SCHOOL OF EDUCATION Classroom Interaction Research Fall 2007 Lesley Rex 1 RESEARCH ON CLASSROOM INTERACTION (Ed 737-001) Thursdays 1- 4pm 2214 SEB COURSE SYLLABUS Lesley A. Rex, Ph.D. 2014 School of Education 734-647-1988 [email protected] www.umich.edu/~rex/ Meetings by appointment only. Course Description This seminar will be of interest to PhD students whose research includes the study of classroom interactions, and who want to understand a variety of methodologies for that purpose. My goals in organizing the course are to ! provide a historical overview of research on classroom interaction and its philosophical roots. ! understand the perspectives and methodologies of seven dominant approaches to studying classroom interaction. ! support class members in constructing a perspective and methodology for their own research involving classroom interaction. We will begin by reading Rex, L., Steadman, S., & Graciano, M (2006). Researching the complexity of classroom interaction. In J. L. Green, G. Camilli, & P. B. Elmore (Eds.), Handbook of Complementary Methods for Research in Education (3rd edition). Washington, DC: American Educational Research Association. A historical overview of classroom research trends that focus on interaction, this chapter provides examples of seven research traditions, whose perspectives produce different analyses and interpretations of classroom interactions and what is accomplished in and through such interactions. By comparing within and across the different approaches to research into classroom practices, we will discuss how each approach produced a different analysis because of its purpose, conceptual framework, logic of inquiry, and related methodology. Next, we will discuss three essays written by philosophers of education. Clive Beck’s essay: “Postmodernism, Pedagogy and Philosophy of Education” (1993) and MaxineSCHOOL OF EDUCATION Classroom Interaction Research Fall 2007 Lesley Rex 2 Greene’s and Walter Feinberg’s responses. Their dialogue provides a rich entry point for our discussion of the intellectual traditions related to research in education. After building a historical and philosophical context for classroom interaction research, we will look closely at a single approach. Using my book, Discourse of Opportunity: How talk in learning situations creates and constrains, we will pursue the question: How does a particular approach afford and limit what can be viewed and known as classroom interaction? To complete the course, members will collect articles concerning classroom interaction related to their particular area of study. They will present them to the class in a manner we will determine. During the seminar, members will write memos to note and reflect upon constructs, methodologies, knowledge, and reflections of use to them in their individual work. We will work as a class and in groups, so that by the end of the seminar each member will have produced a written text that serves her or his research. Readings There will be four sources of readings for the course 1) Library electronic reserves of articles representing traditions of interaction research; 2) the book, Rex, L. A. (Ed.) (2006). Discourse of Opportunity: How talk in learning situations creates and constrains. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press; 3) articles about postmodernism; and, 3) readings in classroom interaction you select in your own area of interest. Required readings (except the book) can be found on the course CTools site of which all registered students are members. 1) On our course CTools site you will find: ! Electronic library reserves for the following texts: Bloome, David, Ann Egan-Robertson . "The social construction of intertextuality in classroom reading and writing lessons." Reading Research Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 4, October, November, December 1993, pp. 305-333. Borko, Hilda. Margaret Eisenhart, Catherine A. Brown, Robert G. Underhill, Doug Jones, Patricia C. Agard "Learning to Teach Hard Mathematics: Do Novice Teachers and Their Instructors Give up too Easily?." Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, Vol. 23, No. 3, May 1992, pp. 194-222. Candela, Antonia . "Students' Power in Classroom Discourse." Linguistics and Education, Vol. 10, No. 2, 1998, pp. 139-163. Carpenter, Thomas P. and Fennema, Elizabeth "Cognitively Guided Instruction: Building on the Knowledge of Students and Teacher." International Journal of Educational Research, Vol. 17, No. 5, 1992, pp. 457-470.SCHOOL OF EDUCATION Classroom Interaction Research Fall 2007 Lesley Rex 3 Castanheira, Maria , Crawford, Teresea, Dixo.n, Carol N., & Green, Judith "Interactional Ethnography: An Approach to Studying the Social Construction of Literate Practices." Linguistics and Education, Vol. 11, No. 4, Winter 2000, pp. 353-400. Cobb, Paul, Stephan, Michelle, McClain, Kay, Koeno Gravemeijer. "Participating in Classroom Mathematical Practices." The Journal of the Learning Sciences, Vol. 10, No. 1, 2001, pp. 113-163. Eisenhart, Margaret. Borko, Hilda, Underhill, R. obert G., Brown, Catherine A., Jones, Doug, & Agard, Patricia "Conceptual Knowledge Falls Through the Cracks: Complexities of Learning to Teach Mathematics for Understanding." Journal for Research in Mathematics Education. Vol. 24, No. 1, January 1993, pp. 8-40. King, Alison, Rosenshine, Barak. "Effects of guided cooperative questioning on children's knowledge construction." Journal of Experimental Education, Vol. 61, No. 2, 1993, pp. 127-148. Kumpulainen, Kristiina and David Wray. "The nature of peer interaction during collaborative writing with word processors," in Classroom Interaction and Social Learning. New York: Routledge/Falmer, 2002, pp. 57-75. Lampert, Magdalene . "When the Problem Is Not the Question and the Solution Is Not the Answer: Mathematical Knowing and Teaching." American Educational Research Journal, Vol. 27, No. 1, Spring 1990, pp. 29-63. McDermott, R. P. "The acquisition of a child by a learning disability," in Understanding practice: Perspectives on activity and context, edited by Chaiklin, Seth and Jean Lave. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993, pp. 269-305. Mehan, Hugh. "Beneath the Skin and Between the Ears: A Case Study in the Politics of Representation," in Understanding Practice: Perspectives on Activity and Context, (Learning in Doing) edited by Seth Chalklin and Jean Lave. New York: Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge, 1993, pp.