In this paper we identify four formats of classroom talk for integrating everyday and scientific discourse--replacement, interweaving, contextual privileging and pastiche. In the replacement format, progress in understanding is gauged by the extent to which scientific representations replace the more concrete and everyday representations in…

It has been increasingly recognised that classroom discourse plays an important social role as a semiotic mediator of knowledge construction with respect to curriculum content. The assumption is that through active verbal engagement with a topic of interest, students are enabled to master the modes of language use associated with schooling--the…