Reading notes for Oct. 27

Miscellaneous thoughts on Markham

This past summer in EP 604, we learned that most any digital tool you can think of can be used in the research process, when accompanied with ample researcher reflexivity. Markham's chapter on "Internet Communication as a Tool for Qualitative Research" drives this point home again and again as she explores different frameworks and conceptualizations of the Internet and their implications for qualitative research.

Markham is generally very consistent in framing each of her segments in terms of constraints and affordances that, when properly understood and appreciated, "can help researchers make wise choices as they investigate potentially unfamiliar research environments..." (p. 97). I did find it strange that her discussion of the Internet's time-bending capabilities was markedly positive with no mention of drawbacks. I agree that the "chrono-malleable Internet" has numerous "pragmatic advantages," as described on pages 103-104. But what is lost when participants can rehearse, edit, and "pause" conversations at will? I will probably be scolded for privileging face-to-face, but I do like the spontaneity and immediacy of that kind of exchange.

Another big take-away for me regarding EP 604 was what I perceived as a loud and clear mandate for digital literacies in qualitative research.  Markham picks this up on p. 112.  The 21st-century surge of digital technology and the Internet influences our mundane, daily practices, but it also transforms the very core of what it means to be a "good" researcher.

The same impact is being felt in education.  In my field, there are those similar to Markham who call for a heightened awareness of the implications of digital tools for teaching and learning. Lankshear & Knoble, for instance, champion digital literacies in educational contexts. They advocate a “dialectical” approach, which brings together “elements of the conventional and new that are often in tension within established educational set-ups" (p. 255). Educators gain “insider” sensibilities through hands-on exploration of new technologies so as to better envision and develop pedagogies that will take students “from where they are to where we believe it is good for them educationally to go” (p. 246).

Markham makes a parallel statement in her chapter: "If researchers cannot adjust to the particular features and capacities of Internet technologies, they may miss the opportunity to understand these phenomena as they operate in context" (p. 112). 

Markham's comments on issues of "control" were also fascinating, and somehow got me thinking of CA. We may have already discussed this a bit in class already, but I cannot recall what, if anything, the CA community has to say about computer-mediated communication (CMC)? I am hard pressed to remember anything ten Have wrote on the subject. After all, can something computer-mediated be considered "naturally occurring"? (Lamerichs & te Molder would say "yes" -- p. 452.) 

But CMC is not really conversation, is it? There is the increasing occurrence of synchronous video conferencing, but CMC is generally not spoken. It's mostly written.  Participants get to contextualize their own words with emoticons, punctuation, modification of voice, and asterisks (such as "Jennifer" did in Markham's example on pp. 106-107). These functions are usually taken up by the conversation analyst during transcription, but within CMC, the participant essentially gets to generate his or her own portion of the  "transcript" for the researcher.

Talk about a shift in control! 

"Shift Happens"

A few years ago an instructional technologist in Colorado created a simple PowerPoint video to inform his school's faculty about the impact of digital tools and globalization on education.  Somehow, it made its way onto the Internet and became an international phenomenon in a matter of weeks, making its creator, Carl Fisch, an IT "rock star" of sorts.

Here in Knox County, Tennessee, school board members circulated the video among their constituents, and it eventually was required viewing during a Knox County teacher inservice program. Even the minister at the church I attend showed it during a Sunday school discussion on postmodernism and Christianity. 

The video was titled Shift Happens, and the fact it went viral with more than five million views on YouTube sort of proves its own point.

Markham talks about "shift" when she suggests that researchers change their view of the Internet as a medium for "information transmission" to one of "meaning-making" (p. 98).  All the readings this week build on this theme, speaking variously of shifts from the cognitive to the constructivist (Markham), from the cognitive to the discursive (Lamerichs & te Molder, 2003), and from "cognitive aspects" to "discursive construction" (Horne & Wiggins, 2009, p. 171).

Variability, instability, a general feeling of impermanence and rupture has characterized the last century even before the arrival of the Internet and CMC. You can always "count on" variability! I am drawn to qualitative research in general -- and the discourse analysis tradition, specifically -- because of its acknowledgement of this aspect of modern life. One of the most appealing aspects of DA is its respect for the element of variability, which undeniably pervades life despite researchers' best attempts at "control." 

A priori frameworks and preconceived standards and expectations of competence or "norms" are consistently challenged in a variety of social science research contexts, such as counseling and sociology and, of course, education, where the industrial-era factory model has proven more than inadequate at addressing the individual and the idiosyncratic. Qualitative research allows me to muck around with the contradictions rather than sweep them aside. And CMC, when viewed with the "discursive psychological perspective" as advocated by Lamerichs & te Molder, lays this all bare. 

CMC is not a neutral medium for simply conveying fixed knowledge inside one's mind; it is a platform for visibly and transparently organizing and working out new thinking and new ideas -- I'm thinking now of my previous post about "signs" and Gunther Kress' "epistemological commitments." Online discussions and other CMC provide a virtual worktable for individuals and groups to lay out their thinking.  It reminds me of the math teacher urging the student to "show your work," which always seemed like a pain for some students who could instantly figure the right answer in their heads. But for other learners, showing one's work meant the possibility of illustrating a new way to arrive at the same answer or, at the very least, receiving partial credit for demonstrating mastery of certain steps in the right direction.

 As a language arts person, it seems odd to me at this very moment to use an example from mathematics instruction to illustrate the value of variability and individuality in learning. Hmm. 

Still, language arts teachers pay lip service about the merits of discussion and distributed knowledge-making, but most classroom research in this area reveals that face-to-face discussion is seldom done, much less CMC.  Well-intentioned teachers, who don't mind relinquishing control of the knowledge flow, face at least two challenges.  First, classroom discussion requires a huge time investment. Second, the process and outcomes are not always easy to document (read: measure and assess).

And this is where CMC comes in service both to teachers and researchers. Twenty-first century information and communication technologies can do a lot to mitigate the challenges of distributed knowledge building. Blogs, wikis, and online networks permit individuals to start, extend, and continue discussions beyond the ordinary limits of time and space, such as was done in the nutrition class in the Lester & Paulus article.  They allow the shared cognitive workspace to be plainly visible and accessible on a 24/7 basis. 

Reading notes for Oct. 27

Reading notes for Oct. 20

Reflecting on CDA

It's official.  It there was any doubt I was CDA before, it's now certain: I'm one of them.

 

I approached this week's selections from Rebecca Rogers' An Introduction to Critical Discourse Analysis in Education  thinking, "Gee is my man." But the more I read about Gunther Kress, the more intrigued I became. 

 

What's odd is, Fairclough, Gee, and Kress have been with me all along without me even knowing it! On page 9, Rogers mentions the New London Group and their seminal document A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures. This is a cornerstone piece of my theoretical frameworks, and I am only now making the connection that all three fellows helped author it!  Weird.

The "New London Group" was mostly, if not entirely, a collective of literacy scholars who called for a radical change in literacy pedagogy in response to “cultural differences and rapidly shifting communications media.” Anyone who writes about or researches the "disconnect" between students’ in-school and out-of-school literacy practices tends to cite the New London Group's theoretical overview of how to successfully leverage new literacies in service of educational goals as well as the personal development and overall well-being of students. 

 

The New London Group took pprogressive-minded educators to task for over-emphasizing "situatedness" in instruction, and they put forth the “pedagogy of multiliteracies” to compensate for the limitations of situated practice by adding in overt instruction, critical framing, and transformed practice. Through critical framing, learners “denaturalize” their growing mastery of practice and “constructively critique it, account for its cultural location, creatively extend and apply it, and eventually innovate on their own, within old communities and in new ones” (pp. 86-87).

 

I have referenced the New London Group "manifesto" as a how-to document for student-centered technology instruction; I had never understood it as a "shared vision" for critical discourse traditions, as Rogers notes (p.9). But it makes sense in light of her explication of the generative aspects of Critical Social Theory, where "the end goal is to hope, to dream, and to create alternative realities that are based in equity, love, peace, and solidarity" (p. 5). This is getting at the "design" side, and I think it explains why I am drawn to Kress' vision. 

 

Overall, it was challenging to tease out the distinctions between Fairclough, Gee, and Kress.  It all started to run together at some point, and they all build on the principle of discourse as socially constitutive and tied up in power systems. Discourse is multimodal, with language/grammar being but one of several representational sign systems. And I took Rogers' caution to heart, that it was not necessary to "choose sides" and that a "hybrid" approach was not only possible but even preferred in light of the various constraints imposed, especially within institutional contexts.

 

However, I did feel a tug toward Kress, on whom I will comment a bit further. 

 

Connecting to Kress

As were some of my classmates, I was intimidated by the discussion around semiotics and wondered if I have the intellectual capacity to take on these ideas. But I liked what little I understood about social semiotics as a sort of buffer against pure critique of social and institutional structures.  Social semiotics looks at how meanings are designed and re-designed through interaction, with implications for those (like me!) who are interested in "the relationship between educational practices and productive uses of power" (Rogers, p. 14).

 

I want to learn more about this "difference between design [social semiotics] and critique" (Rogers, p. 14), and I think this is what separates Kress from the others.  It has something to do with the "material" aspects of discourse and what Rogers notes as Kress' "focus on the sign-maker, rather than the sign" (p. 8).  

 

In Kress' chapter, I just really loved his discussion of the student's rendering of cell with nucleus as an "epistemological commitment."  It sounds high-falootin', but what it suggests to me is this total re-orientation in the classroom to what students know and can do as opposed to the typical deficit model that measures students' learning by how well they enact preconceived "standards" of excellent and how well they perform on achievement tests.

 

You see this a lot in literacy instruction, such as when teachers or parents fail to recognize emergent print concepts and letter formation in a pre-literate child's playful "scribbling," or when adolescents' bonafide text creations (fanfiction, YouTube uploads, personal webpages) are dismissed as "spending too much time playing on the computer."

 

I love Kress' emphasis on multimodality as defined on pp. 208-209. , which suggests a major paradigm shift for classroom teaching. Kress says, "To make a sign is to make knowledge" (p. 211). So powerful!! We say we are always looking for "signs of learning" in the classroom, but are we really? Seldom to we create spaces or make room for "spoken signs" and "image signs."

Reading notes for Oct. 20

"I don't know": Reading notes for Oct. 13

Maybe it's a blessing I did not post to my blog last week, because it wasn't until Thursday night's discussion that I began to consolidate my thinking and make some connections across the last chapters of Wood & Kroger and ten Have. I recognize that "consolidating" and "connecting" is the intended purpose of the blog, but even then, I usually seek out someone to talk to as I am immersed in the readings, usually my classmate Renee.

But I didn't have time to chat with my colleague last week, due to a major transcription task in front of me.  Once I removed the earbuds and got the voices of my field informants -- all 11 of them -- out of my head, I drove to class in a mental fog.  I was in no state of mind to discuss, much less write about, the "detailed, painstaking, sometimes tedious work" of producing a warranted and trustworthy research analysis (Wood & Kroger, p. 181).

"I don't know" 
Who would have thought that the innocuous and ubiquitous phrase "I don't know" would snap me out of my transcription-induced funk?

Last Thursday night, some of my classmates expressed skepticism around claims made about the use of "I don't know" in academic discourse. At first, I was reminded of CA's less-than-endearing traits (to me) --  its "obsession" with details and unapologetic refusal to acknowledge the obvious (ten Have, Chapter 3). But the extract in question was from a DA study, not a CA study, and the reaction it stimulated brought our class discussion back full-circle to basic issues and challenges of producing "good" research.  Although it was just a short segment of the full analysis, our diverse reactions to the study provided at least a partial indicator of its power to stimulate meaning-making. 

Audience 
One of the most profound lessons for me in year-long ethnography with Dr. Anders was the idea that we are not speaking for participants, but to an audience. The word used in class last week was "resonance," a criterion for good writing in general, I believe. With 12 hours of qualitative methodology courses under my belt, I can safely say no single scholar has stirred my thinking more on this topic than Laurel Richardson, whose essay "Writing: A Method of Inquiry," I'd already read twice, and now, a third time.

According to Richardson, our "meaning is in the reading." As a qualitative researcher, I must write in such a way as to ensure a connection with an audience, my intended readership, whoever that may be. "...[Q]ualitative work depends upon people's reading it," Richardson tells us (p. 346). 

Applied CA 
Without realizing it, I was primed for reading ten Have's conclusion. Finally!  An acknowledgement (albeit a "cautious" and "agnostic" one) of those researcher-practioners who aim to take up CA to inform or contribute to a specific field or discipline. In fact, I learned from these last chapters that CA's warrant has much to do with the analyst's orientation to audience.

In a summary of ideas proposed by James Heap, ten Have writes, "Whether it is worthwhile to do ethnomethodology (or CA) depends on the value of the news it produces for an audience" (p. 195). Further, the goal of applied CA is to deliver "news" that may foment change within an organization or among a group of participants.

So, CA isn't just the linguistic equivalent of navel-gazing after all! :-)

This idea of "newsworthiness" as a measure of warrantability reminded me of Wood & Kroger's "powerful criterion" of fruitfulness. Fruitfulness has to do with "implications of the present work for other work" (p. 175). Like last Thursday's class discussion, I feel I have performed a 360-degree turn. I am back now to some of my earliest questions, reflections, and reservations. The idea of DA as a mechanism for shining light on "acknowledged social problems" is one I've wondered about off-and-on within this blog. 

"Alternatives"

The price, of course, for openly assuming a stance is increased vigilance in the area of researcher reflexivity. The qualitative researcher is obligated to "bracket," to be openly reflexive about hunches and presuppositions.

Wood & Kroger describe this as taking account of "moral implications" (p. 175).  I like how another author, Patti Lather in "Issues of Validity in Openly Ideological Research," calls it "a self-corrective element" (p. 188). Similar to Wood & Kroger's call for criteria that "transcend" traditional positivist standards (p. 167), Lather offers a "reconceptualization" of validity (p. 188). She writes, "Our best shot at present is to construct research designs that push us toward becoming vigorously self-aware" (p. 190).

I enjoyed how Wood & Kroger recast "reliability" as a matter of repetition, but not in outcomes, which are always subject to interpretation. Instead, repetition as a standard of quality works differently in DA. It's the aggregate of researcher actions, "part of the careful attention to detail and the concern for refinement that are major features of discourse-analytic work" (p. 166).

And validity is not based on black-and-white truths that are somehow captured. Validity is a matter of strength and trustworthiness that is "co-constructed" between informants, author, and audience. Quoting Potter, Wood & Kroger point to the "greater prominence" assigned to reader reaction, "an emphasis that both results from and is encouraged by the greater transparency of discourse-analytic work" (p. 168). 

Crystals

Crystals are typically transparent, sometimes a little cloudy and not without a few imperfections. And that is why I love Richardson's crystal metaphor, recommended as an alternative to the traditional triangulation procedure for demonstrating quality of a study.  I went back to "Writing: A Method of Inquiry" to make sure I understood the metaphor. Could I ferret out any implications for DA? What about those of us who are not writing "postmodernist mixed-genre texts"? Does that mean the process of "crystallization, " as Richardson describes it, isn't a viable alternative within the DA tradition?

I don't know.

Or, maybe crystallization is as much a researcher process as it is product?  We refract and reflect at all stages of research so the final piece of writing, even a conventional research report, is clearer and more engaging.  Richardson describes experimental processes, such as revisioning one's work as fiction so as to see it from different points of view.  This doesn't mean we all hang it up and become fiction writers, she says, it means we take advantage of the "propitious" time we live in and give ourselves up to the "playful pull" (p. 362).

To me, that suggests experimentation in one's writing as a means to locate, condition, and fine-tune one's voice, even if that voice ultimately finds its audience via traditional academic formats. In that regard, then isn't that what this blog is for? A possible venue for "staging a text" and "writing in other ways"?

I don't know. And that's OK.

As Richardson says, "Paradoxically, we know more and doubt what we know."

"I don't know": Reading notes for Oct. 13

Goin' on a pattern hunt!

As part of his Kindergarten homework, Henry had to go on a "pattern hunt." We started the hunt immediately upon pulling up to the curb in front of our house after school. With my phone, I took pictures of patterns he identified in the yard and on the porch.

Henry located numerous patterns of shape, size, and color within the American flag, the picket fence, the decorative lights strung on the porch, the poured-concrete pavers on the ground. Patterns, patterns everywhere!

"Look, Henry!" said his grandmother, who was with us. "Here's one," she said, pointing to a series of concentric circles atop a water meter cover.

Henry frowned, not seeing it. "Granny, that is not a pattern.  A pattern is the same and repeats itself," he instructed, before continuing his search.

Well, of course, it was a sort of pattern we were all looking at in the ground. Patterns involve form and/or structure and occur with varying levels of extensiveness and complexity, thus making them "sometimes difficult to recognize" (Wood & Kroger, p. 117).  Henry was so well schooled in the textbook definition of "pattern," he could not wrap his five-year-old mind around an interesting departure from the rule.

This is the challenge of the novice researcher/analyst: striking the right balance of unschooled intuition and basic analytical knowledge. It isn't easy intuiting significance from interestingly deviant cases if you don't "know" a little about what you are looking at.

Recognizing "patterns of interactions"

At once, I think novice analysts may have an advantage insofar as "unmotivated looking" because we are not deeply schooled in the DA/CA literature base. And, yet, as ten Have explains his strategy, "...[T]he starting point is some 'noticing' in the transcript that something 'interesting' seems to be happening at some moment. From that moment on, the purpose of the strategy is to elaborate and contextualize that rather intuitive moment" (p. 124).

It is helpful, then, to possess "a few basic concepts from the CA tradition to structure one's 'looking'" (p. 121), and ten Have's four, fundamental "organizations" from the CA knowledgebase seem incredibly helpful to me as I move forward.

In a similar vein, Wood & Kroger provide lists of "sensitizing devices," lest we become "loose and undisciplined" during our early explorations of the data (p. 91). They acknowledge that it is difficult to know if an interesting feature hasn't already been described elsewhere by other scholars. This has come up earlier in class discussions: how do we keep up with the vast array of features, concepts, and devices? In this regard, it seems the novice is at a disadvantage if not at least generally familiar with the CA/DA literature. No one wants to reinvent the wheel.

In at least one previous blog post, I have worried about not being able to master the vast array of "concepts and devices" emanating from the traditions of DA. For this reason, I enjoyed their discussion of "useful concepts or sets of ideas" that, in some cases, "transcend any particular tradition" (p. 100). Like ten Have's suggested "organizations," which I think Wood & Kroger lump together as "collected dossiers," the list of concepts in Chapter 8 strike me as something to hang onto as I prepare to embark on my own pattern hunt.

Another go-round with context

Context remains at the center of "lively debate" in DA, this time regarding its role in the analysis and interpretation of data. Where, if at all, does information about settings, circumstances, social roles, demographic variables, and so on work its way in?

Context comes from within and without. Wood and Kroger note the "contextualization of utterances is a procedure that is relied upon by participants themselves and is hearable-visable in the discourse that we are analyzing" (p. 128).

It gets dicey around "extrinsic context" -- how much of setting, institutional orders and participant characteristics, class, gender, race, age, and so on, can we draw on in our analysis? Wood and Kroger recommend a "simple" strategy, which we have heard before in class -- it's only relevant if the participants make it relevant. Otherwise, how do you know where to stop? And heavy doses of researcher reflexivity can help mediate the process of determining what is relevant. Wood and Kroger: "It is crucial to emphasize that the recommendation is not to ignore context, to leave out what is important, but to be very careful about how it is brought into analysis" (p. 129).

This is where I have some questions about the document/text we are to locate for our project. I have looked at one primary document, the School Improvement Plan (SIP), a document every public school must compile and submit to the state each year. I located in the SIP a very small bit about the collaborative teaming that I am currently observing. I have reviewed every relevant page of the school website, but this is understandably geared toward students, parents, and community stakeholders and does not include information about the mission, philosophy, purpose, or background of the collaborative team concept or even site-based management in general. I have also sent out emails to a few team members inquiring about documentation. 

But perhaps I should wait and see what kind of paper trail is circulated or produced from within the team when I am there??

Another interesting analytic move related to context that I would like to learn more about is this idea of "extending the boundaries of the interaction under analysis" and developing "ethnographic knowledge" or "shared knowledge" between myself and the participants.  Wood and Kroger say, "Sometimes ethnographic research is necessary." This suggests a longer engagement in the field than I had originally planned, and I am starting the process of requesting an extension from the principal and the head of research for the school district.

ten Have, P. (2007). Doing conversation analysis: A practical guide (2nd ed.). Los Angeles: SAGE. 

Wood, L. A., & Kroger, R. O. (2000). Doing discourse analysis: Methods for studying action in talk and text. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

Goin' on a pattern hunt!

DA project update

I have observed twice at my research site "Plan B" (the high school) since Sept. 22. This week brings my third visit to the school and -- finally -- an opportunity to record a full collaborative team meeting between core academic teachers. 

After consulting with my adviser, I have decided to request permission from the building principal to continue fieldwork indefinitely with hopes of turning this project into "something more." I am currently doing a research review for Dr. Allington on the ways in which collaborative dialog, distributed leadership, and shared decision-making support effective literacy instruction. We will see where this goes....

Other than an overarching concern about producing a meaningful transcript in time for the Oct. 13 data session, I would like to share some initial concerns and observations about the site and participants:

1) After listening in on two meetings, I am conscious of the fact that I am really attuned to the content of the talk between teachers and have not really been cognizant or deliberate about talk features and devices. I am growing a little antsy, I guess, because this weeks' chapters are all about pre-analysis and early analysis of discourse, and I am still at the front-end of transcription.  That said, the content of the collaborative team meetings is really interesting (to me) and covers a variety of topics and issues.  I am much more jazzed now about this research plan, than my original Plan A. Funny how things change.

 

2) During the first observation, I sat at the table and chose not to write notes or clack away on my computer because I did not want to put off the group.  Plus, in a way, that constitutes "recording," and I agreed not to record.  So, afterward, I went to the school library and typed up everything that I could remember, first impressions, questions, ideas, etc. On the second observation, I sat away from the table and tapped fieldnotes into my iPad and this proved to be effective, but I was less able to attend to all of the non-verbals, facial expressions, etc.

3) The perfect metaphor for this experience: embedded journalist with a military unit on the front lines of action.  That's how it feels. Some additional observations:

• lots of laughter, humor, camaraderie, "inside" jokes
• lots of micro-level discussion and problem-solving about specific students and student issues (absences, truancy, pregnancy, failing grades, tardies, school transfers, pressures related to family and/or work and financial obligations) So, the somewhat cliched image of educator as "triage expert" comes to mind, but that's my metaphor, not the participants'.
• The bulk of conversation focuses on grades, test scores, passing-failing -- issues of performance as opposed to issues related to actual teaching and learning. And I have heard zero dialog about literacy learning. Perhaps this is the natural outcome of interdisciplinary teaming at a high-needs school, where the problems of students are "shared" between faculty who are making deliberate effort to create a culture of caring. 

4) Some potential problems and challenges pertaining to transcription come to mind:

• lots of overlapping and latching speech
• lots of use of student names.  I can supply pseudonyms for the major participants on the team, but what do I do about the countless student names brought up in conversation?  Last week they probably discussed two dozen different students. Do I insert students' initials into the transcript? Do I use S1, S2, S3, etc.?
• environmental noise (from a photocopier in the meeting room as well as an open door on a hallway filled with students during the passing period) could potentially corrupt some segments of the recordings
• Zan, my pseudonymous friend and primary contact on the team, occasionally addresses me directly to fill in context or to include me in whatever joke is at hand. (I, in fact, know about half of the collaborative team already, so building rapport has proven not to be an issue).  Do I tell her just don't do that anymore?

DA project update

Example of DA study in reading education

I am currently doing a research review of the state-of-the-art in secondary reading instruction.  I am finding that this is variously referred to as "high literacy," "new literacy," "thoughtful literacy," and "higher-order literacy" (Allington & Cunningham, 2007; Langer, 2002). Discussion, or "intelligent literary discourse" (Langer, p. 1), is central to the development of this idea. So, to that end, I had in mind that I would search for a discourse analysis study that focused on some aspect of secondary literacy instruction, but particularly classroom discussion.

I began by searching the recommended discourse analysis journals listed in BlackBoard. I found that my combination of search terms -- literacy (also tried English), high school (also tried secondary), instruction, teachers, and adolescent -- did not yield many results relevant to my research agenda.  Within Google Scholar, I added the search term discourse analysis, and I had more luck finding what appeared to be interesting studies (to me) but nothing that resembled "pure DA." I changed up my approach yet again, going to the combined archives of two top-tier, peer-reviewed journals in my field: Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy and Reading Research Quarterly, both published by the International Reading Association. I discovered that if I did not narrow the "Learner" field (as seen in the screen capture below), I got 18 search returns:

However, even among these 18 results, nothing quite resembled the DA studies we read last week. Several of the studies I previewed were of a case study design that deployed discourse analytic techniques.  Other studies claimed an ethnographic orientation while applying discourse analysis methods. Is this the bricolage effect (Wood & Kroger, pp. 25-26)?  In the past, I have read philosophical and scholarly commentary that compares the educator's work to that of  a bricoleur, and I am now wondering if that isn't being reflected in the work of educational researchers within the qualitative tradition, or at least within the DA tradition.

At any rate, one study in particular caught my eye because of its focus on literature-based instruction and classroom talk with pre-adolescents.  I chose this study to critique.

Clarke, L. W. (2007). Discussing Shiloh: A Conversation beyond the book. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 51, 112-122. doi:10.1598/JAAL.51.2.3

• Context and motivation-In fall 2003 five fifth-grade students appeared to be vigorously discussing literature in student-led group, but Clarke noticed segments of conversation within the transcripts that went "beyond the surface level of the discussion" (p. 113).  Both Clarke and the students' teacher believed in the value of literature discussion groups for improving levels of student engagement and higher-order thinking and problem solving, but Clarke wanted to open up this "common instructional practice to a critical analysis" in hopes of informing classroom teachers how student-led literature groups might be restructured to better serve the literacy skills and future employment opportunities of "working class students" (p. 113). [The literary text being used is the Newbery-winner Shiloh (1991) by  Phyllis Reynolds Naylor.]

• DA tradition-Claiming "influences beyond this text" (p. 113), Clarke used Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) to connect the students' discussion of Shiloh to classroom, school, and community discourses. Specifically, Clarke drew upon the three-part analytic framework devised by Fairclough: description, interpretation, and explanation.

• Methods/data sources-As part of a larger, three-year qualitative study, Clarke video- and audio-taped many discussions and supplement these tapes with observation, field notes, student interviews, focus groups, and student writing samples and journal entries.  For the study at hand, he chose to zero in on a single conversation between five fifth graders, which he said represented themes found across other groups. He coded this conversation for turn-taking sequences as well as other features (listed below) and then performed a content analysis based on length of turns and gender.  He wrote "data narratives" (analytic memos?) around each code (pp. 114-115). During the interpretation phase, Clarke widened his analytic net to include all the other data sources from his three-year study, which he said "gives power to this small example as an illustrative case"  (p. 115). During the final part of Fairclough's framework, which is explanation, Clarke accounted for his interpretations by connecting them to broader "situational, institutional, and societal influences" and the existing literature base on dominant discourse by boys (pp. 117-118).

• Language features attended to (theoretical constructs)-Following Fairclough's guiding question -- "What interactional conventions are used and are there ways in which one participant controls the turns of others?" -- Clarke decided to  focused on turn-taking systems. He also "coded" for sidetracking, center staging, giving orders, using insults, disagreeing, ignoring, using reinforcement, community building, giving listening responses, and interrupting. In the final phase of analysis, Clarke connected local themes of male-dominated discourse between students to an "underlying ideology of male discursive power" and "hegemony" (p. 117).

• Claims made as findings-Clarke identified three major themes in his analysis of the conversation extract; all three themes essentially had to do with a gender imbalance and the male-dominated nature of the conversation. This led him to conclude that the literature circles as they currently functioned in the fifth-grade classroom were a staging ground for "perpetuating gendered discursive roles" (p. 120).  

• So what question?-  Allowing for the fact that student-led literature circles in theory can make a powerful impact on literacy development and the socialization of students, Clarke suggests teachers rework their approach by more careful and considerate literature selections (texts that explore gender issues, for example), direct instruction on group processes, and "re-inserting" themselves into groups as a facilitator/coach.

• Comments/reflections -I really wanted to learn more about the use of CDA in reading and literacy education, but I don't think this particular study is an exemplary model.  For one, I don't buy Clarke's  generalizations about "working-class students" and his shaky substantive claims about student-led discussion groups as a "common instructional practice." (This is simply not supported in the wider literature base.) Moreover, he makes questionable methodological moves, such as using "student informants" to contextualize video segments with him in a sort of member-checking process and relying on a massive data set to guide his interpretations. His efforts resemble triangulation; although, he does not refer to it as such. Overall, I was reminded of Wood and Kroger's discussion of striking a balance when drawing on different perspectives, lest you fall victim to the "pitfalls of eclecticism" (p. 25).

Example of DA study in reading education

On serendipity and design: Notes for Sept. 22

As in most research, serendipity is important: it helps to be alert for unexpected opportunities. -- Wood & Kroger, Doing Discourse Analysis

A serendipitous data collection opportunity

This week I will begin observing collaborative faculty meetings held each Thursday morning at a local high school where I use to teach. This is one of two data collection options I am exploring this semester for Discourse Analysis. Unlike my Plan A context, in which I am essentially a researcher-participant, I had to negotiate entry into the high school site, and I am still not entirely certain if and when I will be able to obtain discourse recordings there.

As I have described in previous reflections on research contexts, this opportunity to do fieldwork came about through a chance encounter with a good friend and former colleague who happens to chair the collaborative team. As such, I am just trying "to roll" with this one! I am going to try to assume the stance of an explorer, who might use "whatever data" I can lay my hands on (ten Have, p. 71).

But it's hard not to anticipate what I might find!

Once a perennial low-performer with roughly 80 percent low-SES student population, the school in question began a massive reorganization four years ago upon threat of state takeover. It is now divided into vocational learning communities, and I will be observing collaborative talk between teachers and support staff who work in what is referred to as "the health sciences learning community." Last year, for the first time since the inception of the No Child Left Behind law, the school posted annual yearly progress in all areas. So, to some extent at least, the reforms are working, and by all accounts the school is a more energizing and exciting place to work and to learn than it ever was in the six years I was there.

It is impossible to overstate the level of teacher dis-empowerment that existed when I left the classroom in 2005. Opportunities to work or even to talk collaboratively were few and far between. You might say "professional talk" occurred, but it was more like venting, griping, and "sounding off," usually over rushed 25-minute lunches or while standing in line to make photocopies.  Time was not carved out during actual contract hours for teachers to work face-to-face with their peers. 

This semester in Dr. Allington's REED 605 (Organization and Administration of School Reading Programs), we are studying how schools can transform into places of "thoughtful literacy" through a number of reform measures, including professional dialog and distributed leadership models. This leads me to wonder about the impact of the collaborative team meetings on the quality of literacy instruction at my former school.

Has the emphasis indeed shifted from "minimum literacy competencies" to "higher-order literacy" (Allington & Cunningham, 2007, p. 129)?  Will this be reflected in the collaborative team dialog? Is there a connection between collaborative, problem-solving dialog among teachers and collaborative, problem-solving dialog among the students they teach?


And there I go, formulating ridiculously ambitious questions that cannot possibly be answered within the short scope of this data collection exercise. Worse, I fear I am so blinded by my own narrow interests and expectations that if I were lucky enough to stumble upon some analytically worthy chunks of data, I won't recognize them.  After two years of intense, graduate-level study, far removed from the participants and contexts I claim to "know" so well, will my vision re-adjust to the outside world? Or, am I permanently handicapped by the researcher's lenses? Some form of theoretical myopia?

For these reasons, I took to heart the summary of ethical issues and the final cautions about data sources in Wood & Kroger's Chapter 4. In a case such as mine, where I have "happened upon" discourse in serendipitous fashion, it is best to "open up" the questions and maybe let go of them entirely. I also need to be content with understanding the discourse where it is situated, between professionals around a conference table. As much as I want to explore connections to classroom instruction and teacher-student interactions, this is not the route for doing so.

On a slightly different note, insofar as the actual recording procedure goes, events in the last few days have especially sensitized me to the "ethical and practical concerns that require the modification of ideal practice" (p. 64). I have been advised by the principal/gatekeeper to not record during my first few observations, so as not to interrupt the participants' collaborative flow. I spoke to the chair of the collaborative team about this stipulation, and she remarked that she couldn't think of a single member who would object to being recorded. They are, she said, a fairly "unbridled and brazen bunch." As a former teacher, I can relate to this. Because so much of our work day is routinized, scripted, regimented, and timed, we embrace opportunities for collegial interaction -- perhaps too much! Teachers tend to let loose when in each other's company. And that, of course, may be the very reason why the principal wants me to go slow and make my presence known.

Designing a transcript

Serendipity is great for data collection, but not so much for transcription, I think. A novice who attempts Gail Jefferson's approach of noting every feature "because it's there" will surely go mad before completing a transcript! Somewhere between collection and transcription, a researcher must begin to focus her goals, aims, and objectives.

This week's readings on the topic of transcription gave me a chance to revisit some of the concerns I raised in my earliest DA post: namely, just how is it you prepare a transcript with such attention to detail and NOT have a clearly defined research question?

According to Elinor Ochs, you don't. She says, "...the transcript should reflect the particular interests -- the hypotheses to be examined -- of the researcher" (p. 44).

I can see now that it is less a matter of defining questions as it is continually refining questions, such as the "spiralling fashion" noted by ten Have (p. 69). To that end, Wood and Kroger's advice about "initial readings" was especially helpful for identifying an analytic approach as well as segments of data to analyze; although, it implies an even greater time investment for the transcription process than I had initially calculated. I also will the "strategy of reversal," in the event I end up with an uninspiring data set, which is entirely possible due to my narrowing window for data collection.

Of all the readings, I found ten Have's discussion of the "practical aspects" of transcription to be the most accessible, particularly the sections on timing of silences and formatting issues. His process of going in "rounds," starting with a verbatim rendering that grows increasingly descriptive with the systematic layering of "how's," made a lot of sense, especially in light of the practice sessions conducted in class.

I found the Ochs chapter to be the most challenging. It was the way that she described selectivity as a desirable outcome of transcription and not just an inherent problem of transcription that really made me think! After reading Jefferson, I was struck by Ochs' statement that a transcript should not have "too much information.... A more useful transcript is a more selective one." Over and over again in the literature, we are warned about the impact of researcher bias in the production of transcripts. Yet, Ochs seems to recommend we embrace selectivity -- but with our eyes open. Ochs' less-is-more advice sets up an interesting contrast to Jefferson's "if it's interesting put it in" approach.

Problems of selectivity vary from discipline to discipline, according to the researcher's phenomenon of interest. For example, like the other theorists, Ochs discusses strategies for the representation of verbals and nonverbals, but not in the manner I had come to expect after reading ten Have and Wood and Kroger. Unlike the other theorists who warn against privileging nonverbals, Ochs warns against "verbal foregrounding," which, understandably, poses a problem in her field of study, child language acquisition.

In sum, selectivity is inescapable; it is only problematic in the absence of researcher reflexivity. Regardless of one's field, a lack of reflexivity during the transcription process has "consequences," a point Ochs makes repeatedly. It reveals our biases about spatial organization, contingent relationships between utterances, directionality, verbal and nonverbal behavior, and adult communicative models.

References: 

Allington, R. L., & Cunningham, P. M. (2007). Schools that work: Where all children read and write (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson. 

Jefferson, G. (2004). Glossary of transcript symbols with an introduction. In G. H. Lerner (Ed.), Conversation Analysis: Studies from the first generation (pp. 13-31). Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Ochs, E. (1979). Transcription as theory. In E. Ochs & B. Schieffelin (Eds.), Development pragmatics. New York: Academic Press.

ten Have, P. (2007). Doing conversation analysis: A practical guide (2nd ed.). Los Angeles: SAGE. 

Wood, L. A., & Kroger, R. O. (2000). Doing discourse analysis: Methods for studying action in talk and text. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

On serendipity and design: Notes for Sept. 22

Reading notes for Sept. 13

This week's post is a review of discourse analysis (DA) studies from the field of education. First, some overall reflections:

• Most (all?) of this week's articles dealt with the constraints and resources of talk in institutional contexts. The Benwell study gives a nice theoretical frameworks.  Of all the articles, I wish I had read it and the Young and Miller study first.  These authors did exceptional work describing their frameworks.
• Substantively speaking, it's interesting that the object of study in the Buttny and Rath (2007) and Benwell and Stokoe (2002) articles is participant reliance upon talk resources in response to blurred boundaries between school culture and contemporary society. The Cromdal et al. study also examines how participants confront blurred distinctions between once rigidly defined social orders; although, this time it's the peer group and the adult world within the school context.  I think it's exciting the way DA work occurs at the point where cultures collide. A lot of interesting research in my area of interest -- adolescent literacy development -- focuses on "collisions." As a rite of passage, adolescents regularly negotiate boundaries between adult and youth and school and home, with additional tensions produced by membership in cultural, racial, and linguistic minority groups. 
• One methodological move I noticed across all the studies is that findings are not so much asserted as they are suggested.  Claims are worded like inferences or educated guesses and are couched in terms such as "perhaps," "we might," "this may," and "this suggests." 
• Something else I wonder about regarding methodology is this business of attending to "language features." Sometimes I am confused about what is a specific device or feature of talk and what is a broader category or frameworks. However, the Young and Miller (2004) article, which I read last, did a nice job of clarifying. Language is used to create an "interactional architecture" around a common talk practice.  (I like that!) I think I have a better understanding now but wish I had read Young and Miller first.
• A new pedagogical practice introduces a "new routine" (Cromdal et al., p. 205) -- I like to think that's what this blog is generally about!!!

Buttny, R., & Rath, S. K. (2007). Discursive practices in talking problems during a school–family meeting. In A. Hepburn & S. Wiggins (Eds.), Discursive research in practice: New approaches to psychology and interaction (pp. 247-262). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Topic/audience/need for the study-This study examines how participants draw on "conversational resources" (p. 248) when dealing with delicate topics and personal matters during a school-family meeting. According to the authors, it is now more commonplace for school  personnel to confront the "private and interpersonal realm of relationships that may pose problems" in the lives of students (p. 247), whereas, in the past, school officials primarily focused on the academic and vocational pursuits of students.        
Methods/data sources-A "discursive analysis" method was applied to excerpts from a videotaped session between a teenage mother and her family and several school staff members upon the girl's return to school.
Language features attended to-discursive constructions of school and family, social norms and cultural taboos as "conversational resources" that provide "boundaries" (p. 248); agenda statements (see p. 250 for other possibilities); practice of raising "candidate problems" and "candidate problem plus query" (p. 250,251, 252, and in detail on pp. 260-261) and "candidate positioning" (p. 252); false starts and self-repair (p. 251); delicate objects (p. 248 and 251); lexical choice and indexical terms (top of p. 252) used "to construct the issue as a delicate object"; anger, "affect terms," and "the grammar of emotion discourse" (p. 253); co-telling (p. 253); three-part list (p. 253); non-verbal responses and additional transcription to "capture some aspects of gaze" (p. 255); sequential context and accountability sequence (p. 256); proverbial/idiomatic expressions (p. 256); extreme case/apocryphal formulation/exaggeration (p. 259); competence assertions (p. 259). Whoa!
Claims made as findings-The co-director relied on a discursive practice known as "formulating a candidate problem along with a query" to invite family members into dialog about the sensitive issues surrounding teen parenting. The co-director also used "indexical terms" and exaggeration in reference to delicate topics, such as the young woman's sexual activities.  These practices allowed the co-director to probe into delicate topics and areas once considered private, family matters (p. 261).
So what question?-"A problem staff members may face is getting participants to open up and engage in discussing and examining problems" (p. 252) This study describes practices that counselors and school personnel might recognize as being effective or ineffective in dealing with personal and family problems within institutional contexts.  As the authors noted, this analysis is based on a "one-shot" meeting between participants (p. 262), so there is no way to know if the co-director's efforts at opening a dialog, exploring issues, and providing advice will have any lasting impact or positive effect.
Comments/reflections-By attending to different segments/excerpts and different language features, the analyst can conduct multiple studies from the same talk. In passages such as the paragraph at the bottom of p. 251 and again at the top of p. 253, it seems the authors take an interpretive stance using elements from the text to support their claims.  This reminds me of a plot and character analysis in literature. Each time claims are made about a talk feature, the literature is cited, such as the commentary on the grandmother's use of a "three-part list" as appraisal of the improved situation -- Jefferson (1990) is referenced. The pattern seems to be extract, interpretation with supporting evidence, and summary.

Questions-"Discursive analysis" is the same as "discourse analysis"? 

Benwell, B., & Stokoe, E. H. (2002). Constructing discussion tasks in university tutorials: shifting dynamics and identities. Discourse Studies, 4(4), 429-453. doi:10.1177/14614456020040040201

Topic/audience/need for the study-According to the authors, little research has been done on "tutorial discourse in higher education," but in what few studies that have been done, the evidence indicates that the traditional pattern of a teacher-led hierarchy shifts to the control of the tutor with a slight degree more of flexibility afforded to students (p. 431). The authors contend that in their extended analyses, they have observed a more substantial shift in dynamic. To learn more about this shift, they focused on "task-setting sequences" initiated by the tutor, which they say is an under-explored area of tutorial discourse (p. 431).
Methods/data sources-"Classes from three higher education institutions were audio- and video-recorded. The resulting data, which included both tutor-led and peer group discussions, were transcribed and analysed using conversation analysis (CA)." (from the Abstract, p. 429). The first data set includes eight one-hour, undergraduate tutorial sessions from a variety of disciplines. The second data set consisted of  small-group work sessions with three to six participants faciliated by a tutor. The data sessions were transcribed using Jeffersonian transcription. The authors used CA and a "linguistics-based discourse analysis" approach (p. 432).
Language features attended to-The authors pursued "two analytic trajectories" (p. 432): patterns and "three-part structure" (classic IRE) of task-orientation sequences and issues of politeness and "face" based on Goffman's theory (1967). Other features include "features of politeness" and "situated face wants" (p. 435).
Claims made as findings-Two broad themes are discussed: (1) the pedagogical function of tutors' task formulations and turn-taking within those interactions and (2) student resistance to assuming academic identity (briefly introduced on p. 433). While seeming to set a tutor-dominated tone, the three-part formulation may in fact have a student-centered function, as summarized on pp. 441-442. That students make "resistance moves" may be an overall shifting in interactant dynamics within higher education. The authors suggest that these findings challenge conventional thinking about who controls tutorial discourse.
So what question?-In their discussion Benwell and Stokoe take up broader points that go "beyond the local dynamics of educational talk," such as the shift in higher ed culture in which students assume a consumer stance toward courses and institutions. What students seem to want is the old-style, "transmission"  instructional mode, which rejects constructivist-informed pedagogy and may reflect an overall societal hostility to intellectualism. The authors, however, caution against such pat interpretations, saying that this is more than just another example of "dumbing down." Instead, they argue that the students and tutors are acting strategically as a response to the influence of "wider cultural imperatives" on traditional academic identities and contexts (pp. 449-450). 
Comments/reflections-This study gives a nice theoretical frameworks, which is not always provided in articles. The tutors' reformulations of tasks upon failure of student uptake (signified by pauses), makes me think of the pedagogical concept of increasing "wait time" before and after student responses. It's supposed to be something like 5 seconds. You rarely see pauses of that length in the transcripts here, even though the topics (such as quantum physics and postmodernist literature) certainly suggest a need for more wait time!!!!

Questions-"Task formulations," as defined by Garfinkle & Sacks (1970) is a broad category with many variations within it??? Also, is it a common move for the researcher to simply say, "This talk feature is 'functionally ambiguous' and here is my guess as to what's going on"? (See top of p. 441.)

Cromdal, J., Tholander, M., & Aronsson, K. (2007). “Doing reluctance”: Managing delivery of assessments in peer evaluation. In A. Hepburn & S. Wiggins (Eds.), Discursive research in practice: New approaches to psychology and interaction (pp. 203-223). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Topic/audience/need for the study- Cromdal, Tholander, and Aronsson posit that while a lot has been written about the existence of "social orders in schools," very little has been said about the practices that allow adult and peer cultures to co-exist (p. 203).  In this study, they examine "merging points" between school/adult and peer cultures within a teacher-led peer evaluation exercise among eighth graders. Like the participants in the Benwell and Stokoe (2002) study, these students display reluctance to the task, and their teacher must call upon certain "interactional devices" to deal with this (pp. 203-204). According to Cromdal et al., all of this is an outcome of the "collaborative turn" in education in which problem-based learning and student-centered instruction puts more responsibility for learning on the students.  Students are caught up in a weird tension between the requirements for membership within their peer group and the new institutional order within the school. This study specifically focuses on the practices of participants to deal with this dilemma.
Methods/data sources-The basis for the authors' analysis is a 20-minute excerpt from a peer evaluation session between five eighth-graders and their teacher.
Language features attended to-the teacher's use of "psychological construct" in task formulation and re-formulation (pp. 206-207); the teacher's sequential organization of the task; a variety of student practices for resistance of task, such as humor, emotion, outright objection, passivity, stalling maneuvers, loss of eye contact, non-precise qualifiers, and humming (pp. 207-209 and again on p. 213)
Claims made as findings-The students feed off each other's talk resources to avoid the socially sensitive task of group critique. The students' collaborative displays of reluctance "orient to an underlying moral order of the group, a form of group solidarity against the institutional requirement of more elaborate and critical comments" (p. 215). Cromdal et al. relate this to Wiedner's (1974) "telling the code," a way of vocalizing group solidarity (p. 219). The teacher successfully exploits shifts between purpose and tone of the interaction in a way that suggests he wants to help the students save face; although, "face" is not a theoretical construct invoked in the study.
So what question?-Administrators and instructional leaders might use these findings to inform implementation of problem-based learning within classrooms and across institutions. The public and teacher-dominated manner of the peer-evaluation sessions "presents a range of practical concerns for all parties involved" (p. 219). In other words, before implementing the "institutional agenda," it's important to  attend to required shifts in curriculur focus and teacher preparedness/professional development.
Comments/reflections-Researcher jargon: how would you like to be described as "massively indexed"?  Ha, ha. I don't know why, but that term just strikes me as so funny. I prefer more colloquial or idiomatic expressions like, "wearing one's heart on one's sleeve" or "I could read her like a book." But I guess there isn't a place for that in scholarly write-ups. I do like the term "culture contact," attributed to Mackay (1975) and Speier (1976).  

Graff, N. (2009). Classroom talk: Co-constructing a “difficult student.” Educational Research, 51(4), 439-454. doi:10.1080/00131880903354782

Topic/audience/need for the study-Graff takes up the issue of "difficult" relationships with students and how these students come to be "constructed as 'problems.'" He says that the largely "White, middle-class teaching force" can especially relate to this issue in this era of heightened sensitivity to learning differences and cultural diversity. Many studies have already explored broad patterns of talk between teachers and students; Graff seeks to align his work with a smaller body of literature that examines the impact of talk on individual students. He asserts that most studies to not focus on how talk constructs teacher-student relationships. In the study at hand, Graff looks at one teacher-student relationship through three talk excerpts. He is guided by the following research question: What role does the public nature of classroom talk play in casting the relationship between a particular teacher and a particular student as "difficult"? (p. 440)

Methods/data sources-Graff collected field data for two weeks as a participant observer, taking field notes and talking informally with teacher and students.  Then, for eight weeks he videotaped the class using field notes to cue times on the tapes. He created Jeffersonian transcripts from audio tapes, using the video tapes to fill in non-verbals. Graff employs a "systems perspective" (p. 441) that views all behavior and interactions as meaningful communication and that is based on three levels of interaction: message, interaction, and pattern (pp. 441-442). Specifically, Graff performs a conversational analysis on the message-level of  three episodes between a "difficult" student, Hugh Jass (hahahaha), and his teacher, Ms. Martin. He also draws on the work of Goffman's (1981) "participation frameworks" (p. 440). 

Language features attended to-Generally, the IRE/IRF mode of instruction is a predominant factor in this study. Other features mentioned: Hugh's public "by-play" (p. 446); peer responses during and after exchanges between Hugh and his teacher, which serve to create "sides" and cast Hugh as an outsider of the classroom learning community (p. 447 and again on pp. 450-451); pronouns used by both student and teacher (p. 450)

Claims made as findings-Graff claims that the "public nature of interactions" between teacher and students during whole-group instruction gives rise to "complications" that can result in some individuals (such as Hugh) being cast as outsiders to the classroom learning community (p. 445 and again on p. 451). Two patterns of interaction seem to complicate Ms. Martin's relationship with Hugh in the classroom: 1) how she reinforced norms of participation to maintain classroom order, and 2) how she attended to the "rightness or wrongness" of Hugh's answers (p. 445).

So what question?-Based on his initial observations of Ms. Martin and Hugh interacting in the eighth-grade classroom, Graff wondered about the nature of "difficult relationships" and how they form. Through close examination of teacher-student interaction he seeks to answer these questions. Graff suggests that the more a student is perceived as "difficult," the more likely it is he or she will decline "opportunities for productive participation" (p. 451). Thus, the pattern of difficulty is exacerbated in a downward spiral. There are many implications for teachers, not least of which is a re-examination of our use of the IRE/IRF.  According to Graff, his study provides evidence that teachers should vary instructional modes.  Additionally, teachers should exercise "awareness" and allow interpersonal and affective considerations to enter into their decision-making in and around their interactions with particular students who might otherwise not experience success (p. 452). 
Comments/reflections-I am interested in Goffman's work as it is described here and is cited within many of the other readings. I would like to learn more about his work. 

Young, R. F., & Miller, E. R. (2004). Learning as changing participation: Discourse roles in ESL writing conferences. The Modern Language Journal, 88(4), 519-535. doi:10.1111/j.0026-7902.2004.t01-16-.x

Topic/audience/need for the study-This study is about how a Vietnamese ESL student learned a new discursive practice: revision talk during a writing conference.  Rather than make claims about observable gains in English proficiency, which is commonly done in ESL research, the authors drew on situated learning theory to explore how the student and his writing instructor changed their participation over time. 
Methods/data sources-Young and Miller videotaped and transcribed four weekly writing conferences. Their method is informed by "the twin traditions of conversation analysis and ethnography" (p. 520).
Language features attended to-The researchers decided to focus on the following "recurring tokens of revision talk": sequential organization of acts, boundaries for openings and closings, and role construction within the "participation framework" (p. 521). Other features mentioned: "candidate revisions," "turn management," and "a designedly incomplete utterance [DUI]"
Claims made as findings-The two participants changed their roles over time.  The student especially evolved from peripheral to fuller participation, per Lave and Wenger's theory of situated learning: "...[H]e showed he had mastered the interactional architecture of thepractice by performing all acts except those that uniquely construct the role of instructor" (p. 533).
So what question?-There is an implicit message here for instructors to re-orient themselves to the role of "co-learner." Instructors can scaffold self-directed learning by managing "a division of participation that allows for growth on the part of the student." The authors are trying to open up a dialog about "the situated perspective on learning" within the field of L2 acquisition" (p. 533).
Comments/reflections-The first several pages of this article helped me consolidate some of my thinking about CA and DA and all the terminology. As I noted in my opening reflections, I was confused about what exactly constituted a "language feature" versus "interactional resource" versus "a pattern" and so on. Just a little bogged down in jargon. Young and Miller write, "Participants co-construct a discursive practice through a configuration of interactional resources that is specific to the practice." So, now I am beginning to think of a "practice" as a recurring episode or pattern of talk made up of the nuts-and-bolts of language (grammar, syntax, tone/emotion, and all the other non-verbals).   The examples of discursive practices given by Young and Miller (lab meetings, Maya divination, a language proficiency interview) remind me of "genres" in the linguistic sense, such as Mercer described in Words and Minds.

Questions-On page 520, Young and Miller say that practices can be characterized by a "configuration" of six "discursive resources." I get all but the last one: "the ways in which participants construct meaning in a specific discursive practice, analyzed using the methods of systemic functional linguistics." Does this mean they are using a blended methodology of CA and DA, with "systemic linguistics" being a tradition of DA???

I am grateful for the prescribed response structure for this post -- I do not think I could pull off a coherent synthesis of the readings this week!!

Reading notes for Sept. 13