This paper discusses the use of skits and dialogues in a first-year Chinese course to help novice learners enhance their communicative skills. Because novice learners of Chinese lack the appropriate vocabulary and grammar knowledge to express themselves freely, skits can help them use their limited knowledge to communicate in an effective manner.…

Higher education-community partnerships can lead to fruitful rewards that are difficult to realize any other way. However, efforts to create, maintain, and sustain collaborative working relationships include inevitable tensions, the "politics of engagement." Lessons learned about the politics of engagement are presented in this paper.…

A study explored the thoughts people have as they interact with others in conversation. Individuals were asked to communicate with each other over networked microcomputers and as they typed their messages, they spoke aloud their thoughts about the exchanges. These oral protocols, matched with the messages exchanged over the network, were then…

A study explored the relationship between personal narratives and their contexts by developing an analytical framework and applying it to the personal narratives told by guests on "The Tonight Show" and "Late Night with David Letterman." Three episodes of each program, containing a total of 22 personal narratives, were…

This paper analyzes responses by 20 high school history teachers to student questions about the beginning of the American Revolution. The teachers viewed a 15-minute videtape on the subject, responded to a series of scripted questions read by student actors, and later reflected in writing on their teaching performance. The teachers varied by…

A study of classroom interaction in Ontario's French immersion programs is summarized. Transcripts of classroom interactions were analyzed for teaching practices that tend to decrease or encourage student speech. Results suggest that the use of language in immersion classrooms is not significantly different from language use in regular classes. It…

A classroom activity using passport forms that students fill out themselves by interviewing classmates is described. The passport lesson is structured to be self-contained, presenting all necessary structures and vocabulary for successful functioning within the unit. It may be used any time during the language program to reinforce an aspect of the…

This Kiribati communication and culture handbook presents 40 situations in which the volunteer is likely to be involved in the Gilbert Islands, and establishes classroom activities that require the students to exchange messages in a way that is appropriate to the cultural context. Most of the lessons are divided into "basic material" and…

This course on the language of Sri Lanka is intended to be taken under a Sinhala-speaking instructor. This module consists of 90 "cycles," or short lessons, each based on a theme from everyday life. Dialogues appear occasionally among the cycles. Major themes include classroom expressions, terms of address, talking about money,…

"Communicative Competence" is today the avowed primary aim of foreign language teaching. This paper points out that communicative competence in this context differs from communicative competence between two native speakers of the same language. In the two cases the difficulties that appear are not the same. Various possible dialogue elements are…

Cites a typical classroom "pseudo-conversation," showing how German students of English sound stiff and clumsy when conversing with English-speaking partners. This is blamed partly on the teacher's behavior. The example is then expanded into a "communicative exchange." In teaching conversation, manner is seen as more important…

Describes work at a Goethe Institute branch with two groups of foreign students learning German, in which radio news, after preparatory work by the teacher, was used to induce question-and-answer dialogue. Many types of teaching aids and exercises used are described, including three-way conversation. (Text is in German.) (IFS/WGA)

The class structures of Socratic dialogue method, the traditional lecture, and personalized systems of instruction (PSI) are compared. PSI was viewed more positively by students on subjective ratings, and performance outcomes were higher with this method. Treatments offering the multiple testing option produced more positive subjective and…

Examines the verbal interactions of one teacher with young children (three to five years old) in a preschool classroom through an analysis of her questions and dialogue. Results indicated this teacher asked questions encouraging open, extended conversations, and maintained natural and child-centered conversations with children. (Author/BB)

In a dialog format, discusses the dialogical method of liberatory education. Dialog is a means to transform social relations in the classroom and to raise awareness about relations in society at large. In a problem-posing participatory format, the teacher and students transform learning into a collaborative process to illuminate and act on…