Mighty Digests # 9: BENWELL & STOKOE, Constructing discussion tasks in university tutorials...

Article: Benwell, B. & Stokoe, E.H. (2002). Constructing discussion tasks in university tutorials: shifting dynamics and identities. Discourse Studies 4 (4), 429-453.

University tutorial sessions, and in particular its task-setting sequences, are the object of this article. One of the assumptions of the article is that language facilitates learning, and its keyword may be “talking-for-learning”, or language as the site of action (p. 430).

The participants of this research are classes from three British universities. It is, therefore, an institutional context.

The data (audio and video recording) have been analyzed using Conversation analysis (student-student and student-teacher discussions), with the help of the Jeffersonian transcription system.

The study focused on patterns emerging from the interactions, and it found that the opening turns of the tutor were followed by a three-part sequence:

1. initiation: the teacher asks a question
2. response: a pupil answers the question
3. follow-up: the teacher acknowledges and evaluates the response

The study also illustrated that students displayed discursively their unwillingness to take part in the discussions.

I found it very interesting to discover how certain patterns may emerge in an institutional setting, if compared with an informal one. The stronger the conventional context, the more defined the patterns seem to be, almost as an unwritten ritual. Even more interesting, was the discovery that through CA this model can be challenged and different “cross-patterns” can made be visible (for example, through the analysis of “dispreferred turns”).

This is probably one of the best examples I have found so far, unveiling the power of Conversation Analysis, and how it goes under the surface of discourse, challenging the previous findings in the literature.

It made me also reflect on how important it is to “master” the literature to be able to challenge it, or to search new ways to do it, and in my opinion this article does it very well.

I was also thinking if the awareness of such interactional constructions may influence the learning dynamics and outcomes, especially in an academic setting, where the participants have the mental and cultural tools to reflect on their learning experiences, and a certain freedom of expression in discussion sessions.