Dialogic Teaching during Cooperative Inquiry-Based Science: A Case Study of a Year 6 Classroom

Robyn M Gillies

doi:10.3390/educsci10110328

Abstract

Teachers play a critical role in promoting dialogic interaction in their students. The purpose of this case study was to investigate how one very effective teacher taught two, cooperative, inquiry-based science units to her Year 6 class. In particular, the case study focused on how she used different discourses to capture students’ curiosity in the inquiry-based tasks, provided hands-on activities to enable them to test out their hypotheses and develop explanations for what they found in order to help them become more scientifically literate and have a broader understanding of the role of science in the world in which they live. The results showed that the students engaged constructively with their peers on the inquiry group tasks; they used the correct scientific language to discuss phenomena, make claims, and compared findings. Furthermore, they became more adept at expressing their opinions and providing explanations and justifications for the ‘scientific’ positions they had adopted across the six inquiry-based science lessons; core cognitive practices that support learning. This case study highlights the importance of utilizing both authoritative and dialogic discourse to challenge and scaffold students’ thinking to support enhanced understandings and reasoned argumentation during inquiry-based science. This case study fills a gap in the literature on how teachers can utilize different communicative approaches during inquiry-based science units to promote student engagement and learning.

Highlights

IntroductionIt is well known that students learn when they have opportunities to interact with others where they actively listen to what others have to say, reflect on different propositions, present ideas and information, and, in turn, learn to incorporate different concepts and perspectives into their own understandings
Teachers play a pivotal role in inducting students into ways of thinking and reasoning by making explicit how to express ideas, seek assistance, contest different propositions, and reason cogently [1].It is well known that students learn when they have opportunities to interact with others where they actively listen to what others have to say, reflect on different propositions, present ideas and information, and, in turn, learn to incorporate different concepts and perspectives into their own understandings
The case study teacher was one of four teachers who were identified as very effective teachers, based on indicators of teacher effectiveness adapted from the research on teacher effectiveness in teaching science, the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers developed by the Australian Institute for Teaching and Learning (AITSL) and previous research by Gillies [27,28,29] on the effects of cooperative learning on students’ task behavior, language, and learning

Summary

Introduction

It is well known that students learn when they have opportunities to interact with others where they actively listen to what others have to say, reflect on different propositions, present ideas and information, and, in turn, learn to incorporate different concepts and perspectives into their own understandings. Such interactions do not happen without modelling and guidance from the class teacher who must construct learning situations where students have opportunities to learn the language of science. Herrenkohl, Tasker, and White [2] found students were better able to link their hypotheses, scientific investigations, and data analyses to more coherent accounts of their investigations

Methods

Results

Conclusion