Bridging group work and whole-class activities through responsive teaching in science education

Abstract

AbstractPrevious studies have shown both benefits and challenges of group work and whole-class activities in educational settings. One overall finding in the existing literature is that it is challenging for teachers to facilitate whole-class conversations that realise the rich potential of student discussions and undertakings during group work. This article investigates how teachers can facilitate productive consolidating whole-class conversations building on students’ group work experiences by enacting responsive teaching practices, implying foregrounding students’ experiences and ideas, and pursuing the substance of the students’ experiences and ideas in instructional work. Based on a sociocultural perspective, we analyse sequences of classroom interactions where students’ experiences from their lifeworld are invoked in a) settings where student engage in small group activities and b) teacher facilitated whole-class conversations. The educational context is a science project about genetics involving lower secondary school students and their science teacher. Our analysis shows that in group work settings, students’ everyday experiences are invoked but are seldom picked up on and pursued in group conversations as resources for engaging with science matters. In whole-class conversations facilitated by the teacher, especially in situations in which the teacher assumed a responsive teaching approach, students’ everyday experiences were more often realised as resources for shared meaning making and engagement with scientific concepts and ideas. We discuss this study’s implications for teachers designing productive learning activities that combine group work and whole-class activities.