using dialogic diaries to develop student understanding and trainee practice nicola walshe...

Using dialogic diaries to develop student understanding and trainee practice

Nicola WalsheUniversity of Cambridge

Exploring and developing children’s understandings of sustainable development with dialogic diaries•The study

▫25 year 10 students undertaking Edexcel B GCSE

▫11-16 Village College in Cambridgeshire

•Methods▫Dialogic diaries▫Interviews

Exploring and developing children’s understandings of sustainable development with dialogic diaries

•Data analysis▫Analysis of dialogue (after Daniel et al.,

2005)

▫Analysis of general levels of understanding (using revision of Bloom)

▫Analysis of understandings of sustainability

Results

• The metacommunicative dimension

(developing the dialogue)

• The ideational dimension (developing

students’ understanding of the substantive

topic, sustainable development)

• The interpersonal dimension (developing

relationships within the classroom)

“It’s like a sort of a personal connection between the pupil and the teacher ... you can recap what's going on in the lesson and see things from different perspectives. Having that connection with a teacher ... actually gets me more involved with school in general.” Tyler

Issues

•Time▫For students to write the diaries?▫For me to respond?▫For the diary-writing process to continue?

•Writing▫Writing vs drawing▫Blogosphere?

•The ethics of ‘diary-writing’▫Ideological process (pupils need to be

convinced of teacher/researcher’s motives▫Political process (questions orthodox ‘teacher-

pupil’ roles)

Stage 1: Reflection after Faculty Session

Stage 2: Pair Blog Responses

Stage 3: School-based activity

Stage 4: Reflection on School-based activity

Stage 5: Pair Blog Responses

Working with trainees (1):Online Blogs on Sustainability

Reflection(s) before Faculty session

Greater number of school-based activities (at a range of scales)

Increased response by me

Working with trainees (2):Dialogic diaries as a research method for trainees

•PGCE trainee: used dialogic diaries to explore student learning for assignment.

•MEd student: using dialogic diaries to track Year 9 students' understanding of distant place (China).