Teacher as envolver: a new role to play in English language discussion classes

Abstract

Given the role of emotional factors in effective teaching and inspired by a number of socio-philosophical, linguistic and psychological theories including Developmental, Individual-difference, Relationship-based (DIR) model and the concept of emotioncy, the present study is an attempt to introduce envolver as a new role for teachers. Sense-related emotions towards a word or an entity that can relativise cognition fluctuate from avolvement (having no feelings) and exvolvement (having heard, seen or touched) to involvement (having had direct experience or having done research). Accordingly, teachers seem to adopt an envolving role in which they avolve, exvolve or involve the learners in different classroom practices. By conducting semi-structured interviews, the researchers asked 24 language teachers to nominate the topics they preferred the learners to be avolved, exvolved or involved in class. The findings revealed thematised topics for each category, including taboos for avolvement, routine topics for exvolvement, and life-related and thought-provoking ones for involvement. Finally, the results were discussed in the context of education.

A Positive Psychology Perspective on Positive Emotion and Foreign Language Enjoyment Among Chinese as a Second Language Learners Attending Virtual Online Classes in the Emergency Remote Teaching Context Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…As Li et al ( 2018 ) pointed out, FLE-Teacher overlaps, to some extent, with other two dimensions of FLE in that teachers play a central role in class and, therefore, they contribute either directly or indirectly to students' experience of FLE. Pishghadam et al ( 2019 ) also redefined the role of teacher in the class from the perspective of emotioncy and regarded teacher as an “envolver” who exvolves or involves the learners for different purposes. Pishghadam et al ( 2016a ) listed three types of emotioncy: avolvement, exvolvement and involvement.…”

“…In this regard, Pishghadam et al ( 2013 ), referring to Greenspan's ( 1992 ) Developmental Individual-Difference Relationship-Based model (DIR), set forth a new approach to SLA, Emotion-Based Language Instruction (EBLI), which “is based on the fact that having stronger emotions toward second/foreign language vocabularies leads to a better understanding of them and facilitates learning” (Pishghadam et al, 2016b , p. 513). They also introduced the concept of emotioncy, which refers to the degree of emotions one has toward language entities (Pishghadam et al, 2013 ), and is defined as “the varying degrees of sensory emotions that each entity (either a word or a concept) evokes and carries for each individual, depending on whether they have heard about, seen, touched or experienced that entity in their own context” (Pishghadam et al, 2019 , p. 44). Emotioncy “ranges on a hierarchical order of null, auditory, visual, kinaesthetic, inner, and arch emotioncies” (Pishghadam, 2015 , p. 1), and “higher levels of emotioncy (inner and arch) bring about higher levels of comprehension, learning, and retention because of involvement, i.e., they engage learners from inside, while lower levels of emotioncy (auditory, visual, kinaesthetic) lead to exvolvement because they engage learners from outside” (Pishghadam, 2015 ; Pishghadam et al, 2016b , p. 513).…”

Sensory Emotion in Words: Evidence From an Event-related Potential (ERP) Study in Light of the Emotioncy Model

“…Inspired by Greenspan's (1992) DIR model of first language acquisition, Pishghadam, Tabatabaeyan, and Navari (2013) introduced the concept of emotioncy to highlight the role of sense-induced emotions in language education (Pishghadam, Adamson, & Shayesteh, 2013). In other words, emotioncy is rooted in the theories of embodiment, highlighting the role that the sensorimotor experiences play in the formation of our cognition (Atkinson, 2010;Pishghadam, Mahmoodzadeh, Naji Meidani, & Shayesteh, 2019). Emotioncy is established as different levels of emotion generated by the recruitment of our senses in understanding different concepts (Pishghadam, Tabatabaeyan et al, 2013).…”

“…To state it differently, having emotion as one of its basic constituents, emotioncy focuses on "the emotions evoked by the senses", ranging "from avolvement (null emotioncy) to exvolvement (auditory, visual, and kinesthetic emotioncies), and involvement (inner and arch emotioncies)" (Pishghadam, 2016, p. 1). While avolvement deals with a situation in which an individual has no knowledge of something, exvolvement happens when an individual has heard, seen, or touched something, and involvement, that is deepening the experiences of the intended concept (Pishghadam, Mahmoodzadeh et al, 2019), occurs when an individual has experienced (inner) or researched (arch) something (Pishghadam, Baghaei, & Seyednozadi, 2016;Pishghadam, Jajarmi et al, 2016). Figure 1 depicts the hierarchy from avolvement to exvolvement, and involvement with regard to the emotioncy levels engaged in each stage.…”

Toward an Emotioncy Based Education: A Systematic Review of the Literature

“…Research on the psychology of emotions (see Greenspan, 1992 , Pishghadam et al, 2013 ) indicates that teachers are expected to carry out various emotional roles in the classroom. Hence, employing the concept of emotioncy, Pishghadam et al ( 2019b ) introduced the role of teachers as envolvers. Considering the different types of emotioncy from avolvement to metavolvement, these scholars postulated that “teachers seem to adopt an envolving role in which they avolve, exvolve or involve the learners in different classroom practices” (Pishghadam et al, 2019b , p. 41).…”