A case study examined the brief conversations about writing that took place between a high school English teacher and two of his students. One illustrative writing conference conversation lasting 1 minute and 19 seconds shows how, through the push and pull of their short exchange, student and teacher simultaneously read the book, read the writing…

A common problem for teachers and students is that the teacher's control of the communication in the classroom limits the students' use of their language to learn. Group learning, an alternative to the traditional teacher-led classroom structure, can enhance the students' opportunity to use their language. An understanding of the following three…

This paper suggests a new way to approach the study style in instructional communication. First, the paper reviews and critiques existing approaches to communication style research. Following that it is suggested that a fundamental limitation of existitng approaches is that researchers have typically superimposed conventional criteria for teaching…

The current public debate between the images of the smiling war hero and of the grimacing Vietnam veteran provide opportunities to define two discourse communities that manifest themselves in students' written discourse. These can be seen as akin to the first American jeremiads, which were Puritan treatises written by seventeenth century religious…

This collection of 98 lesson plans for foreign language instruction is the result of a series of eight Saturday workshops focusing on ways that language teachers can develop their own communicative activities for application in the classroom. The lessons were produced by 30 foreign language teachers, each of whom was required to write a brief…

A microethnographic study and intervention were conducted in a mixed-age preschool classroom with 3- to-5-year-old native speakers of English, Khmer, and Spanish. All were learning English and had native-language support. In the study's first phase, the language of five children was audiotaped during play time. In the second phase, the whole…

A naturalistic study investigated writing-related teacher planning and classroom activities in a combined second and third grade classroom and a sixth grade classroom. Data were collected from participant observation, teachers' reflections on classroom writing, and naturally occurring teacher and student writing samples. The study, which was based…

Observations of 90 lessons reveal the limitations of the whole-class discussion, the dominant teaching method in elementary and secondary schools. In addition to producing a low percentage of student involvement, rarely more than 50%, teachers' questions and answer techniques do not usually stimulate critical thinking. Besides most often asking…

Prepared as part of a series applying recent research in oral and written communication instruction to classroom practice, this booklet reviews research and presents suggestions designed to improve the classroom communication climate. The first section of the booklet describes the process of building a supportive environment to reflect a range of…

The promotion of literacy among minority groups depends in part upon educational and sociolinguistic discourse analysis. As a contribution to that effort, the present study provides data on the narrative in the language of Mexican-American adults by gathering and analyzing personal narratives produced in both English and Spanish. These narratives…

Methods classes in teacher education are under attack. If teacher education programs are to survive with a methods component, teacher educators need to begin living and demonstrating the models of pedagogy they advocate. Methods courses must go beyond the lecture mode to democratic practice in which students and instructors build social learning…

Changes in the teacher's authority structure as well as changes in the content of student talk during peer response sessions occur over the course of a school year in a first-grade classroom. In the beginning of the year, the teacher, a beginner in the Teachers College Writing Project, dominated the talk during share sessions, while the students'…

In its first year, the Hawaiian Language Immersion Program combined kindergarten and first-grade students in two classes. About half of the students had no speaking knowledge of Hawaiian; the remainder had attended Hawaiian-language preschools and/or spoke Hawaiian at home. Both teachers, fluent speakers of Hawaiian, were new to teaching. The…

Questioning patterns in dialogue journal interactions of two groups of sixth graders are analyzed. One of the two groups was made up of native English speakers, while the other consisted of beginning learners of English as a second language. The analysis finds a pattern of shared interaction very different from that found in numerous studies of…

Important features of eight second language teaching methods--grammar-translation, direct, audiolingual, the Silent Way, Suggestopedia, community language learning, Total Physical Response, and the communicative approach--are summarized . A chart outlines characteristics of these aspects of the methods: goals, teacher and student roles, the…