What happens in the classroom?

Moves and Acts Yadira Edith Oceguera Guareo

WHAT HAPPENS IN THE CLASSROOM? MOVES AND ACTS

B Y : Y ADIRA E DITH O CEGUERA G UAREO . M ARCH , 2012.

INTRODUCTION
Interaction is the process through which education takes place. It is an essential part of teaching - learning process and it offers a lot of opportunities for learning English. Teacher transmits information to students who then give back their understanding or the lack of it. In this essay I will analyze an example of the interaction going on in an English classroom. How the teacher student interaction affects the learning process? Is there such thing like the interaction that should take place during the English classes? Are we, as teachers, aware of the importance of encouraging relevant interaction in the classroom?

THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
The way we talk in the classroom or in any other institutional situation is different from the way we talk in everyday casual situations. For Sinclair and Coulthard, cited by Malamah-Thomas (1987), the classroom language offers a more structured type of discourse than normal everyday conversation. For Kurhila (2004), institutional talk (like the one occurring in the classroom) is characterized by being goal-oriented and containing contributions shaped by the institutional goals. That would make the analysis easier. This analysis aims to provide us with an idea of the kind of teaching learning process going on in the classroom (MalamahThomas, 1987). An appropriate interaction would just depend on the purpose of the particular lesson. It means that teachers should not have the same type of approach every time, but the interaction should change according to the main objective we try to achieve. (Malamah Thomas, 1987). It is important to notice that the analysis proposed by Sinclair and Coulthard, cited by Malamah-Thomas (1987) was aimed to the use of the language in general, while the Brown Interaction Analysis System (BIAS) was focused on education. In both analyses the method is to divide up the interaction taken place into moves and acts, each of them are given a name according to their function. Here we will find a system analysis derived from different systems adapted to the needs of this essay.

CONTEXT

What happens in the classroom?

Moves and Acts Yadira Edith Oceguera Guareo
The interaction was recorded in a bilingual primary school, second grade. Students are children between seven and eight years old. Most of them have an appropriate level of language according to what is expected for the standards of the school. Some of them are still in this process. The teacher is a proficient native speaker woman who has helped students to improve a lot during the school year.

ANALYSIS
The class objective was to recycle some vocabulary words and to learn their use in context. At the beginning of the class, teacher had given cut outs with different parts of an already studied song to each student. They were sharing their strips with parts of this song while teacher stopped to check over the main vocabulary words. The general topic was rainforest. They had made some decorations for the classroom and also they were completing a chart using the main vocabulary words. Let us look at the interaction: Person making the move T. Ss. T. S. T. Ss. T. T. Ss. T. T. S. T.

Words spoken Remember we started singing a couple of songs yesterday? Yeah Guess what? What? We are going to do it today too No!!!Yeah!!! Yessel Do you want to share yours? (Student nodes) OK Im ready Yessel when you are (Reading slowly) Five small poisonous monkeys scratch quickly in the canopy (Teacher writes down the words on the blackboard while speaking) Oh! Thats terrible Yessel! Five poisonous monkeys! OK, I need some help Who can tell me where the canopy is? I dont remember

Classification Focus Reply Focus Reply Metastatement Reply Nominate Elicit Reply Accept Elicit Reply Aside

T. T.

Focus Elicit

What happens in the classroom?

Moves and Acts Yadira Edith Oceguera Guareo
Look. We have a rainforest started over here, and we are talking about the canopy Who can show me where the canopy is? Who can show me where it is? (Students raising hands) Anna, please come over You can only point to it because may be you cant reach it OK. Where is the canopy? Everybody else: have it in your head (Anna points out to the middle part of a tree) All rightWhat do you think? Is that the canopy? No! Oh, ohwhats wrong? (A different student talking) Oh, ohit has to be on the top with those other So, whats special about the canopy? This is the canopy right hereWhats special about it? Whats it like? Rodrigo? It is likethe top Its the top, right? Is it the tallest, tallest? No! No, its just a top layer rightWhat is it like? An umbrella! A big umbrella, right? Remember the layer song? The canopy is like a big umbrella? OK Sotheyre fighting on the ground

T. T. Ss. T. T. T. T. T. Ss. T. S. T. T. T. S. T. T. Ss. T. S. T. T. T.

Focus Elicit Bid Nominate Direct Elicit Direct Challenge Reply Challenge Reply Elicit Prompt / Clue Nominate Reply Accept Elicit Reply Prompt / Clue Reply Accept Focus Focus

What happens in the classroom?

Moves and Acts Yadira Edith Oceguera Guareo

Ss. T. Ss. T. T.

No! Where are they fighting? Canopy! Up in the tree tops, right? OK, all rightsoAre you ready to sing this song?

Reply Elicit Reply Accept Focus

T. and SS. Singing together Small, poisonous monkeys scratch Quickly in the canopy, Quickly in the canopy, Quickly in the canopy

CONCLUSION
According to the analysis, teacher was doing most of the talking. Students had a nice and good participation even when they did little talk. It was interesting the way teacher contextualized the vocabulary and made students interested in the topic. The interactions helped students to understand how language is used in a given context and to construct the language. This type of analysis can show us if we as teachers are using interaction in a correct way to contribute to the teaching-learning process. In this case, I would say teacher has a good interaction with her students allowing them to construct their own learning. Since many issues arise during our everyday activities in the classroom, every class and every group will develop a different dynamic and our planned interactions may not always work. However, we as teacher should be aware of the kind of interactions we are having with our students and should also think about how to improve those interactions according to our needs and goals.

REFERENCES: MALAMAH-THOMAS, A. (1987). CLASSROOM INTERACTION. OXFORD: OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS. PP. 44 59. KURHILA, S., 2004. CLIENTS OR LANGUAGE LEARNERS - BEING A SECOND LANGUAGE SPEAKER IN INSTITUTIONAL
INTERACTION. IN:

R. GARDNER AND J. WAGNER, EDS. SECOND LANGUAGE CONVERSATIONS. LONDON: J, W AND

CONTRIBUTORS.