Final_Seri Chung

[Se-ri Chung]

Final.hwp

I've been working on this for about a month and it's still not done. What I found out is that I would be never satisfied with it. So, I decided to hand in and ask for your advice. (a file attached) 

INTRO

This paper deals with a body of data from a single episode ("Look and Listen") in a lesson. They are taught by two teachers to a class of students in fifth grade. In this data, we will look at how the teacher and the children take turns asking and answering about a single picture concerning a video clip they are about to view. In the children's utterances, we will notice that there are errors and some kinds of tendency. We shall argue that this reflects the problems of teachers' uptake and recast. We will also notice the usage of types of questions by teachers, and in particular for creating characters. Finally, as we will see, there is the idea of MOTIVATION, an insider perspective, and an outsider one. We will suggest that VERBAL processes (that is, questions about what characters are SAYING) produce longer and more involved exchanges. These verbal process questions offer the teacher a key opportunity for integrating text and talk.

Problem ONE : Look and Listen

Here, I'm going to talk about especially utterances of teachers. I have chosen some data given by David Kellogg. KT(Korean Teacher) and FT(Foreign Teaching assistant) teach the fifth graders the lesson "Let's go swimming". Below, I will explain how the teacher sets the scene using questions, how she creates the characters by showing the video without sound, and finally how she checks understanding. In each interpretation of data, I will discuss alternative ways of solving these problems.

1.1 HOW DOES THE TEACHER SET THE SCENE?

In the head of transcript, teachers get attention first. And then, they give information using questions about time and space in the picture. First of all, let's see what two instructors do to get attention in the very beginning.

FT: Ok. So let's get started on lesson 8.

FT: Everyone, please open your book to page 64. Page 64. Ok?

KT: Yes. Look at the picture in the book. Let us look at the picture in your book.

FT says "Page 64" twice, because he is not sure if the students understood the whole sentence ("please open your book to page 64"). Students need to have grammatical competence in order to get the meaning in the sentence level. He's trying to scaffold their abilities in the word level. After that, KT says ("Look at the picture in your book."), because she supposes that children would be interested in pictures. Her adding "Let us" to the previous sentence is to diversify the structure of sentence and not just to repeat the same sentence. By doing so, she can have another chance to get students' attention.

Second, teachers give information using questions about time and space in the picture. KT asks about the weather to make students think about WHEN. It is related to the reason why the characters want to go swimming now.

KT: Then how's the weather ... how's the weather is it?

S: Very hot.

KT: Very ... ?

Ss: Hot. Very very very hot.

KT: It's very hot. Is it morning or afternoon?

Ss: Morning/ Afternoon.

KT: Morning or afternoon?

Ss: Afternoon.

KT tries to transfer the word "hot" to all the students' minds and lips through his intonation going up ("Very ...?"). KT uptakes ("It's very hot.") in grammatical structure and then recasts ("Is it morning or afternoon?). She reinitiates to link the time and space with FT("FT: I think it's afternoon." / "KT: Why?" / "FT: I think they are leaving school."), later on.

KT: Why do you think it's afternoon?

S: Because .. here is ... sun is in ... sky.

KT: Sunny? Sunny is BIG sunny? (sic)

S: No, the sun is ...

KT: The BIG sun is in the sky? The big sun is in the middle of the sky?

S: No.

T: That's because ... that's why it's afternoon? Chris, what do you think?

Before that, KT looks for the reason why Ss think it's afternoon. But it is found that a student takes a look at the thing ("S: Becase ... here is ... sun is in ... sky.") rather than the situation("KT: The big sun is in the middle of the sky?"). KT implies that there are differences according the height of the sun but the student doesn't get the scientific concept. Following solution is to ask FT for a help. It would be better if she showed the idea with drawings which suits their cognitive levels.

KT: They are leaving school?

FT: In the afternoon. And it's really hot.

KT: (point to the picture) This is their school?

S: Yes.

Both teachers wrap up the conversation to set the scene talking about the building in the picture. Now, students get the idea on WHERE as well as WHEN. It is time for students to say what they heard so far. There is a hope that output goes along with input.

S: They go home.

KT: They are ... ?

S: Go home.

KT: Yeah, leaving school ... to go back ...

S: home.

KT: home ... to go home.

KT scaffolds with item based structure of the sentence ("KT: They are ... ?") but a student only can say the bare infinitive("S: Go home."). Nevertheless, KT doesn't ignore his utterance and puts it in to-infinitive.

Even in the head of the lessons, open questions are useful. It requires student's creativity and cognitive level. But, at the same time, narrow questions are proper to set the scene. To get the set of expected answers, teachers should plan the type of questions and get ready for the possible responses. The range of unexpected answers are depended on teacher's attitude toward the errors. There are three types of questions which lead students' information processing. I want to point out the wrong use of a question type in the end of second part.

1.2 HOW DOES THE TEACHER CREATE THE CHARACTERS?

The effort-less way to create the characters is to remind their name. Children love fiction so that they tend to immerse themselves into stories. So, teachers put them inside the story and/or outside the story. Three type of questions are dealt to see how they recreate the characters in the scene. First, students are asked who they are in the picture to recall the characteristics which are already known.

KT: What do you see?

Ss: ...

KT: Who do you see?

S: Him... 아, He.

"What-" question is too open to answer. It seems that she meant "what do you see in the picture?" gesturing as if she looks at it. As long as she wanted answers to be specific she needs to narrow the arrange of answers using “Who-" question. It doesn't require any hypernym nouns, but hyponym names. That's why it is much easier for students to think about possible answers. In a student's utterance, Names are replaced with pronouns. It seems that he is trying to come up with a name of the characters that he's seen before. He notices the character, but his name hasn't come to his mind yet. It means that he still needs some time or efforts to remind all of their names. We can also see that the student has some problem with subjective and objective pronouns. Even though he has low level of grammatical competence, he tries to revise himself through meta-cognitive competence. Although, what teacher is looking for in students' answer is not pronouns - either subjective or objective - but names.

S: 진호

FT: 진호

KT: 진호

Both teachers uptake "진호“, because it is one of the right answers that they were waiting for. We can see that the pronouns above intentionally ignored focusing on meaning not on forms. FT's uptake confirm‎s the right answer and then KT's uptake elicits the other right answers.

KT: Joon.

Ss: 진호, 준, 미나, Anna, Ann.

KT gives another example answer "Joon“ without patience. Or she decided to let the students know what is asked since the students do not say any more after long period of silence. After that, students are accelerated getting the idea on the form of the answers.

KT: Anna?

S: Ah, Ann.

KT: Jinho, Joon, and...?

Ss: Ann.

KT: Ann.

When KT uptakes it like ("Anna?"), it means that she found one of the answers wrong but quite similar to the right one. Students' error might have come from mis-pronunciation or their own abstract rule that girls' names end with "-a". After KT implicits that they pronounced in a wrong way, the student might revise their concept which there is an exception of the rule. But KT doesn't confirm‎ the answer right away uptaking the students' utterances again. KT wants to make sure that they have fixed the rule. It is not enough to create characters only with their names. So teachers make students to imagine showing the video without sound. There are three kinds of questions for what characters are doing, thinking and saying.

FT: Alright.

KT: Then what are they doing? Look at the TV.

Teachers are ready to move from the talks about being in the picture to doing on the TV. Students can have background knowledge and fore-images in their mind before they listen to the dialogue. They take a guess what the characters are doing through material process. Below, KT asked improper type of questions ("KT: Then what are they doing? Look at the TV.") for mental process.

Ss: Swimming. Swimming pool.

KT: They are ...?

S: They are going to swimming pool.

S: Swimming pool

KT: They are ... ?

S: Going to swimming pool.

KT: Do you think they are going to the swimming pool? Now?

A student focuses on the place "swimming pool" rather than what they want. In addition to characters' behaviors or activities, the type of question for thinking should be asked. If teacher asked "What do they want to do?", she wouldn't need to ask if they will go swimming now or not.

KT: (pointing to the picture on the screen) Do they look happy?

Ss: No!

KT: No, they are not happy now. They are ......

S: They are ...

KT: They are feeling terrible.

S: Yeah.

KT: They are tired.

With the type of question for feeling, they talk about emotions relating to today's weather. First of all, KT points out unavailability of the air-conditioning ("KT: (looking at the air-conditioner) We can not use air-conditioner now?") to make students think about how the characters would feel in the situation.

KT: Chris, what do you think they are feeling?

FT: They look too hot.

KT: They are too hot like ... Chris. Are you too hot?

FT: Yes, I'm so hot right now.

KT: (replaying the video clip and pause with sound off) Oh, what are they ... ?

KT: (pointing to the characters on the TV) Oh, oh, they are smiling.

S: That's great.

KT: They are now happy.

FT: Yes, let's go swimming.

Both teachers try to put students into the situation through their sympathy. Unfortunately, students seem to be still outside the story. A student look the characters from the third person's view and say ("S: That's great."). So, FT puts himself into the characters' shoes, saying like them ("FT: Yes, let's go swimming.").

S: Because ...

S: They are going to the ... now... swimming pool.

KT: Ah, because they are going to ... the swimming pool now. Yeah! Let's ...

Ss: *&^%$

KT: Let's ... (glaring at Chris distracting the children)

KT tried to elicit the objective sentence "Let's go swimming!" along with the character's feeling. But students were distracted by FT and have lost the context. So KT calls attention to the gesture of the character. There are differences between KT's and FT's question. KT asks what the gesture means ("KT: (gesturing as Joon does in the video) What does he mean by doing this?"), whereas FT asks what it is said with the gesture ("FT: Or he says ... ").

KT: (replaying the video for a second and pause) What is Jinho saying now?

Ss: I can't swim.

KT: Oh, I can't ... Really?

S: I can't.

S: Jinho is good.

KT: Maybe. Maybe.

S: Jinho is very good 수영.

S: But ...

S: I didn't have a swimming suit. 하하

KT: I don't have a swimming suit?

S: So ... 어 ...

KT: Jinho says "I don't have a nice swimming suit".

After some approaches to draw what characters say, the obvious type of question for saying comes up. It is easy for teacher to ask directly but students might feel difficult or embarrassed compared to before steps. Although students are not able to say any sentences of the dialogue, Look and Listen shouldn't burden them with production. This is the stage to be ready and get interested in for the following. For teachers, it is useful and essential to see what level their students are and will be.

1.3 HOW DOES THE TEACHER CHECK UNDERSTANDING?

Before listening to the dialogue, KT checks understanding. It comes after talking about the picture(1.1) and watching the video without sound(1.2). Here, she simply asks if students understand what's going on in the picture and/or video of the story.

KT: Ok, that's it. Do you understand what's going on in the story?

S: Yes!

KT: Do you want to listen?

Ss: Yes!

Ss; (watching the video clip with sound)

KT: Who can tell me about the story? What did you hear?

What KT checks is if they have got some background knowledge of the following dialogue as well as enough interests and motivation to listen. If students are ready, it is the right time to listen. After playing the video clip with sound, she asks questions to check up comprehension. Before and after listening, there are differences between types of questions. After listening, they are not Y/N type questions any more, they become open questions like “Tell me about-" or "What-?". With open type of question, students get to say more. In the discourse of the class, students' utterances take up a greater part than teachers'.

S: 어... first, they are so hot. So they want to go to swimming pool. So... But ...

KT: But ... ?

S: But Jinho can't go swimming pool today.

KT: Today, this afternoon he can not go swimming. Why not?

S: Because they ... 아, Jinho must go to piano class.

KT: Piano lesson? He has a piano lesson? He has to go to piano 학원? Maybe piano lesson. He has a piano lesson.

Students have some trouble with article uses. They can either say "go to the swimming pool" or "go swimming". But KT's recast focuses on the meaning and goes forward asking "why not?". To make them sense the Item based structure "go -ing", KT may recast backward. This is to prevent from fossilization, when the same errors occur continually from the beginning of the class to the end of it.

S: So they promise to go to swimming pool tomorrow.

KT: Tomorrow? They will go swimming tomorrow ?

S: And they ... they swim ... 아, ... they swim ... then ... Jinho win.

KT: Jinho won the race ... swimming race?

KT wants students to use future tense to say what is promised for tomorrow. And then, she uses past tense to say what happened later. It might confuse students with time sequences, Since the promise takes place before the swimming race. It would be better to retell the whole story in present tense, putting students inside the story.

KT: For .. Jinho?

S: Yes.

KT: So Jinho answers ... What is Jinho's answer?

S: Ok.

KT: Ok. Good. Tomorrow I have time. Let's go swimming tomorrow.

KT moves a student's point to the literary character by recasting ("KT: For ... Jinho?"). She want the student to say what Jinho answered. The student shows his understanding of the context and the situation saying the shortest possible answer. Output is much smaller than input yet. This is why next episodes such as Listen and Answer, Let's Play are accompanied with.

Lydia Ginzburg says this:

"The literary character is a series of manifestations of a single individual or of references to him. The depiction of that individual’s words, actions, external features, and internal conditions, the narration of events connected to him, and the authorial analysis of it gradually accumulate to the point where they coalesce into a definite entity capable of functioning in a variety of situations. The formal sign of that entity is the character’s name." (1991: 222)

As well as description of the situation, words of the characters like Jinho's answer are things to learn. This makes the type of verbal questions. The problem is that students never say the whole sentence unlike teacher's feedback. They would rather choose short and simple version which is much economical. This indicates either their creativity or lack of productivity. The issue is how to recognize the differences between them.