Practices over time: Tracking the development of dialogic practices in pre-service teachers

1. Practices over time: Tracking the development of dialogic practices in pre-service teachers Samantha Caughlan Mary Juzwik Carlin Borsheim-Black Jodene Fine

2. Acknowledgements • Bates-Byers Award for Technology and Curriculum, Michigan State University • Spencer Foundation Small Grant Program

3. Literacy Achievement Research Center Our mission is to advance knowledge related to literacy achievement in the U.S. and the world. www.msularc.org

4. The problem • Teachers overuse lecture and underuse discussion (Applebee, et al., 2003; Juzwik, 2007; Nystrand, 1997). • Dialogic instruction, including discussion, is linked to English student achievement (Applebee et al., 2003; Nystrand, 1997). • Little is known about what designs in teacher education promote dialogic instruction or support teacher candidates in their development of dialogic practices.

5. Research Questions • Given participation in VBRR, to what extent do teacher candidates achieve dialogically organized interactions in their classrooms over time? • Given participation in VBRR, how do teacher candidates plan for organized instruction over time? • What is the relationship between planning and achievement of dialogic instruction?

6. Dialogism • Property of all language and refers to the intermingling of voices. • Exists in contrast to monologism where a single authoritative voice dominates discourse (Bakhtin, 1981; 1984; 1986).

7. Dialogic Instruction • A cluster of practices that include certain discussion-based approaches to teaching, certain kinds of questioning processes (e.g., authentic teacher and student questions), and certain genres (e.g., responsive narratives).

8. Operationalizing “dialogic” • Teacher authentic questions (TAQ) • Teacher nonauthentic questions (TNQ) • Teacher uptake (TU) • Student questions (SQ) • Student participation • High Participation • Dialogic tools

9. Dialogic Tools • Tools mediate interactions in ways that encourage dialogic participation (Wertsch, 1993; Vygotsky, 1978; 1986). • In this case, tools refers both to physical objects, ways of organizing instructional space and speech genres.

10. Description of program • 2-year methods course sequence • Year 1 • Introduce terms • Watch “expert” video examples • Year 2 • Video record selves teaching 3 - 4 times • Learn how planning contributes to dialogic • Analyze transcripts • Compose a digital video reflection

11. Description of program Interns • Video record themselves • Select clip • Transcribe clip • Post clip with contextualizing materials (introductions, lessons plans, transcriptions, reflections) to Voicethread • View each others’ posts and comment • Analyze in class through dialogic lens

12. Data Generation • Downloaded Voicethreads (88 interns; 301 posts) • Printed hard copies of print materials

13. Data Analysis • Developed a code book for 26 categories grouped under demographics, planning, questioning patterns, and participation patterns • Calibrated coding procedures and met regularly to resolve questions • Coded 301posts • Constructed “the chart”

14. Data Analysis Descriptive statistics • Average incidence of dialogic indicators • Average incidence of dialogic indicators across four posts • Catalogued instructional focus, dialogic tools, etc. • Began looking for connections and relationships • Began to see dialogic tools and high student participation as being important • Brought in quantitative expertise to ascertain the significance of what we were observing.

15. There is a significant development between video post 1 and subsequent video posts • Number of teacher questions decreases • Ratio of authentic questions to non-authentic questions increases • Number of student questions increases • There is a sharp rise in the number of student utterances in proportion to teacher utterances after VP 1

16. TAQ & TNQ over time

17. Student questions over time

18. Ratio of student to teacher utterances over the four video posts

19. The number of student utterances in proportion to teacher utterances rises sharply after VP 1 Video posts 2, 3 and 4 are significantly different than post 1, but not from one another.

20. There are more high participation posts in second semester than first semester

21. Upward trends in dialogic indicators are associated with planning We were able to link high student participation to the use of dialogic tools found in lesson plans. Mixed-model analyses with video post as a repeated measure demonstrate this relation.

22. Use of dialogic tools over the four video posts.

23. More dialogic tools used in post 3 than post 1.

24. Use of dialogic tools in post 4 is not significantly different from post 1, but this may be due to having too few posts at time 4…. …only year 1 had a fourth post.

25. A simple correlation with all video posts together suggests a positive correlation between dialogic tool use and the ratio of student-teacher utterances

26. Dialogic tools in high-participation posts (HPP)

27. Tools appearing in higher concentrations in HPP (20% of total posts): Year 1: Pass toy: 100% Socratic seminar: 100% Drama: 57% Meta-lesson: 50% Circle: 50% Take a stand: 50% Student-written questions: 37.5% Year 2: Exit cards (100%) Gallery walk (100%) Grades (100%) Student-written questions (75%) 4 corners (66%) Take a stand (50%) Tokens (50%)

28. Conclusion • Teacher candidates can implement dialogically-organized instruction • Planning is important • Dialogic tools appear to be key • Certain dialogic tools appear particularly useful in promoting dialogic interaction, where student voices are more prominent.