Since the 1950s, there has been a plethora of studies on classroom interaction. Most of them focussed on the language used by the teacher and the learners, and the structures and patterns of classroom interaction. As Allwright & Bailey (1991) pointed out, they are aspects which are observable in the classroom. These studies were conducted from an observer's perspective. Relatively little attention has been paid to the "unobservable" dimensions of classroom interaction which are as important, if not more so, than the "observables."
Learner Participation
Let us take for example an aspect of classroom interaction where numerous studies have been done on learner participation. The focus has been very much on the amount of learner participation, the negotiation of meaning between learners and their relation to second language acquisition. The assumption seems to be the more learners participate orally and the more they engage in the negotiation of meaning, the better they will acquire the language. This assumption largely ignores the possible underlying factors governing learner participation. One of them is learning style. Some learners prefer to listen and internalize rather than to verbalize. Teachers who force these learners to participate verbally may adversely affect their learning process.
Another factor is the psychological state in learning a second or a foreign language. Horwitz, Horwitz, & Cope (1986) point out that second or foreign language learning is a psychologically unsettling process because it threatens one's self-concept as a competent communicator. Hence, second or foreign language learners often suffer from what they refer to as "language learning anxiety" which, if not attended to properly by the teacher, can have a debilitating effect on the learning process (see Tsui, 1996).
Yet another factor is learners' cultural backgrounds. Learners with different cultural backgrounds may have very different conceptions and beliefs about what the classroom should look like and what constitutes proper behaviour in the classroom. For example, in a study of the socio-cultural factors affecting student participation in Hong Kong classrooms, it was found there were some guiding principles about classroom behaviour that students shared amongst themselves, one of them being they should be modest and not volunteer answers until they were called on by the teacher; otherwise they would be accused of "showing-off" (see Johnson, 1996; Tsui, 1995).
Teacher Talk
Let us take another aspect of classroom interaction which has received a great deal of attention: teacher talk. Studies of teacher questions, for example, have focussed on the types of teacher questions, how they modified the questions and the kinds of response they elicited from students. Very little has been done on why and when teachers directed a particular question to whom. The same teacher question asked at different times and directed to different students may serve different functions, including focussing attention, exercising disciplinary control, encouraging student participation, moving the lesson forward, and so on (see Tsui, 1995). This kind of information is not retrievable from the language used by the teacher unless we probe into teacher thinking and teacher decision-making.
The Unobservable
One possible reason for the lack of attention to the unobservable is that studies of classroom interaction were most conducted from an observer's perspective with no attempt to access what went on inside the participants' minds. Yet, very often, information provided by participants would be crucial to the understanding of the complexities in classroom processes. For example, in a study conducted on the communication strategies used in group work by ESL students in Hong Kong, it was found that there was a very high percentage of agreement. However, it was only from the interviews with students that the researcher found that agreement was used by students as an avoidance strategy when they did not understand what the group members were saying or when they had nothing to contribute.
It was only recently that ESL classroom research has begun to adopt an ethnographic approach which investigates classroom events from the participants' rather than from the observer's perspective, looking at these events in their naturalistic settings and in their entire context. For example, Johnson (1996) included in her study students' perception of classroom events as an important part of understanding classroom communication. The studies collected in Nunan & Bailey (1996) examined not only classroom interaction data, but also teachers' and learners' journals, stimulated recall protocols, interview data, and lesson plans. Both the teachers' and the learners' perspectives were central to the studies or were brought in as part of the analysis. (For an excellent example of an ethnographic approach to classroom investigations, see Hammersley, 1990).
Conclusion
Classroom processes are extremely complex. It would be simplistic to think that an observer can fully understand what is going on in the classroom by observing and analyzing a number of lessons. Studies on classroom processes adopting an ethnographic approach and examining qualitative data have yielded far more interesting insights than those which focused on the study of mere quantitative data in experimental settings. ESL/EFL classroom interaction research started off by drawing on insights from teacher education research. Its focus on the observable linguistic aspects of classroom interaction have generated numerous interesting studies which have enhanced our understanding of classroom interaction.
However, it is becoming more and more apparent that dimensions like teacher beliefs, teacher thinking and teacher decision-making are very important in understanding teacher behaviour in the classroom. There is a very rich body of knowledge in recent teacher education research which can be drawn upon to illuminate classroom interaction phenomena Recent research on second language classrooms has already begun to tap this resource (see for example Nunan & Bailey, 1996; Richards & Freeman, 1996; Richards & Lockhart, 1994).
There is also a very rich body of knowledge in L1 classrooms on the relationship between language and learning which are highly relevant to ESL/EFL classroom interaction research (see for example Norman, 1992; Wells, 1985). Johnson' s study (1996) is an attempt to draw upon this body of knowledge. These studies show that classroom interaction research will benefit a great deal from research in neighbouring disciplines as well as from conducting research not only from the researcher's perspective but also from those of the teacher and the learner.
References
- Allwright, D., & Bailey, K. (1991). Focus on the language classroom. New York: Cambridge University Press.
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Bailey, K., & Nunan, D. (1996). Voices from the language. New York: Cambridge University Press.
- Hammersley, M. (1990). Classroom ethnography. Milton Keynes: Open University Press.
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Horwitz, E., Horwitz, M., & Cope, J. (1986). Foreign language classroom anxiety. Modern Language Journal, 70(1), 125-132.
- Johnson, K. (1996). Understanding communication in second language classrooms. New York: Cambridge University Press.
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Norman, K. (Ed.). (1992). Thinking voices. London: Hodder & Stoughton.
- Richards, J., & Freeman, D. (1996). Learning to teach. New York: Cambridge University Press.
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Richards, J., & Lockhart, C. (1994). Reflective teaching in second language classrooms. New York: Cambridge University Press.
- Sato, C. (1982). Ethnic styles in classroom discourse. In M. Hines & W. Rutherford (Eds.), On TESOL '81, (pp. 11-24). Washington, D.C.: TESOL.
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Tsui, A. B. M. (1995). Introducing classroom interaction. London: Penguin.
- Tsui, A. B. M. (1996). Reticence and second language learning anxiety. In K. Bailey & D. Nunan, (Eds.), Voices from the language, (pp. 145-167). New York: Cambridge University Press.
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Wells, G. (1986). The meaning makers. London: Hodder & Stoughton.