ERIC Number: ED504504
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 2009-Feb
Pages: 18
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Instituting Change in Classroom Discourse Structure: Human and Computer-Based Motif Analysis. WCER Working Paper No. 2009-1
Nathan, Mitchell J.; Kim, Suyeon; Grant, Timothy S.
Wisconsin Center for Education Research (NJ3)
We compared the structure of discussions in a middle school mathematics classroom before (Year 1) and after (Year 2) teacher participation in professional development activities aimed at enhancing students' participation and the co-construction of mathematical ideas. Changes in the role of teacher and student were accompanied by identifiable changes in discourse structure. In particular, while traditional initiation-response-evaluation (IRE) patterns continued throughout, the de-centering of the teacher's authority led to a reduction in IRE occurrences and increases in student-directed initiation-demonstration-evaluation (IDE) patterns. Analyses conducted by human coders were corroborated by computer-based motif analyses that identified flexible patterns using probabilistic, data-mining methods, while also predicting some novel discourse structures. Appended are: (1) Event Codes Used, with Examples from Transcripts; (2) Example Section from Year 1, Lesson 1, of the Stream of Codes Obtained from the Four Lesson Transcripts Used for Both Human and Computer-Based Pattern Finding; and (3) Motif Example. (Contains 6 tables and 2 figures.)
Descriptors: Teacher Participation, Faculty Development, Middle School Students, Secondary School Mathematics, Middle School Teachers, Student Participation, Teacher Influence, Teacher Role, Student Role, Mathematics Instruction, Mathematical Concepts, Classroom Communication, Teacher Student Relationship, Probability, Data Analysis, Computer Assisted Testing
Wisconsin Center for Education Research. School of Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1025 West Johnson Street Suite 785, Madison, WI 53706. Tel: 608-263-4200; Fax: 608-263-6448; e-mail: uw-wcer@education.wisc.edu; Web site: http://www.wcer.wisc.edu/publications/workingpapers/index.php
Publication Type: Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: Middle Schools
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: Institute of Education Sciences (ED)
Authoring Institution: Wisconsin Center for Education Research
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A