whatever resources and inquiry possibilities are available to improve those ideas,
reformulating problems as the knowledge building advances, and presenting results ...
Thus, it could be said that instead of assimilating design-mode activity into the
academic curriculum the academic curriculum is assimilated into design mode…”
(Bereiter & Scardamalia, “Education for the Knowledge Age: Design-centred Models
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of Teaching and Instructions.” In Alexander and Winne, eds., Handbook of Educational
Psychology, 2006).
From a more explicit disciplinary perspective, Ford and Forham (Michael Ford and
Ellice Forman, “Redefining Disciplinary Learning in Classroom Contexts,” Review of
Educational Research, 2006, p. 3.) recently developed an approach to the teaching of
science that expresses the shift from a focus on knowledge acquisition and performance
to understanding tasks quite well: “Repeatedly, for more than a century, educational
reformers have reminded us that students enter and leave school with a very limited
notion of what the disciplines they study are actually about … and that they should be
engaged in the activities of historians, mathematicians, scientists or literary analysts
rather than just learning about the results of those practices…” Developing disciplinary
understandings, skills and dispositions involves developing the capacities necessary to
engage in certain kinds of knowledge-intensive social practices, in academic and nonacademic contexts, and to do so effectively and meaningfully.Students don’t learn
disciplinary skills, understandings and dispositions by learning about it but by doing it
in authentic ways.
Learning disciplinary knowledge thus requires participating in
authentic disciplinary practices and conversations rather than just learning about the
results of these practices, including:

Disciplinary practices that generate new knowledge claims,

Disciplinary practices that evaluate the truth value of knowledge claims

Disciplinary practices that apply knowledge to new problems or situations

Disciplinary practices that communicate and debate disciplinary knowledge
and findings.
We propose to code for four domain specific forms of knowledge production tasks:

Math: non routine tasks

English: extended text production

English: interpretative / hermeneutical tasks

English: expressive tasks
27.2.3. Mathematics: Non-routine tasks. In mathematics, mathematical tasks that are
“ill-structured” or “non-routine” have strong disciplinary features that
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of mathematics. Boston and Smith, for example, characterize “non-routine
mathematical tasks” as tasks having five features:

they require complex non-algorithmic thinking (ie not explicit, predictable, well
rehearsed pathways or algorithms for students to use);

they require students to explore and understand domain specific concepts and
processes;

they demand self monitoring or self regulation of ones’ cognitive processes;

they require students to access relevant information in working through task;

they require students to analyse the task and task constraints that may limit
possible solution strategies.
27.2.4. English - Extended Text Production. In English grammar, elaborated or
extended text production—writing a play, short story, history, or biography—constitute
a form of knowledge production task if students are required to do so in ways that gives
explicit attention to, and understanding of, specific genre rules and conventions. These
tasks can be uni-modal (E. g. written) or multi-modal (visual, digital, written, oral,
textual). Eg. in Maths, using geometric knowledge and concepts of optimisation,
students are o create a design to equip a room that fits 40 people using some materials
provided and a modest budget. The requirement is the group of 40 people can break into
groups of 5 and conduct their discussion without disturbing other groups, provide good
ventilation using fans (as air-con not allowed). Students need to figure out what shapes
might provide better airflow (maximise airflow); what materials might impede sound
travel (minimise interfering noise); minimise cost.
27.2.5. English - Interpretive or hermeneutical tasks. In English literature,
knowledge production tasks can take several forms: interpreting or deconstructing texts,
images, music or dance. If these interpretative tasks require making meaning by
developing and defending an interpretation by drawing on relevant domain specific
standards, conventions, procedures, norms or rules. When tasks have these
characteristics, the work of the task constitutes a form of knowledge production.
27.2.6. English – Expressive tasks. In English classes, tasks that require students to
interpret and enact meaning (E. g. by acting out a play, or reading a poem or a story out
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loud to a class) in ways that acknowledge and draw upon relevant protocols, standards,
conventions, procedures or norms are knowledge production tasks. (Eg; “use
emphasis,” “give meaning,” “use your body to convey meaning,” “vary your tone and
intonation,” “get inside and enact the story or poem”).
28. EPISTEMIC PLURALISM AND DELIBERATION
Disciplinarity is characterised by epistemic pluralism or openness – or to put it
negatively, by the absence of epistemic closure. Epistemic pluralism accepts that there
can be multiple perspectives on an issue or solutions to a problem. However,
disciplinarity insists that epistemic pluralism be principled rather than promiscuous or
lacking in discrimination – perspectives or solutions have to be well grounded, publicly
justifiable and accountable to the knowledge community. We know from Core 1 that in
a very large proportion of Singapore classrooms, knowledge claims are presented as
truth claims – claims that are true per se—rather than as contestable claims to be settled
by evidence, reasons, arguments, comparison, discussion etc. In this scale, we want to
explore this issue again, but keeping additional considerations in play as well.
Consequently, for each phase, we will code for five features of knowledge claims made
by the teacher and/or students:

Is the knowledge claim presented as truth or as a contestable claim? If the
knowledge claim is presented as a contestable claim, we have an instance of
epistemic agency. (Note Cazdens comment in Mercier and Hodgkinson on the
exercise of epistemic agency in the right to offer alternative accounts,
explanations. Epistemic agency is characteristic of exploratory or understanding
talk).

Is the knowledge claim supported by reasons (evidence, arguments,
justification) or not? If not, it is an expression or statement of opinion rather
than a knowledge judgement.

Does the attendant knowledge talk permit or encourage knowledge critique (in
which students are encouraged or permitted to question the validity of the source
or knowledge claim)?

Who are the epistemic agents involved in making knowledge claims: the
teacher, individual students, the whole class or small groups in the class?
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
Is the knowledge claim made after collective deliberation (in which the
epistemic agents discuss the reasons or evidence for a knowledge claim) or not?
28.1. Knowledge Orientation. Knowledge presented as (incontestable) truth or as a
contestable claim that can in principle be validated or supported by evidence, argument,
justification, comparison) Scale:
28.1.1=Knowledge as Truth;
28.1.2=Knowledge as a Contestable Claim.
28.2. Knowledge Claim Supported by Reasons. Knowledge claims are supported by
evidence, argument, agreement, justification, comparison etc:
0=No;
1=Yes
28.3. Knowledge critique. Students encouraged to question the validity of a source or
the claims made by teacher, text or knowledge source:
0=No
1=Yes
28.4. Epistemic agency. Is the author of the knowledge claim
1=teacher,
2=individual students,
3=class as a whole,
4=small groups in the class
28.5. Collective Deliberation. Does the teacher permit or encourage collective
deliberation of the knowledge claim? 0=No, 1=Yes
29. EPISTEMIC VIRTUES
Earlier we noted that engaging in disciplinary knowledge work (ie., disciplinarity)
involves the exercise of both generic and domain specific epistemic virtues—telling the
truth, seeking the truth, consistency, reliability, persistence, intellectual courage,
curiosity, imagination, and so on. These virtues are dispositions that can be modelled
and nurtured.3 Developing disciplinary dispositions therefore involves the deliberate
3
Note the efforts of Phillip Jackson et al in the Moral Life of Classrooms to capture the
nature of the moral life of the classroom.
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cultivation of these virtues. The principal theoretical inspiration for this argument
derives from recent developments in “virtue epistemology” (E. g. Zagzbski, Greco,
Kornblith, Grayling, Williams, Benson and Stangroom, Balckburn, Pritchard etc). John
Greco, for example, characterizes virtue epistemology this way:
“Virtue epistemology begins with the assumption that epistemology is a
normative discipline. The main idea of virtue epistemology is to understand
the kind of normativity involved on the model of virtue theories in ethics.
This main idea is best understood in terms of a thesis about the direction of
analysis. Just as virtue theories in ethics try to understand the normative
properties of actions in terms of the normative properties of moral agents,
virtue epistemology tries to understand the normative properties of beliefs in
terms of the normative properties of cognitive agents. Hence virtue theories
in ethics have been described as person-based rather than act-based, and
virtue epistemology has been described as person-based rather than beliefbased.
For example, non-virtue theories might try to understand the epistemic
justification of belief in terms of doing one's epistemic duty, believing
according to the evidence, or using a reliable method. In each case the
account of justified belief makes no reference to any normative properties of
persons. On the contrary, it would be natural on such views to think of
epistemic virtues as dispositions to believe in the ways in question. Virtue
epistemology changes this direction of analysis by understanding justified
belief in terms of epistemic virtues. For example, Ernest Sosa has argued
that justified belief is belief that is grounded in epistemic virtue. Similarly,
Linda Zagzebski has argued that knowledge is true belief arising out of acts
of intellectual virtue. Of course the next task is to give an informative
account of the cognitive virtues involved in such definitions. Depending on
how this is done, we get further versions of virtue epistemology.” John
Greco, “Virtue Epistemology,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2004.
But there is also a second source that we think is relevant to classrooms in Singapore. In
his book on Sagehood (2009), the Confucian scholar Stephen Angle suggests that one
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of the (unintended?) consequences of Confucian perfectionism (as in self perfection
through diligent effort, learning and reflection) is the idea that the sage is infallible – the
sage never makes an error of judgement and his word is final. I suspect that this
understanding of the epistemic infallibility of the sage has crept into the cultural
construction of pedagogical authority as well in the classroom and authority more
generally in Confucian societies, although it is far from accurate to say that Singapore
is, strictly speaking, a Confucian society. This contrasts with Western epistemological
sensibilities where, since Descartes in the 17th century, the dominant sensibility has
been one of epistemic modesty, scepticism, doubt, caution and insistence on the
demonstration of proof or justification of knowledge claims. This sensibility is
generally characteristic of modern disciplines as well.
Given the relative dearth of virtue talk of an epistemic nature in Singapore classrooms,
we will simply code for presence (1) or absence (0) in each phase and aggregate at the
lesson and unit level. If there is a higher incidence of epistemic virtue talk than we
expected, we can use Likert scales and even more detailed counting procedures using
Studio Code.
29.1. Veracity/veritistic value. Importance of truth telling and/or truth seeking;
appreciating the pervasiveness of ethical issues in different disciplines.
29.2. Intellectual courage. Importance of finding out or looking for the truth; ability to
view things from alternative positions and reconsider one’s position or change one’s
stand if the evidence or reasoning warrants it.
29.3. Intellectual humility. Importance of recognizing limits of knowledge;
understanding and appreciating the fallibility of human judgement.
29.4. Intellectual curiosity. Importance of being intellectually curious; being able to
understand and assimilate/synthesize the ideas of others.
29.5. Intellectual scepticism. Importance of scepticism until convinced by reliable
evidence, valid inferences or good reasons; not accepting things as true on the basis of
authority; able to tolerate uncertainty and ambiguity.
29.6. Excellence/ quality. Importance of producing high quality work. E.g. writing
clear, evocative, meaningful sentences; successfully advancing an inquiry by making
plausible inferences, analysing key assumptions and identifying the implications of
different positions. Emphasis on coherence, consistency and rigour.
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29.7. Reflexivity. Importance of understanding how one learns; self understanding;
metacognitive wisdom; self regulation; being insightful and being able to apply
concepts and skills learnt.
29.8. Persistence/Perseverance. Importance of persistence, trying harder, showing
commitment to the task.
29.9. Imagination, creativity. Importance of being imaginative, creative, even being
playful and taking risks.
29.10. Principled (judgments). Importance of making principled judgements;
distinguishing the opinion from the person.
29.11. Understanding others. Importance of understanding the perspective of others;
showing patience and respect for the rights of others to voice their positions.
30. REGISTER
Register is a term used in sociolinguistics relating to the variety or form of language
used for a particular purpose or in a particular social setting. In the following example,
two distinct registers are identifiable by the choice of words and length of utterance:
Teacher to pupil (both standing outside a classroom): What happened in there, just
now?
Pupil
Can
you
(rather
please
angrily):
tell
He
me
why
come
you
moved
here,
what!
from
I
your
seat?
chase
him.
Register is often marked by politeness and relative social status: we wouldn’t speak to a
Principal in the same way as we would to a taxi driver when making a request or giving
an
instruction.
Two basic registers or language styles are to be coded depending on the relative level of
formality displayed by the speaker/writer:
30.1. Formal. Prominent use of technical and/or academic vocabulary, exact
definitions are important and necessary
30.2. Informal. Casual, slang, frequent interruptions, imprecise, no background
information is provided, required or necessary
Note:
Both teachers and students can lapse into, or purposefully use, formal and informal
registers in rapid succession. Indicators: 0=not Present, 1=Present, 2=Mixed
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ACTIVITY CODES
Reciprocity. Reciprocity is a specific form of collective talk and is evident when
teachers and students (or students and students) listen to each other, share ideas and
consider alternative viewpoints and do so in a respectful manner (although strictly
speaking, mutual respect is not a requirement of reciprocity). Alexander distinguishes
between talk that is collective and talk that is reciprocal: for Alexander, collectivity is
evident when teachers and students address learning tasks together as a class. However,
I think reciprocity is the more demanding and useful of the two criteria and we should
code for its presence rather than for collectivity. (In any case, conceptually collectivity
is implicit in or entailed by reciprocity). Michaels and Resnick describe talk that is
collective and reciprocal as a form of “accountable” talk — specifically talk that is
“accountable to the learning community.” At its best, when it leads to classroom talk
that assumes the dimensions of “dialogue” (Alexander), it is talk that “attends seriously
to and builds on the ideas of others; participants listen to and learn from each other,
grappling with ideas together.” Reciprocity does not necessarily involve mutual respect
– antagonists in combatitive exchanges often show plenty of reciprocity but no respect
for each other. Conceptually then reciprocity merely requires that participants in a
conversation listen to each other attentively. However, because we suspect that it will
be hard to code separately, we have added mutual respect as an additional normative
dimension to our conception of reciprocity by stipulating that it exhibits mutual respect.
Scale metric: We will use a 0-3 Likert scale to code for the degree of reciprocity in
classroom talk during activities: 0=None; 1=A Little 2= Moderate Amount; 3= A Lot.
Purposefulness. Purposefulness is criterion of dialogue that Alexander (2008, p.113)
finds present when “teachers plan and steer classroom talk with specific educational
goals in view.” This might be difficult to judge at the activity (whole class discussion
only level), and might need to be judged at the lesson level only, taking into account
what the teacher says in the post-lesson interview. However, it might be evident from
the flow of conversation during the class that the teacher has a very clear view of the
end point of the lesson – what she wants to students to understand – and continuously
directs student talk towards it. In other words the teacher keeps the talk on task.
Purposefulness therefore is indicated by the degree to which the teacher uses classroom
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talk to support and advance the learning outcomes s/he desires for the learning task. We
will use a 0-3 Likert scale to code for the degree of reciprocity in classroom talk during
activities: 0=None; 1=A Little 2= Moderate Amount; 3= A Lot.
Cumulation. Of all the criteria of dialogue, this is perhaps the most important. Broadly,
“dialogue” is a form of classroom talk that purposively builds student understanding
over the course of the lesson in a process that Alexander terms “cumulation.” Alexander
suggests that dialogue involves purposively working towards achieving a common
understanding or shared meaning through structured, sequenced, chained, cumulative
questioning and discussion that focuses on exploring and developing meaning,
understanding and reasons, guides and prompts, reduces choices/narrows possibilities,
minimizes risk and error, and expedites the handover of concepts and principles. What
is crucial is that the sequence facilitates development of meaning and understanding and
deepens or moves forward the argument, story or explanation—that there is evidence of
steady development and deepening of student understanding over the course of the
lesson which constructs a shared dialogue about the issue, story, explanation, puzzle.
Consequently, “cumulation” occurs when “teachers and students build on their own or
others ideas and chain the claims into coherent lines of thinking and enquiry” (p105).
Unless cumulation occurs, classroom talk remains “discussion” rather than “dialogue.”
In effect, the process of cumulation is at the heart of “knowledge building,” “knowledge
generation” or “constructing knowledge.” We will use a 0-3 Likert scale to code for the
degree of reciprocity in classroom talk during activities: 0=None; 1=A Little
2=
Moderate Amount; 3= A Lot.
Symmetry. Symmetry is a measure of the distribution of discursive and epistemic
hierarchy in classroom exchanges: whether it is strongly asymmetrical (or hierarchal) in
which the teacher is the dominant voice and authority, whether it a form of classroom
talk in which the voice and authority of the teacher is more indirect and exercised
through the kinds of scaffolding of classroom talk that the teacher provides, or whether
it is a more egalitarian form of classroom talk in which students and teachers share
equally in the exercise of discursive and epistemic authority.
Asymmetrical Talk. Short Teacher-Student IRE exchanges that are generative and
cumulative but the principle source of, or work for, cumulation, is undertaken by the
teacher rather than students. An example would be teacher collecting a number of ideas
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from students before generalising from these ideas. The main emphasis is that the
teacher controls the majority of the dialogic interaction and exercises strong epistemic,
pedagogical and conceptual authority. This would be co-indicated by 11.3 (Discursive
Authority residing largely with the Teacher). Code Absent (0) or Presence (1).
Scaffolded Talk. More substantive T-S IRE exchanges that are generative and
cumulative but ones in which the students are more responsive to each other ideas (ie
exhibit greater reciprocity) and build on and extend one others’ ideas, arguments,
hypotheses, explanations in a way that exhibits cumulation. The teacher continues to
plays a directive role in maintaining the directionality of the exchanges—by probing
certain ideas/exchanges or marginalising certain ideas/exchanges, thus imparting
purposefulness and direction into classroom exchanges—but permits and supports
students exploring ideas and developing conceptual momentum through their own
efforts. Evidence of this will be co-indicated by coding for negotiated or mixed
discursive authority (#3) in 11.3. Code Absent (0) or Presence (1).
Egalitarian Talk. Discursive and epistemic authority is shared between teacher and
students, but leaning more towards the students. Teacher plays minimal role during the
dialogue and allows the students to develop ideas independently, intervening in the
exchanges only when necessary (eg exchanges are moving clearly off-topic), and
entering into dialogue near the end to cumulatively summarise the exchanges. For
example, Lefstein (2006, p.9) suggests that in this more sharing of roles and authority,
the teacher may perform the following functions only, leaving the students to engage in
dialogue maximally. Code Absent (0) or Presence (1).
Convergent or Divergent Talk. Lefstein (2006) suggests that Alexander’s account of
dialogue is too narrow—that it focuses on “convergence” and “consensus” rather than
“divergence,” “tension” and “difference.” In the former, the teacher focuses on
developing shared understandings and meanings; in the latter, the teacher focuses on
exploring tensions, differences in the perspectives that students bring to the topic. The
latter is more characteristic of disciplinary conversations. Dennis again has something
useful to add here: “a teacher at X school that was discussing during tutorial, an
examination question. After a long discussion about how to answer this, he opened it up
by asking them, ‘how would you now answer this differently? I mean, we have
discussed one possible approach to tackling this question, now think about how else you
might be able to push some of these ideas further.’ Because the students know their
content, they began to come up with multiple viewpoints, different approaches, which
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even the teacher never thought about, and he had to think hard about whether the
students’ suggestions were appropriate or not. The first dialogue was one of common
understanding, the latter dialogue (as described) recognises and explores different
viewpoints, alternative perspectives or approaches, arguments, rationales. Such
alternatives are discussed, negotiated and accepted by the teacher and/or students.”
While we expect the convergent and divergent talk to be orthogonal – that talk will
predominantly be one or the other but not both during an activity – we will permit
coding of the presence of both in case our assumption is wrong.
Convergent Dialogue. Convergent talk happens when students try to find common
ground or develop a shared consensus. Convergent talk is generally the default pattern
in small group work. Dennis Kwek comments: “By the inherent nature of group work in
Spore, most of the dialogue will be convergent as at the end of the group work, the
teacher typically wants a shared presentation or finding from the students. Even if it is
divergent dialogue happening within the group the students will have to converge as it
is a required norm of group work. Evidence of divergent dialogue in group work should
be when, after the students presented the expected outcome of the group work (ie the
converged outcome), they went on to point out that there are differences within the
group and that it was difficult for them to arrive at the needed consensus. So the group,
when presenting to class, might say “We generally agree that there is no graciousness in
food courts and that much needs to be improved, but this depends on many factors such
as whether the food court has ample areas and signage for people to clear their trays, if
there are fines for people not to clean up after they eat, if the crowd is young or old,
mixed gender or single gender, in places where higher authority mingle and you are
socially pressured to behave.” Code Absent (0) or Presence (1).
Divergent Dialogue.Dialogue that recognizes (and explores?) the validity of
differences, alternative perspectives, arguments, reasons. Probably very rare in
Singaporean classrooms. When it happens, it evidences a form of epistemic pluralism.
Code Absent (0) or Presence (1).
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LESSON CODES
The purpose of the lesson codes is to capture and record emergent properties of lessons
not necessarily apparent at the phase level. Many properties of a lesson can be captured
through aggregation procedures across the various phases at the lesson level; for other
properties, however, we want the coders to enter a separate discreet code because the
indicator only makes sense at a lesson level. (There are some scales, however, where
we will aggregate and seek your separate overall judgement).
The lesson codes should be done as immediately after the coding of lesson phases.
A.
PURPOSEFULNESS
L1.
Stated Teacher Learning Objectives for Lesson. [Enter Teachers
verbal explanation of rationale and learning goals for lesson. There is
no default choice.]
L2.
Stated Teacher Rationale for Learning Objectives. Teacher’s
explicit explanation for the rationale for teaching and learning
L3.
Mode of Communicating Performance Criteria. See scale.
L4.
Explicit Performance Criteria. Low explicit performance criteria are
identified by an absence of written or spoken reference to the quality
of work expected of students. Reference to technical or procedural
requirements only (such as the number of examples, length of an essay
or the duration of a presentation) is not evidence of explicit
performance criteria.
L5.
Exemplars of Successful Performance. Includes showing exemplary
student work. This could be the previous cohort students’ work or
model answers from the textbook.
L6.
Degree of explanation of exemplar. See scale.
L7.
Purposefulness. The lesson exhibited evidence that the teacher had
planned thoughtfully, designed or selected learning tasks, selected
instructional activities and steered classroom talk with specific
educational goals in view. Evidence of good, thoughtful lesson
planning and clear goals. In addition, these were communicated to the
students in a clear way.
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L8.
Direction/Progression/Coherence.
The lesson shows evidence of
coherent development and execution in terms of sequencing,
appropriateness. The class moved steadily forward; the teacher did not
get sidetracked or bogged down. The class stayed on task and on track.
The class moved steadily forward in a clear progression and didn’t get
sidetracked by ephemeral issues.
L9.
Correspondence between enacted and intended task. The lesson
showed evidence that the task(s) enacted by the teacher matched the
intent and quality of the task(s) that the teacher intended to enact.
L10.
Backward mapping. The lesson showed evidence that the teacher
recapitulated learning goals; summarized learning journey over the
course of the lesson so that students should, in principle, been
reasonably clear about what the lesson was about.
B.
CLASSROOM CLIMATE/NORMS
L11.
Teacher Responsiveness. There is evidence that the teacher was
attentive and responsive to student questions, queries, puzzlements.
Here we are looking for a qualitative judgement based on your
impression of the lesson as a whole.
L12.
Student engagement. There is evidence that students were engaged in
the work of the lesson and not merely compliant or going through the
motions. Again, a qualitative judgement based on your impression of
the lesson as a whole.
L13.
Student agency. While phase level coding includes a measure of
student agency that we can aggregate to the lesson level, we would
also like to have a qualitative judgment from the RAs given the
importance of this issue to the development of the classroom as a coregulated learning community. As in the phase level, we want a
judgement of how much influence students have over the choice of
topic, the assessment task, the instructional strategy, and so on.
C.
INSTRUCTIONAL PRACTICE
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L14.
Task Structure. Adapted from Alexander 304-05, 340 -41.
Alexander’s account confusingly focuses on activities: tasks rather
than activities are the appropriate focus.
L14.1. Singular. Within a lesson, only one task was deployed.
L14.2. Multiple-unrelated.
Within a lesson, a series of task (2
or more) were deployed. The tasks have no clear relationship
to one another, but may be cognitively similar to the
preceding ones. They do not build on the other activity(s).
L14.3. Multiple-related iterative. Within a lesson, a series of tasks
(2 or more) are deployed. The tasks are iterative, cognitively
similar to the preceding ones and do not build on the other
task(s). Examples are: Task A using example A, Task B using
example B, where B and A are similar in cognitive demands.
L14.4. Multiple-related sequential. Within a lesson, a series of
tasks (2 ore more) are deployed. The tasks had a clear
relationship to one another and are cognitively similar to the
preceding ones. They built on the other tasks(s). i.e. the
following tasks could not work without preceding activity.
L14.5.
Multiple-related developmental. Within a lesson, a series
of task (2 ore more) were deployed. The tasks had a clear
relationship to one another in a cumulative manner. Such
cumulation can be seen in terms of increased challenge or
complexity of related tasks E.g. Doing task A enables you to
be able to do task B, where B is more complex than A and
depends on knowing how to do A. [Idea of curriculum-asscaffold & curriculum enactment]
L15.
Task Structure. There is evidence that the overall task structure,
whether singular or multiple, was well designed, cumulative
and
proceeded in an orderly progression that was understandable,
meaningful and accessible to all students.
L16.
Monitoring. There is evidence that the teacher constantly and
carefully monitored student understanding, and attempted to probe and
establish the level of student understanding. While we have a
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quantitative measure at the phase level, we want a qualitative
judgment at the lesson level as well.
L17.
Instructional Flexibility/ Pedagogical Judgment. There is evidence
that the teacher is adaptive in his/her choice of instructional strategy as
and when the need arises, that the teacher does not dogmatically
follow her pre-planned strategy especially if it does not seem to work.
Teacher showed evidence of flexibility and “pedagogical agility”
(Erica McWilliam) to take advantage of ‘teachable moments’.
L18.
Misalignment. There is evidence that chosen instructional strategies
were clearly inappropriate to the tasks so that task and instructional
activity were clearly misaligned. We have focused on “misalignment”
rather than “alignment” because it is easier to detect. As DK suggests,
alignment assumes two things: (a) we know what is the appropriate
strategy for said task; (b) even if we can’t claim to (a), then all we can
say is that a strategy ‘works’ in that said task got completed.
Flexibility implies a greater set of pedagogical repertoires that the
teacher may have, and a sense of ‘pedagogical agility’ (to use Erica’s
term).
L19.
Learning Support: Provision. There is evidence that the teacher
provided appropriate learning supports when necessary. Again, while
we have a quantitative measure at the phase level, we want a
qualitative judgment at the lesson level as well.
L20.
Learning Support: Withdrawal. There is evidence that the teacher
withdrew learning supports as student understanding and mastery
developed. Again, while we have a quantitative measure at the phase
level, we want a qualitative judgment at the lesson level as well.
L21.
Feedback. There is evidence that the teacher gave students, either
collectively, in groups or individually, detailed, substantial feedback
on student talk or written work. Again, while we have a quantitative
measure at the phase level, we want a qualitative judgment at the
lesson level as well.
D.
Intellectual Quality of Knowledge Work
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These scales focus on the intellectual quality of tasks and classroom talk over the course
of the lesson.
L22.
Focus on Knowledge Transmission / Coverage. There is evidence
that the dominant preoccupation of the teacher through the lesson was
knowledge transmission and “coverage” (Wiggins and McTighe) of
the topic rather than knowledge building or complex knowledge
construction.
L23.
Task Design: Focus on Complex Knowledge Construction. There is
evidence that the dominant preoccupation of the teacher through the
lesson was knowledge building or complex knowledge construction
rather than knowledge transmission and coverage of the topic.
Specifically, there is evidence that the teacher designed tasks that
permitted students to actively engage in complex knowledge practices
– to generate knowledge claims, to represent knowledge claims, to
validate or justify knowledge claims, to communicate knowledge
claims, and to communicate knowledge claims—that permitted them
to develop conceptual and procedural understanding and skills rather
than focus on memorizing propositional knowledge or information.
L24.
Whole-Class Dialogical Classroom Talk: Focus on Complex
Knowledge Construction. There is evidence that the teacher
succeeded in engineering forms of classroom talk that purposively
worked towards deepening understanding or shared meanings through
structured,
discussion
sequenced, chained, cumulative questioning and
that
focused
on
exploring
meaning,
developing
understanding and expedited the handover of concepts and principles.
What is crucial is that the sequence facilitated development of
meaning and understanding and moved
the argument, story or
explanation forward (cumulatively) in a purposeful manner by seeking
clarification of meaning, by asking for reasons and evidence, looking
for connections between concept, opening up discussion to alternative
perspectives,
by
generally
engaging
in
understanding
work,
exploratory talk and/or accountable talk.
L25.
Small Group Talk: Complex Knowledge Construction (Dialogical
Talk). There is evidence that small group talk focused on exploring
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meaning and developing understanding. What is crucial is that group
talk facilitated development of meaning and understanding and moved
the argument, story or explanation forward (cumulatively) by seeking
clarification of meaning, by asking for reasons and evidence, looking
for connections between concept, opening up discussion to alternative
perspectives,
by
generally
engaging
in
understanding
work,
exploratory talk and/or accountable talk.
L26.
Knowledge Transfer. There is evidence that the teacher supported
transfer of understanding and/or skill from one context to another.
L27.
Knowledge Integration.
There
is
evidence
that
the
teacher
attempted to link the work of the class to work in earlier or later
classes.
L28.
Knowledge Reproduction. There is evidence that the teacher was
very concerned to ensure that the students were properly prepared for
semestral or national assessments.
L29.
Metacognitive Self Regulation.
There is evidence that the teacher
tried to help students develop “metacognitive wisdom” (Galton) by
prompting and supporting students to monitor their own learning
patterns and to manage their learning appropriately and efficiently.
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UNIT CODES
The purpose of the lesson codes is to capture and record emergent pedagogical
properties of units not necessarily apparent at the phase or lesson level. Some
properties of a unit can be captured through aggregation procedures across lessons,
but for other properties, however, we need the coders to enter a separate discreet code
because the indicator only makes sense at a unit level.
The unit codes should be done as immediately after a review of all of the lessons in a
unit.
A.
PURPOSEFULNESS
U1.
Purposefulness. The unit exhibited evidence that the teacher had
planned thoughtfully, designed or selected learning tasks, selected
instructional activities and steered classroom talk with specific
educational goals in view. Evidence of good, thoughtful lesson
planning and clear goals. In addition, these were communicated to
the students in a clear way.
U2.
Direction/Progression/Coherence.
The unit shows evidence of
coherent development and execution in terms of sequencing and
appropriateness of lessons. The class moved steadily forward; the
teacher did not get sidetracked or bogged down. The class stayed on
task and on track. The class moved steadily forward in a clear
progression and didn’t get sidetracked by ephemeral issues.
U3.
Review. Teacher recapitulated learning goals; summarized the
learning journey over the course of the unit.
B.
CLASSROOM CLIMATE
U4.
Student engagement. There is evidence that students were engaged
in the work of the lesson and not merely compliant or going through
the motions. Again, a qualitative judgement based on your
impression of the lesson as a whole.
U5.
Task Structure and Sequence. There is evidence that over the
course of the unit, the teacher used a variety of appropriate learning
tasks and sequenced them in an appropriate and cumulative way.
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U6.
Instructional Breadth and Flexibility. There is evidence that over
the course of the unit the teacher selected a variety of instructional
activities and showed evidence of flexibility and “pedagogical
agility” to take advantage of ‘teachable moments’.
U7.
Summative Assessment. The teacher conducted a summative
assessment of the work of the unit. DW: “there should be an
indicator that captures in some way the fact that at the end of the
unit, the teacher endeavoured to obtain evidence that the students
have learned the key content, skills or dispositions that was taught
throughout the lessons. This could be in the form of a summative
assessment at the end (bloody typical) or something more innovative
like a project or performance task, or formative assessment.
Essentially, evidence of student handover of knowledge.”
U8.
Performative Task/Project.
The teacher asked students to
complete a performance task or project at the end of the unit. See
DW comment above in U8.
C.
INTELLECTUAL QUALITY OF KNOWLEDGE WORK
U9.
Focus On Knowledge Transmission. There is evidence that the
dominant preoccupation of the teacher throughout the unit was
knowledge transmission and “coverage” (Wiggins and McTighe) of
the topic rather than knowledge building or complex knowledge
construction.
U10.
Task Design: Focus on Complex Knowledge Construction. There
is evidence that the dominant preoccupation of the teacher
throughout the unit was knowledge building or complex knowledge
construction rather than knowledge transmission and coverage of the
topic, including the design of learning tasks that permitted students
to actively engage in disciplinary practices – to generate knowledge
claims, to represent knowledge claims, to validate or justify
knowledge claims, to communicate knowledge claims, and to
communicate knowledge claims – that permitted them to develop
conceptual and procedural understanding and skills rather than focus
on memorizing propositional knowledge or information. In
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particular, there is evidence of purposeful and cumulative classroom
dialogue.
U11.
Classroom Talk: Development of Dialogical Talk. There is
evidence in the unit of classroom talk (whether whole class or small
group) of a dialogical form that purposively worked towards
deepening understanding or shared meanings and expedited
handover of concepts and principles. In particular, there is evidence
of purposeful and cumulative classroom dialogue.
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