Educational Dialogue

Co-ordinators: Professor Rupert Wegerif and Dr Judith Kleine-Staarman

This group will focus on projects related to educational dialogue and new technology and the data that has come out of these projects. The focus in these projects has always been on the quality of the dialogue more than on the ICT element, although the ways in which dialogues are mediated is obviously also interesting and important. This focus on the educational quality of dialogue fits well with the funded Talking Counts project currently being led by Carol Murphy supported by Tricia Nash as RF and by Ros Fisher and Rupert Wegerif as Co-Investigators. This project is looking at Exploratory Talk as a catalyst for conceptual change in KS1 Arithmetic and is already generating fascinating data . The proposed group will focus on issues of method and methodology arising from these funded projects, on writing papers out of these projects and on preparing bids to continue a coherent programme of related projects. Technology, although not centre stage, will play a part as a medium for dialogue.

The group will also discuss presentations and papers about the theory of dialogue and ‘dialogic’ in education in relation to the affordances of different media.

There will be one central group meeting a term to discuss progress on writing and bidding and report on project activity and discuss research group matters. In addition to the central group, there will be reading group sessions and workshops for analysing data together.

Central Group Meeting dates for 2009/10 are:

12th November 2009, 12.30 – 2.00 pm: The group will be looking at data from Carol Murphy's project: Talking Counts: An intervention programme to investigate and develop the role of exploratory talk in young children’s arithmetic.

11 February 2010, 12.30 – 2.00 pm

13th May 2010, 12.30 – 2.00 pm

Reading Group dates:

17 September 2009, 3.00 – 5.00 pm:

21 October 2009, 4.00 pm, Staff House: paper by Adam Lefstein on dialogue in classrooms

18 November 2009, 4.00 pm, Staff House: paper by Hubert J.M. Hermans 'The Dialogical Self:Toward a Theory of Personal and Cultural Positioning'

16 December 2009, 4.00 pm, Staff House:

20 January 2010, 4.00 pm, Staff House:

17 February 2010, 4.00 pm, Staff House:

17 March 2010, 4.00 pm, Staff House:

21 April 2010, 4.00 pm, Staff House:

19 May 2010, 4.00 pm, Staff House: