Two Axes for the Analysis of ‘Commonsense’ and ‘Formal’ Geographical Knowledge in Classroom Talk

McHoul, Alec; Watson, Dyan

doi:10.1080/0142569840050305

Cited by 79 publications

(41 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…5 On topics in classroom lessons, see also Payne and Hustler (1980), McHoul andWatson (1984), Heyman (1986), and Heap (1988).…”

Section: Setting the Taskmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unpacking Tasks: The Fusion of New Technology with Instructional Work

Greiffenhagen

2007

Comput Supported Coop Work

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Abstract. This paper discusses how a new technology (designed to help pupils with learning about Shakespeare's Macbeth) is introduced and integrated into existing classroom practices. It reports on the ways through which teachers and pupils figure out how to use the software as part of their classroom work. Since teaching and learning in classrooms are achieved in and through educational tasks (what teachers instruct pupils to do) the analysis explicates some notable features of a particular task (storyboarding one scene from the play). It is shown that both 'setting the task' and 'following the task' have to be locally and practically accomplished and that tasks can operate as a sense-making device for pupils' activities. Furthermore, what the task 'is', is not entirely established through the teacher's initial formulation, but progressively clarified through pupils' subsequent work, and in turn ratified by the teacher. IntroductionThis paper discusses the embedding of a new technology into existing teaching and learning practices. This theme is illustrated through a detailed analysis of how a new storyboarding software (designed to help pupils learn about Shakespeare's Macbeth) was introduced and integrated into classroom exercises and the ways in which teachers and pupils figured out how to organise its application as part of their educational work.The data is in many respects unremarkable, but is used here to illustrate the way in which educational purposes and tasks do not necessarily exist in advance of the work to be done, but are construed and produced by participants reflexively in and through their engagement with the new technology and their evolving assumptions about what it is that the task might consist in. Learning the task and learning the technology are mutually constitutive for both teacher and students. The data serves to unpack what 'setting a task' and 'following a task' consist of as practical accomplishments. The organisation of teaching and learning are things done by teachers and pupils as they encounter the technology together for the first time.The analytic approach to tasks presented here is not to be understood as 'task analysis' (see, e.g., Diaper, 1989; Annett and Stanton, 2000). For the latter, tasks consist of a hierarchy of goals and means, in which any given technology would be seen as the means to achieve the task, quite separate from the goals which constitute it:Task analysis means the breakdown of overall tasks, as given, into their elements, and the specification of how these elements relate to one another in space and time and functional relation.( Sheridan, 1997, p.87) In such studies, the delineation of tasks is the outcome of analysis, i.e., a product of the analyst's methods. This study takes a different approach 1 . Tasks are conceived of as oriented-to and achieved phenomena, i.e., as defined in and through participants' activities (and it is a contingent matter as to whether parties attempt to construct a plan of things to be done in advance of undertaking them...

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“…5 On topics in classroom lessons, see also Payne and Hustler (1980), McHoul andWatson (1984), Heyman (1986), and Heap (1988).…”

Section: Setting the Taskmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unpacking Tasks: The Fusion of New Technology with Instructional Work

Greiffenhagen

2007

Comput Supported Coop Work

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“…McHoul et Watson (1984) analysent plus particulièrement le processus par lequel les enseignants et les élèves font appel à des notions de sens commun dans la production et la transmission des connaissances formelles de la matière enseignée. A partir d'une analyse de la conversation qui s'établit entre l'enseignant et les élèves dans une classe de géographie, les auteurs essaient de démontrer comment les notions de sens commun et les connaissances plus formelles véhiculées dans le programme peuvent être inter-reliées, et en quoi celles-là peuvent constituer une ressource dans la maîtrise de celles-ci.…”

Section: Les Savoirs Scolaires Et Les Programmes D'étudeunclassified

Articles de revues parus en 1984 dans le domaine de la sociologie de l’éducation

Trottier

1985

Revue des sciences de l'éducation

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“…As was indicated in Hester and Eglin (1997a, b: 3), categorizations may be accomplished not only with respect to persons (the original reference for 'membership categories') but they may also be used in respect of collectivities (Coulter 1982;Jayyusi 1984;Sharrock 1974) and non-personal objects of various kinds (McHoul and Watson 1984), including what have traditionally been referred to in conversation analysis as 'conversational objects' or 'sequential objects' (for example, questions, answers, story-invitations, requests, instructions, etc.). Indeed, that persons are able to distinguish one type of conversational object from another suggests some course of membership categorization analysis.…”

Section: Occasionality and Categorial Transformationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Categorial Occasionality and Transformation: Analyzing Culture in Action

Hester

2012

Hum Stud

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Our focus in this article is on some uses of categorial transformations. The discussion is divided into two main parts. In the first part, we begin by outlining our approach, namely membership categorization analysis (MCA), indicating the origins of the term and elaborating the conception of MCA as an 'occasioned' members' apparatus. We then explain what we mean by the concept of categorial transformation, review some of the very few previous studies which have investigated this phenomenon and which are pertinent to its further study, and indicate how categorial transformation serves to embody and illustrate the occasionality of MCA. In the second part of the article, we present an analysis of two extracts from a transcript of the naturally occurring talk-in-interaction which occurred in a particular family meal, involving two children and their parents. A variety of categorial transformation practices in this data are identified and their particular local usages described. In the concluding discussion we consider our argument and our analysis in light of previous discussions of the trajectory of Sacks' work.

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Two Axes for the Analysis of ‘Commonsense’ and ‘Formal’ Geographical Knowledge in Classroom Talk

Cited by 79 publications

References 9 publications

Unpacking Tasks: The Fusion of New Technology with Instructional Work

Unpacking Tasks: The Fusion of New Technology with Instructional Work

Articles de revues parus en 1984 dans le domaine de la sociologie de l’éducation

Categorial Occasionality and Transformation: Analyzing Culture in Action

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