Taking a Turn for the Better and the Worse: The Relationship between Achievement and Self-Reported Discourse Behavior

Abstract

This article describes the results of an exploratory study on the relationship between level of student achievement as measured by previous final course grade and student-and-teacher discourse patterns in German class. Oral discourse represents concomitantly many foreign language students' number-one learning goal (Harlow and Muyskens; Ludwig) and a great source of anxiety (Campbell and Shaw) and frustration (Horwitz). In foreign (as opposed to second) language learning, the bulk of these expectations and fears play themselves out within the confines of the classroom speech community, including peers and the teacher, the prime forum for target language interaction. We can thus expect that language learning success influences directly or indirectly (e.g., through anxiety) the type of output students produce, the type of input they receive or perceive, and the manner in which they view classroom discourse on the whole. This preliminary study uses self-reported data to generate specific research questions and to provide concrete guidance for further in-depth research on this topic. An investigation of discourse behavior, whether a relatively informal observation or a formal study, requires that the researcher analyze and evaluate a body of data whose quantity and variety can be daunting unless specific organizing principles or analytic systems are employed (El-Kadi 200). Such organizing principles include subject groupings, such as learning success, and an inventory of discourse behaviors which vary in accordance with the subject variables. The study aims to compile a catalogue of questions which promise to yield insightful results when applied in a more thorough examination of the discourse behavior of more-as compared to less-successful students and their teachers. This study, however, cannot distinguish between cause and effect. Its results do not clarify which discourse patterns may be influenced by and, conversely, which may influence overall student achievement. Therefore, conclusions regarding pedagogical implications such as whether and how to alter classroom discourse patterns, remain speculative and will be pre ented as part of the discussion rather than as a central part of this article.