Abstracts - Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa

ANNE THWAITE, EDITH COWAN UNIVERSITY, AUSTRALIAGRAHAM MCKAY, EDITH COWAN UNIVERSITY, AUSTRALIASHAPING SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY DISCOURSE WITH 5-YEAR-OLDS: DO TEACHERSMAKE A DIFFERENCE?This paper will report on data obtained during the course of the project “Earlyliteracy through science in Indigenous and culturally diverse communities”, fundedby Edith Cowan University in Australia from 2009-2010, in which the authors wereinvolved as researchers. This project investigated the discourse of teachers andother adults working with 5-year-olds over nine weeks as they conducted scienceand technology investigations around the theme of building and building materials.Our paper will provide a functional analysis of the data compatible with previousapproaches to classroom discourse analysis such as Cazden (2001) and Christie(2002). We will describe how the adults attempt to construct the science andtechnology discourse and compare the discourse involving trained teachers withthat involving other adults, such as teacher aides and parent helpers, as theyinteract with the children. We will investigate variables such as Exchange Structure,including ‘teacher knows the answer’ – dk1 moves; Speech Function, includingInitiations and types of Responses; Mood, including its relationship to SpeechFunction; Modality; and number and length of turns by both the children and theadults. Implications of the differences found between the discourse of trainedteachers and that of other adults will be discussed.ReferencesCazden, C. (2001) Classroom Discourse: The Language of Teaching and Learning. Portsmouth,NH, USA: Heinemann.Christie, F. (2002) Classroom Discourse Analysis. London: Continuum.PAPER SESSION 9B - ROOM 2 - FRIDAY, 28 JULYISFC38 Book of Abstracts Page 30 Lisbon, July 2011