Who has power? An investigation of how one teacher led her class towards understanding an academic concept through talking and microblogging

Kari Anne Rødnes,Ingvill Rasmussen,Maren Omland,Victoria Cook

doi:10.1016/j.tate.2020.103229

Kari Anne Rødnes, Ingvill Rasmussen + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2020.103229

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Abstract

This study examines work with an academic concept in a multicultural classroom where a microblogging tool was used to facilitate dialogues. The analysis of extracts from classroom talk shows how one teacher prompted students to explain, elaborate and compare their written blog posts. The verbal richness and multiple perspectives evoked through the combination of dialogue and technology allowed the students to engage in active exploration of the concept of power in a social science lesson. This paper contributes to our understanding of dialogic practice as well as how specific features of technology can facilitate productive classroom interactions.

Highlights

Classrooms are increasingly diverse in terms of students’ language and cultural backgrounds as well as their experiences with and access to digital and multimodal technologies
Through analysis of talk and microblogging, the overarching goal of this study is to contribute to the knowledge about how teachers can include students with diverse backgrounds in technology-supported learning processes and actively use language to support the appropriation of academic concepts
The analysis above presents a trajectory where a class worked with a central academic concept and shows how the teacher managed to lead students from their everyday conceptions to a more subject-specific understanding

Summary

Introduction

Classrooms are increasingly diverse in terms of students’ language and cultural backgrounds as well as their experiences with and access to digital and multimodal technologies While this diversity creates new possibilities to invoke richness through participation in educational dialogues, it poses challenges for the teacher. It is necessary to gain more knowledge about the strategies that teachers may employ to manage the complexity in contemporary classrooms To address this issue, we investigate how one teacher led her class in a lesson focusing on the academic concept of power. We investigate how one teacher led her class in a lesson focusing on the academic concept of power She included students with varied levels of language mastery in classroom dialogue and productively drew upon their preconceptions whilst using a digital microblogging tool for support. Concept learning demands active language use (Lawrence et al, 2015)

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