>The reason I asked about the lecturing was that one of the things I found
>when I used to teach in the CS department was that it was very difficult to
>shift from giving lectures to a more participatory form of problem-solving
>once I started lecturing. It was as though once the conversational roles
>were established, it was very difficult to alter them. I was wondering
>whether you had had similar experiences.
Tim, this is precisely what I found when I studied small group discussions
of literature in high school English classes. The patterns of discourse in
teacher-led discussions set the patterns for the small group discussions.
When teachers dominated discussions, the students had very few resources for
engaging in discussion themselves and were perfunctory in their response to
the stories. When teachers engaged the students in joint activity--that is,
using their role as "leader" to encourage students to elaborate their
contributions--the students engaged in more elaborated small group discussions.
Refs:
Smagorinsky, P., & Fly, P.K. (1993). The social environment of the
classroom: A Vygotskian perspective on small group process. Communication
Education, 42(2), 159-171.
Marshall, J.D., Smagorinsky, P., & Smith, M.W. (1995). The language of
interpretation: Patterns of discourse in discussions of literature. NCTE
Research Report No. 27. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English.
Peter Smagorinsky
University of Oklahoma
College of Education
Department of Instructional Leadership and Academic Curriculum
820 Van Vleet Oval
Norman, OK 73019-0260
office phone: (405)325-3533
fax: (405)325-4061
psmagorinsky who-is-at uoknor.edu