Sunday, February 4, 2007

Classroom Interactions: What is the right mix?

The topic this week in our CALL class was Classoom Interactions. More specifically, we discussed the different kinds of interactions, our thoughts on the right mix of interactions for the classroom, and how to get the right mix. To help us get the ball rolling, we read two articles about interaction. The one that left a larger impression on me was called "Getting the Mix Right Again: An updated and theoretical rationale for interaction" by Anderson(2003).
Anderson says there are six possible kinds of classroom interaction. The three most common types being student-student, student-teacher, and student-content. These forms were all easy for me to digest, as they all exist in varying degrees in my classroom. The other, less prevalent forms are teacher-teacher, teacher-content, and content-content. These, I didn't understand. Maybe, it's because I haven't experienced them yet. I can't think of any concrete examples of these types of interactions. Classmates, any thoughts?
Anderson goes on to explain that, in any classroom situation, at least one, and usually two or three kinds of interactions should be present. Ideally, there will be a high level of one kind of interaction, supported by lower levels of other forms. I think this statement is generally true. In our CALL class discussion forum this week, we talked about what percentage is present of each kind of interaction in our classrooms. I think it's difficult to put a percentage on these kinds of things, because each class is so different. But, it's important to be aware of the interactions that are present and the role that each form of interaction takes.
In my general English education classes at my public school, I would say there is a high level of student-content interaction. A majority of the activities (listen and repeat, practice with a partner, comprehension) are on a CD-ROM, and the students follow along with their textbooks. My role is more of a guide in these classes. I don't like this role very much. But, there's not much that can be done about it, since there are so many students(about 40) in the class and there are goals that we must meet.
In addition to these large classes, I also teach much smaller classes in the afternoon. In these classes, there is a much higher level of student-student interaction. I like to explain the task at the beginning(student-teacher), provide them with some task(student-content), and have them work on it together with a partner or group(student-student). I feel much more learning is getting done here. Because the class is much smaller, I can do more with them. And, they get so much more out of it, being in a small class, working together to solve a problem. This is where I want to go with my future classes. Next year, I will be teaching English conversation at a university. I foresee an almost even level of student-teacher, student-student, and student-content interaction, depending on the content, the topic, the class, many factors.


This reading really made me aware of the kinds of interactions that I am currently having with my students and, more importantly, the kinds of interactions that I want to have in the future. This is a good thing.

2 comments:

Eric said...

John, I think teacher-teacher interactions are the interactions I have with other faculty, other teachers in courses I'm taking, other teachers via list serves and professional organizations.

I think teacher-content is the interactions I have with new content I find browseing the resources on the class wikki. It could be a new song I hear in the language I teach that I want to bring to class. It could be a book I'm reading.

Content-content has me stumped.

Anyone else?

Dan said...

Hi John,

Eric's right on the teacher-teacher and teacher-content interaction.

As for content-content interaction, that is just computers talking to each other. This is a relatively new aspect of interaction. For example, your RSS aggregator interacts with all of the blogs on its list and brings you only the newest postings. That is content-content interaction.

Dan