Problema 2

Another approach to initiating the interpretation stage of the ELC, that the trainers regularly employ, is to request interpretations that project the expectation of an account from the trainee that rests on their epistemic access to an event, during the previously taught lesson. More specifically, trainers request accounts of ‘how they (the trainee providing feedback) know’ about an aspect of an event. This is often related to their awareness of the behaviour of the students in the class that was taught. The following extract illustrates one instantiation of this approach to engendering the interpretation stage of the ELC in developing FBTs. It is taken from the negative group-feedback phase of Cathy’s feedback cycle on day five of the course; the trainer is Liz.

Extract 26 – “How did you know that they knew…” D5FB 374

1 L: but no you ga:ve an example and then you told them to ta:lk

2 (.) to their partners (.) how did you kno:w that they knew

3 (.) what to do and how to do it

4 (0.4)

5 C: I didn’t

6 (0.3)

7 L: ah !ha ((Tr begins to nod head strongly))

8 (0.3)

9 A: yeah

10 (2.8) ((Tr’s head nodding continues))

11 L: that’s a big difference between the fi:rst one and the

12 second one in the second one you saw them do it (.) asked

13 the questions (0.4)

Previous to the extract above, the group have been negotiating the development of a

description of an event from Cathy’s lesson; Cathy and Annie have been disagreeing about a particular point for a number of turns. At the opening of the extract (line 1) the Tr self- selects, marking her disagreement with the previous turn, “but no”, then producing her description of the event in question, “you ga:ve an example and then you told them to ta:lk (.) to their partners”. She then makes a request for an interpretive account from the Tw, “how did you kno:w that they knew (.) what to do and how to do

it”. This request projects the expectation, to the trainee, of the production of an account that requires several layers of epistemic access. As well as the ever-present necessity to reflect, post-hoc, on a recent teaching experience, the trainee is being asked to interpret her

understanding of the account, in terms of ‘what she knew’ at that point in time, and ‘how she knew it’ (“how did you kno:w”). But this account in itself is predicated on her

understanding of the students behaviour at that point in time, “that they knew (.) what to do and how to do it”. Thus the trainer is requesting the trainee to interpret her understanding - at that point in the previously taught lesson - of the students’ understanding of the expectations of the task she had set.

This kind of request requires the trainee to give an interpretive account of their ‘knowing’ and relates to a particular focus of reflective practice. Trainees can claim, in reflecting on an event or practice, knowledge of the student’s understanding of this event or practice. So in the above extract the trainee is claiming that she had set a task, but that the students’

engagement in the task was problematic. This shift in frame by the Tr requires the trainee to reformulate her account in terms of ‘how she knew’ that the instructions had been understood by the students, as opposed to assuming that they had been understood. Thus this kind of interactional move from the Tr, requires the trainee to provide evidence of how they came to their understanding of the success, or failure, of an event based on observable evidence from the behaviour of the students. A preferred response in this above example might be for the trainee to claim evidence of a particular behaviour; for example, ‘I asked the students questions which confirmed their understanding of the task’.

However, following the request from the trainer in the above extract, at line 5, the trainee responds to the request with a ‘claim insufficient knowledge’ (e.g. Sert, 2011). Her claim of insufficient knowledge, “I didn’t” (line 5), does not display a lack of ability or willingness to provide the requested account, but rather displays her lack of ‘knowing’ about whether, in this case, her instructions were ‘understood by the students’. This claim of no knowledge is oriented to by the trainer with a change of state token in line 7, “ah !ha” (Heritage, 1984a), displaying her acceptance of the claim of no knowledge, but also treating it as something newsworthy. This verbal display occurs concurrently with strong head nodding from the trainer, and this embodied action continues through the silence that follows. These verbal and embodied actions mark this interpretive claim as ‘an important point’. The Tr then self-

selects and provides a reason for the events in question, “you saw them do it” (line 12), which is grounded in the observable behaviour of the students within the previously taught class. This evidence is formulated as distinguishing between the two instances in question,

“that’s a big difference between the fi:rst one and the second one in the

second one you saw them do it”. Thus the trainer shifts her stance from requesting an interpretive account, in the absence of evidence from the trainee, to providing an interpretive account. In this sense then, the trainer is shifting to the role of co-informant in providing an interpretation of the event in question (see section 5.4.5).