dialogue and the development of creative thinking neil mercer
Post on 21-Dec-2015
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Dialogue and the development of creative
thinking
Neil Mercer
What is language? It is a tool
• for creating and maintaining shared identities and cultures
Cumbria
Cumbrian dialect words
Fell
Beck
Tarn
Scale
Dale
Lait
Laik
Lowp
What is language? It is a tool …
• …for creating and maintaining identities and cultures
• …for making sense of the world together
• …for solving problems creatively
• We can not only interact with language, we can interthink with it
ways of using language
ways of thinking
Lev Vygotsky
The amount and quality of the dialogue children experience at home is one of best predictors of their eventual academic attainment (Hart & Risley, 1995).
School offers the only chance for some productive, educational dialogue for some children
To be creative, we need space and time to think
To be creative together, children need space and time to talk
What makes a ‘good discussion’?
1.Disputational talk in which speakers…
are competitive rather than co-operative don’t listen to each other each stick to their own point of view
('Yes it is! - No it's not!' ) just make their own decisions.
2.Cumulative talk
in which speakers… share ideas agree with each other …but there is no critical evaluation of ideas.
3 kinds of talk
• all actively participate• ask each other questions
“What do you think…?” “Why do you think that…?”
• share relevant information“Do you remember….?”
• give reasons for their views “I think that because…..”• constructively criticise
“Yes, but if……• try to reach agreement “Do we all agree that….?”
Exploratory Talk, in which speakers
Why is children’s talk in groups often not creative and productive?
Do teachers use talk effectively themselves?
• Yes…• …but they may ask too many ‘closed’
questions that only require short responses,…
• …not enough of the kinds of questions which get children thinking…
• ..and they may not encourage or expect extended talk from children
It would better if teachers…
• asked questions which encourage children to express their ideas and reveal their misunderstandings
• modelled ways of using talk for thinking• set up shared ‘ground rules’ for
classroom talk
• gave children space and time to talk
Class 5’s ground rules for Exploratory Talk
1. Everyone should have a chance to talk
2. Everyone’s ideas should be carefully
considered3. Each member of the group should
be asked: What do you think?
Why do you think that?4. Look and listen to the person
talking5 After discussing, agree what to do
Hundarnir á hundahótelinu
Hundur 1
Nafn FífíTegund franskur kjölturakki (French poodle) Kyn kvenkynAldur 5 áraStærð meðalFæða kjúklingur/skinkaVarðhundur neiGott/gaman krakkar og aðrir hundarVont/leiðinlegt rigning og bleyta
Hundur 2
Nafn TanniTegund sporhundur (Bloodhound Cross)Kyn karlkynAldur 4 áraStærð mjög stórFæða mjög mikiðVarðhundur jáGott/gaman að sitja við arinVont/leiðinlegt kettir
Heimsóknir á hundahótelið
Þessir gestir komu á hundahótelið að skoða hundana um síðustu helgi:
1. Sigurður Jónsson og Guðrún Lárusdóttir.
Siggi og Gunna, Tommi, 10 ára og Lísa, 8. ára. Þau búa í einbýlishúsi í rólegri götu í múthverfi Reykjavíkur. Öll eru þau í skóla eða vinnu á daginn en eru heima um helgar. Þau hafa stóran garð við húsið sitt og
svo er ágætis útvistarsvæði í nágrenni heimilis þeirra.
2. Þorbjörg Ólafsdóttir.Þorbjörg er 75 ára og býr ein í Breiðholtinu. Sonur hennar býr í Keflavík en heimsækir hana oft með barnabörnin en þau eru tvö; Palli, 3 ára og Sara sem er eins árs. Þorbjörgu langar í félagsskap og vill gjarnan fá sér hund. Hún býr í lítilli kjallaraíbúð í fjórbýlishúsi og hefur aðgang að bakgarði.
When Exploratory Talk is happening you hear children
saying…
• ‘What do you think?’
• ‘Why do you think that?’
• I think that because…’
• ‘I disagree, because…’
• ‘Yes, but…’
• ‘Do we all agree?’
• Three cats and three dogs are sitting alternately in a row.
• Change the seating arrangement so that the cats are sitting together and the dogs are sitting together.
• You can only swap adjacent cats or dogs.
• Do this in as few moves as possible.
• How many moves do you need?
What are the effects?
Children…• become more interested in learning• become better at solving problems
creatively together• improve their individual scores on
tests of reasoning• achieve better results in maths and
science and reading comprehension
How can a teacher help children to talk together effectively and
creatively?
• Step 1: help them to ‘see’ how they talk
• Step 2: ‘model’ ways using language for thinking
• Step 3: set up some ground rules for talk
• Step 4: give them some good activities and enough time for them think together
For more information
http://www.thinkingtogether.org.uk/
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