Socratic dialogue and teacher-pupil interaction

Abstract

The aim of this quasi experimental research involving an experimental and a control group was to answer the question whether a course in the Socratic Dialogue in Nelson-Heckmann tradition would have any effects on content area student teachers’ beliefs and interactional behaviour with second language pupils. We consider the question partly positively answered. The course did not seem to have any effects on the teachers’ beliefs about communication as measured by a teacher belief survey, but it did have effects on their interactional behaviour. However, the first half of the answer can further be nuanced by the answer to the specific question regarding the effects of the course in the Socratic Dialogue on the student teachers’ statements on learning. As it is, after the course, the spontaneous statements on learning were more participation oriented. Regarding the nature of the effects on the student teachers’ interactional behaviour with second language pupils, the teachers asked more open-ended questions, slowed down the pace of the dialogue, explicitly invited the pupils to contribute and allowed them more time to express themselves. Also, they paid more attention to language. The microanalysis of the interaction in the teacher-pupil learning dialogues where the teacher’s interactional behaviour had changed, displayed change patterns pointing to an increase in interactional space for the pupil and in open question sequences containing a greater variety and frequency of metalinguistic sequences. In the course of the research, three instruments were developed. The first was the Socratic Dialogue assessment form. It may be considered a successful attempt at defining the Socratic Dialogue and its main features. It was developed in the cooperation with four experienced Socratic Dialogue facilitators and one Socratic Dialogue theoretician. Its inter-observer reliability was good. The second instrument was a teacher belief survey. Drawing on two metaphors for learning (Sfard, 1998) it comprised the two corresponding scales along which teachers’ beliefs about communication in general and in learning and instructions in particular were measured. Its reliability was satisfactory as was its construct validity. The third instrument was the teacher-pupil-learning-dialogue scoring scheme which captured the teacher’s scaffolding behaviour on 8 features. The instrument was found reliable for two observers. Each of the three instruments could be seen as presenting a theoretical contribution to the study of the Socratic Dialogue, teacher beliefs and interactional scaffolding by framing one or more of their respective aspects.