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Peer group talk in a language arts classroom: An ethnographic study of Hawaiian adolescents
Abstract
This dissertation reports an ethnographic investigation of the peer group talk of Hawaiian middle school students during an English language arts class. It is concerned with the academic and social agendas of the seventh grade participants. The purpose of the research was to investigate: (a) student labels and descriptions of their interactive accomplishments; (b) communicative features which characterized academic and social engagement; (c) relationships and identities invoked in the conversations. The study was conducted over one school year with primary focus on one group of four students. The analytic categories "doing English" and "socializing" were derived from field notes, video tapes, group and individual interviews, and copies of pertinent written documents. These student terms-for-talk foregrounded their perceptions of what was required to participate appropriately in the language arts classroom and recognition of "socializing" as an acceptable, prominent, and purposeful activity within the small peer group and larger classroom context. Instances-of-the-terms-for-talk were interrogated to identify topic patterns, features-of-the-talk, norms of interaction, and tone of engagement. Patterns of engagement related to peer group harmony included "getting busted," arguing and fighting, preserving the status of group members, using humor, and mediating tensions. Intrapersonal and interpersonal dynamics were examined as dimensions of individual autonomy and group affiliation. Enactments of personhood or identity invoked in the terms for talk "doing English" and "socializing" were rendered as those of 'student' and 'friend' respectively. Monitoring, assessing, directing, clarifying, and confirming were salient interactional strategies associated with academic endeavors, while using humor emerged as the prominent feature of social interactions. The significance of this investigation relates to the value of socializing. Off-task conversations served to promote collective group identity, mediate tensions that arose during academic engagement, and further develop the social and personal identities of the participants. These insights contribute to the literature on face-to-face interactions in classrooms by legitimizing "socializing" or off-task talk as an activity form that can serve to expedite on-task or academic interactions such as "doing English." The results of the study expand our understandings of how students categorize, describe, and construct classroom events.
Subject Area
Curricula|Teaching|Language arts|Communication|Educational sociology
Recommended Citation
Gnatek, Theresa A, "Peer group talk in a language arts classroom: An ethnographic study of Hawaiian adolescents" (1997). Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest. AAI9737529.
https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI9737529