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The discourses of secondary school biology: inter-relating interactional features and teachers' theories
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Type
Thesis
Abstract
Researchers such as Becher, 1989; Pantin, 1968 and McDonald, 1994 in the field of disciplinarity focus on the differences between different disciplines. These researchers describe the variation of knowledge, skills and epistemological difference across different disciplines. Pantin (1968) extended the idea of disciplinarity beyond different disciplines to look into disciplinarity within a single discipline. Science is a discipline that has variation within itself and Pantin focuses on the differences between the sciences.
Set in Singapore, where the dominant pedagogy is teacher-centered and routinised, (Luke, Cazden, Lin & Freebody, 2005), this study tracks two teachers and two classes of students in Singapore to examine the subject of biology. Biology is a subject within the discipline of science and this study examines specifically the variations in interaction for two topics within biology, namely Reproduction in Plants and Ecology. The variation in interaction for this is further tracked in two different settings of the school: the classroom and the school science laboratory. The beliefs of teachers about the subject matter are also described and triangulated with the interactions that are observed in the two settings. The study that I reported here is qualitative in nature and uses tools of interview and analysis of classroom talk to establish the relationship between teachers’ beliefs about the subject matter and the interaction that results. This study seeks to address the following research questions:
A. What interactional features are evident in the teaching and learning of secondary biology as reflected in transcripts of classrooms?
B. What are the similarities and differences in the ways knowledge is realised relating to contrasts of setting and topic: in the classroom versus the laboratory and around the topics of Reproduction in Plants versus Ecology?
C. How do teachers describe and explain the distinctive demands of teaching and learning in biology?
Interviews and transcript analysis are used as methods of data analysis in this thesis. Transcripts are analysed by using principles of Conversation Analysis (ten Have, 1999 and Freebody, 2003) to illuminate the patterns of talk in the classroom and laboratory. The turn-taking structures, the building of exchanges and also the power relations are examined in the classroom and the laboratory for the two different topics. The beliefs of the teachers are elicited through a semi- structured interview that is analysed using paired contrasts and Membership Categorisation Principles (Freebody, 2003 and McHoul and Watson, 1984). From the interview and classroom talk, teacher knowledge in biology is also examined through the lenses of Bernstein and Lyotard. Such analysis is important in two ways. Firstly, it presents contrasting views through which interaction in the classroom and laboratory can be analyzed and understood. Secondly, it provides empirical evidence for existing theories in a local context.
The results of this study revealed that teachers believed that the syllabus and schemes of work for the subject dictated how they conducted their lessons and that they believed that Reproduction in Plants with its specialised vocabulary was highly classified and requires direct teacher transmission of content to the students Ecology on the other hand, with its weakly classified content allows for more student participation in the selection and learning of content. Analysis of classroom interactions reveals that turn-taking was tightly controlled by the teacher, with consensus being constructed generally using IRE sequences with cooperation from the students which usually occurs at the expense of student criticism and questioning. For laboratory sessions, interactions when Reproduction in Plants was taught were found to allow more student- initiated questions but the pattern modelled by the teacher of focusing on rule and convention compliance limited the type of questions asked by the students. During the Ecology unit, interactions during the fieldtrip where teacher control was greatly reduced were found to be less regulated and more spontaneous. The conclusions of the study are that using the lenses of theories of discourse and power were useful in increasing the understanding of ‘interaction’ in classrooms and school science laboratory and how they were similar or different across the two topics.
This study is of value as a micro-analysis of transcripts of a secondary biology laboratory and classroom and offers insights into the beliefs of teachers and how these get translated into classroom practices. This thesis also describes how the interaction in the laboratory and classroom is orchestrated in a principled manner by teachers and students for different topics in different settings. This study is new in the following respects:
A. The analysis is of the similarities and contrasts within a single field of disciplinary knowledge.
B. It documents the relationship between classroom practices and laboratory practices, showing how different kinds of work shape different kinds of interactional opportunities for learning.
C. It documents how science teachers account for differences of discipline, setting and topic.
D. It relates the accounts expressed in interviews and classroom practices.
Set in Singapore, where the dominant pedagogy is teacher-centered and routinised, (Luke, Cazden, Lin & Freebody, 2005), this study tracks two teachers and two classes of students in Singapore to examine the subject of biology. Biology is a subject within the discipline of science and this study examines specifically the variations in interaction for two topics within biology, namely Reproduction in Plants and Ecology. The variation in interaction for this is further tracked in two different settings of the school: the classroom and the school science laboratory. The beliefs of teachers about the subject matter are also described and triangulated with the interactions that are observed in the two settings. The study that I reported here is qualitative in nature and uses tools of interview and analysis of classroom talk to establish the relationship between teachers’ beliefs about the subject matter and the interaction that results. This study seeks to address the following research questions:
A. What interactional features are evident in the teaching and learning of secondary biology as reflected in transcripts of classrooms?
B. What are the similarities and differences in the ways knowledge is realised relating to contrasts of setting and topic: in the classroom versus the laboratory and around the topics of Reproduction in Plants versus Ecology?
C. How do teachers describe and explain the distinctive demands of teaching and learning in biology?
Interviews and transcript analysis are used as methods of data analysis in this thesis. Transcripts are analysed by using principles of Conversation Analysis (ten Have, 1999 and Freebody, 2003) to illuminate the patterns of talk in the classroom and laboratory. The turn-taking structures, the building of exchanges and also the power relations are examined in the classroom and the laboratory for the two different topics. The beliefs of the teachers are elicited through a semi- structured interview that is analysed using paired contrasts and Membership Categorisation Principles (Freebody, 2003 and McHoul and Watson, 1984). From the interview and classroom talk, teacher knowledge in biology is also examined through the lenses of Bernstein and Lyotard. Such analysis is important in two ways. Firstly, it presents contrasting views through which interaction in the classroom and laboratory can be analyzed and understood. Secondly, it provides empirical evidence for existing theories in a local context.
The results of this study revealed that teachers believed that the syllabus and schemes of work for the subject dictated how they conducted their lessons and that they believed that Reproduction in Plants with its specialised vocabulary was highly classified and requires direct teacher transmission of content to the students Ecology on the other hand, with its weakly classified content allows for more student participation in the selection and learning of content. Analysis of classroom interactions reveals that turn-taking was tightly controlled by the teacher, with consensus being constructed generally using IRE sequences with cooperation from the students which usually occurs at the expense of student criticism and questioning. For laboratory sessions, interactions when Reproduction in Plants was taught were found to allow more student- initiated questions but the pattern modelled by the teacher of focusing on rule and convention compliance limited the type of questions asked by the students. During the Ecology unit, interactions during the fieldtrip where teacher control was greatly reduced were found to be less regulated and more spontaneous. The conclusions of the study are that using the lenses of theories of discourse and power were useful in increasing the understanding of ‘interaction’ in classrooms and school science laboratory and how they were similar or different across the two topics.
This study is of value as a micro-analysis of transcripts of a secondary biology laboratory and classroom and offers insights into the beliefs of teachers and how these get translated into classroom practices. This thesis also describes how the interaction in the laboratory and classroom is orchestrated in a principled manner by teachers and students for different topics in different settings. This study is new in the following respects:
A. The analysis is of the similarities and contrasts within a single field of disciplinary knowledge.
B. It documents the relationship between classroom practices and laboratory practices, showing how different kinds of work shape different kinds of interactional opportunities for learning.
C. It documents how science teachers account for differences of discipline, setting and topic.
D. It relates the accounts expressed in interviews and classroom practices.
Date Issued
2006
Call Number
QH320.S55 Tan
Date Submitted
2006