Dialogkompetens i skolans vardag - Publikationer - LTU - Luleå ...

Dialogue – community of practice – school improvement
Dialogue competence means being able to talk and listen, which may seem to be
self-evident in communicative contexts (Wilhelmsson, 1998). In the present studies
this turned out to be somewhat more complicated. In order to learn together
with and from one another while at the same time developing new shared knowledge,
each individual in the conversation was required to possess the ability to
behave with closeness and distance to her/his own and her/his colleague’s perspective.
In the following text the division below will be put in relation to the results
of the thesis:
Self
Others
Closeness talk (write) listen (read)
Distance critical self-reflection critical reflection
on others’ views
Figure 6. Developed model of dialogue competence (Wilhelmsson & Döös, 2005, p. 18)
The aspects that the teachers had to make an effort to develop, concerned assuming
the role of the other, being able to listen actively in order to contribute critical
reflections on what had been said or written (termed ‘response’ in this study). Aspects
that many pupils lacked concerned their own critical self-reflection and an
active role of listener, where the quality of listening was also dependent on conditions
in the physical environment. Not being able to verbalise ones needs means
not having a distance to one’s own hearing impairment (Study I). When experts
(teachers/audio technician) in one’s surroundings take on the task of providing
‘the best solution’ from their own perspective, the individual’s distancing will be
made worse.
Being close to one’s own perspectives and having a distance to those of others
implies ability for differentiation, for making distinctions. Having a distance to
one’s own perspectives and closeness to those of others implies ability for integration,
uniting and incorporating. In the ideal dialogue, all participants offer their
differentiated and integrated abilities. Contributing to integration that is, building
on others’ statements turned out not to be self-evident, and this problem was most
obvious in the web dialogue. A parallel difficulty was discussed there, namely the
pupils’ ability to contribute to integration. Everybody wanted to have their say
without building on a classmate’s narrative (Study III); this phenomenon is in no
way specific to hard-of-hearing pupils. A facilitator or a teacher in the classroom
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