Classroom DiscourseAquatic Insects Vol. 2, No. 2, November 2011, 201–218

Learner initiatives and learning opportunities in the language classroom Hansun Zhang Waring* Department of Arts and Humanities, Teachers’ College, Columbia University, New York, USA

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(Received 10 May 2010; final version received 14 March 2011) Scholars and practitioners have increasingly come to recognise the centrality of learner agency in generating learning opportunities. Such agency is most clearly observed in the initiatives that learners take in the language classroom. Despite the importance of learner initiatives, however, a precise and comprehensive understanding of what such initiatives entail remains lacking. Based on a conversation analytic treatment of 160 relevant cases culled from 14 hours of ESL (English as a second language) classroom interactions, I propose an empirically based ‘typology’ of learner initiative. Drawing upon various theoretical assumptions of what promotes learning, I also give preliminary considerations to the kinds of learning opportunities such initiatives generate.

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Keywords: conversation analysis; classroom discourse; learner initiative; learning opportunity; knowledge display; language play; identity stretching

A centrepiece in classroom discourse is the IRF sequence (Teacher InitiativeStudent Response–Teacher Feedback) (Sinclair and Coulthard 1975), where the learner is invariably positioned as a respondent who assists in implementing the teacher’s pedagogical agenda. While IRF affords its own unique learning opportunities (e.g., Seedhouse 1996), scholars and practitioners have increasingly come to recognise the centrality of learner agency (Ellis 1998; Goodwin 2007; van Lier 1988; 2008) in generating learning opportunities (Allwright 2005). Agency, as explained by van Lier (2008), involves the general principle that learning depends on the activity and the initiative of the learner – more so than any ‘inputs transmitted to the learner by a teacher or a textbook’ (163). In the language classroom, learners can manifest this agency by taking initiatives: for example, in raising questions or providing comments. The obviously interesting question to ask is: in what specific ways do learner initiatives promote learning, or in what specific ways can instruction be organised to maximise learner initiatives? As I began to work through a large amount of video data with these questions in mind, however, I was repeatedly confronted with a much more basic question: What exactly is entailed in learner initiative? The primary goal of this paper, then, is to work towards an understanding of the nature of learner initiative. I do so by produc-

*Email: [email protected] ISSN 1946-3014 print/ISSN 1946-3022 online Ó 2011 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/19463014.2011.614053 http://www.informaworld.com

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ing an empirically based typology of learner initiative using the methodology of conversation analysis (CA). In discussing these initiatives, I will also give some very preliminary considerations to the kinds of learning opportunities they generate, drawing upon various theoretical assumptions of what promotes learning. Background A main issue in classroom discourse research concerns to what extent learners are constrained or liberated by different types of interaction in their pursuit of learning. In their discussion of the three-part exchange structure as the dominant feature in classroom discourse (Sinclair and Coulthard 1975; Walsh 2006; Wells 1993), Hall and Walsh (2002) distinguish between IRE (evaluation) and IRF (feedback), arguing that while IRE users see teaching as a process of transmission, IRF users ‘have a more inquiry-based understanding of learning, which values the activities of exploration, hypothesis testing, and problem solving’ (196–197). As van Lier (1994) writes: ‘[w]e need to isolate those characteristics of interaction which provide opportunities for learning, and then see how they are embodied in the different kinds of interaction that we can identify’ (72). After detailing four types of pedagogical interactions that include transmission, recitation, transaction, and transformation, where talk is jointly managed by all participants, van Lier (1994) suggests that ‘as one moves along a continuum from transmission towards transformation, opportunities for learning are likely to be enhanced’ (80). Paoletti and Fele (2004) conceptualise a different continuum for classroom interaction – from total disorder to complete order – and argue that ‘the highest quality of learning takes place more or less in its middle’ (72). In particular, learner initiative is often considered an important factor in generating learning opportunities. Goodwin (2007) convincingly illustrates the power of ‘occasioned’ knowledge exploration where learning occurred as the children voiced their curiosity in situ. As Walsh (2002) writes, ‘confirmation checks and requests for clarification are to be encouraged not only from teacher to learners, but more importantly, from learners to teacher’ (12). Boulima (1999) also notes the importance of learner-initiated speech in generating opportunities for receiving input and producing output. According to Ellis (1998), a classroom is acquisition-rich when learners are given a chance to control the discourse (147) (also see van Lier 1988). Despite the belief that learner initiatives play a crucial role in promoting learning, a precise and comprehensive understanding of what such initiatives entail remains lacking. A handful of CA studies have also dealt with learner-initiated interactions in the classroom. Orletti (1981), for example, documents two types of ‘embedded selfselection’ by pupils in her analysis of classroom verbal interaction (534–535). In the first type, the pupil self-selects during a pause within a turn previously assigned to another pupil to complete that turn. In the second type, the pupil self-selects, after a regularly completed turn, to start a sequence that interrupts the flow of the previous conversation. Sahlstrom’s (2002) illuminating study on hand-raising in plenary classroom interaction shows that the first hand raiser typically does not get selected. It is argued that by selecting the ‘last’ as the next speaker, the teacher ‘can reward late hand raisers and. . .increase participation from students’ (54). Sahlstrom (2002) also claims that early hand-raising appears to be explicitly designed to display knowing the answer without running the risk of being selected as the next speaker (54). Mortensen (2009) describes how, in the second language classroom, the self-selecting learner establishes recipiency by engaging resources such as

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in-breaths and body movements. In her study of student participation in an ESL classroom, Jacknick (2009) conceptualises student initiations on a continuum of increasing difficulty based on the degree to which the initiation is projected by or affiliates with the prior teacher turn. Finally, Waring (2009) details how one ESL student manages, in close coordination with the teacher, to move out of a series of uninterrupted IRFs during a homework review activity, establishing instead a renewed participation structure that allows for student-initiated negotiations that her co-participants then jointly orient to and successfully accomplish. This paper contributes to the existing literature by further unpacking the nature of learner initiative using the methodology of CA. Data and method The data contain 14 hours of audio- and video-taped adult ESL classroom interactions from seven different classes taught by seven different teachers with class sizes ranging from seven to 15 students. These classes were conducted at a community English programme in the United States and included three levels: beginning, intermediate and advanced. The classes met three times a week from 10.00 am to 12.00 pm on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday for 10 weeks each semester. The learners represent 10 different cultural backgrounds: Chinese, Danish, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Slavic, Spanish and Turkish. A research assistant and I collaborated in the data collection. The video-recordings were transcribed using a notation system developed by Gail Jefferson with some slight modifications to accommodate my particular data set (see Appendix). The transcripts, along with the recordings, were then examined within the conversation analytic (CA) framework. In particular, this study may be characterised as one of applied CA, given its focus on specific institutional activities (ten Have 2007). Conversation analysis is the study of the methods and procedures used to understand and produce conduct in interaction (see ten Have 2007 for a thorough introduction). The application of CA to the field of second language learning only began in the late 1990s (e.g., Firth and Wagner 1997), but its growing presence in applied linguistics has been strong and steady (e.g., Firth and Wagner 2008; Gardner and Wagner 2004; Kasper 2006, 2008; Mori and Zuengler 2008; Richards and Seedhouse 2004). The contribution of CA analyses to understanding second language learning has been varied. First, CA findings have raised our awareness of the emerging and complex nature of learning interactions (Frazier 2007; He 2000; Hellermann 2006; Kasper 2004; Mori 2002, 2004). Second, CA has also been used to document how language learning happens over time (e.g., Brouwer and Wagner 2004; Hellermann 2006, 2008; Markee 2008; Young and Miller 2004). Third, given the reconceptualisation of learning as participation in sociocultural theory (e.g., Pavlenko and Lantolf 2000), the empirical power of CA has been harnessed to detail the interactional practices that either create or inhibit the opportunities for participation, and by extension, the opportunities for learning (He 2004; Waring 2008). In this paper, I resort to this same empirical power in illuminating our understanding of learner initiatives. In particular, endeavours to unpack a participant phenomenon such as learner initiative would require detailed scrutiny of the actual conduct, and conversation analysis (CA) offers a fitting lens through which such scrutiny may be accomplished.

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An initial treatment of the data involves identifying all cases where the learner contribution does not constitute an R in the IRF sequence. This includes cases where the learner talk occupies the position of the R without constituting a response to the teacher’s initiation. Applying this broad criterion for initiative resulted in a collection of 160 cases. A line-by-line CA analysis is then conducted for each case, with special attention devoted to how the ‘initiative’ turn is designed, what its sequential environment is, and what it accomplishes. After working through each case in detail, it becomes clear that initiative is not straightforward concept. It can, instead, be situated on two separate but related dimensions: turn-taking and sequence. Table 1 below summarises the three main types of learner initiatives (A–C) situated on the two cross-cutting dimensions of turn-taking (Sacks, Schegloff, and Jefferson 1974) and sequence (see Schegloff 2007 for various terminologies related to sequence). The most common type of learner initiative occurs when one self-selects to initiate a sequence (Type A). It is also possible, however, to exercise initiative when one self-selects to volunteer a response (Type B). Finally, one can exploit an assigned turn to begin a sequence (Type C). Of the 160 cases, 79 are Type A, 63 Type B, and 18 Type C. For each type of learner initiatives, I first provide detailed analyses of their compositions, positions and actions. These analyses are then followed by a preliminary discussion of how these initiatives may create learning opportunities. For the purpose of analysis, learner initiative is broadly defined as any learner attempt to make an uninvited contribution to the ongoing classroom talk, where ‘uninvited’ may refer to (1) not being specifically selected as the next speaker or (2) not providing the expected response when selected. Type A learner initiative: initiating sequence Type A initiative, featured by both self-selection and an initiating action, exhibits initiative on both the turn-taking and the sequence dimensions. It represents the clearest cluster of examples of what would be recognised as learner agency in action and accounts for 50% of the cases in my data. Learners can self-select to start a new sequence with or without a pre-expansion; learners can also self-select to initiate a post-expansion. I begin with an example that contains a pre-expansion. The class is about to begin the activity of re-enacting the discovery of silk. In lines 1–3, the teacher is wrapping up the explanation of ‘re-enact’. That the teacher’s turn is coming to an end is shown in her: (1) providing a summary of her explanation so far, (2) coming to a possible completion at the end of ‘historical events’, and Table 1. Typology of learner initiatives. +SEQUENCE-INITIATING


SEQUENCE-INITIATING

+SELF-SELECTION

A (Initiate Sequence)

B (Volunteer Response) step in (B1) activate source (B2)


SELF-SELECTION

C (Exploit Assigned Turn) piggyback (C1) do the unfitted (C2)

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(3) adding a sotto voce increment beyond the completion point (‘free constituent’ in Ford, Fox, and Thompson 2002, 17).

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Now that the vocabulary item is out of the way, the teacher is positioned to give specific instructions for the ‘re-enacting’ activity. It is precisely at this point that, in latching, Carol launches a pre-sequence: 10 (01) PBS story 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

T: Carol: ? T: Carol: T: Carol: T: LL: Carol: George: Carol:

T: Carol: T:

((lines omitted where T summarising meaning of reenact)) and they act out things like- historical events. ° what happened.°= =>yeah actually I don’t know i- I j’s-< ° I don’t know if I can comment.° >y"eah.< >yeah.< A:::::nd there’re some channel see eh i- it’s u:h the public channel television? mm hm? >I don’t remember< the:h the letters? P[BS? [PBS. PBS? PBS ( ) ((to G)) Yeah. they have som::e series, that they play i::n (.) I think all of them- no. Some of them were in England? and a::h so (0.2) one was a series a:: family, u:::h modern family like- (0.2) was today, the:y make us believe that they were living in a hundred. in uh- eighteen hundred for example. ((lines omitted)) wow so th"ey were re-enacti::ng [ °( )° [yeah yeah. they dre::ss exactly the way they di:d, Thank you for sharing ° that Carol.° Okay ((continues with task instruction))

In line 4, Carol’s turn starts with the appositional beginning ‘yeah’ that signals incipient speakership (Jefferson 1993). This ‘intent’ to speak is further specified by the word ‘actually’, which ‘mark[s] the introduction of touched-off material’ (Clift 2001, 286), indicating that her ensuing contribution is triggered by the discussion on ‘re-enact’. Carol’s main turn component in lines 4–5 is what Schegloff (1980) calls a ‘pre-pre’, which projects the upcoming action (‘comment’ in this case) and harbingers a multi-unit turn. Note also that Carol orients to her own initiative as an ‘intrusion’ by littering her pre-request with speech perturbations and hedges (e.g., two self-repairs, sotto voce, quick pace). The embedded question ‘I don’t know if I can comment’ (as opposed to ‘Can I comment?’) further distances Carol from the actual request. Finally, her intricately designed pre-request is receipted with the teacher’s enthusiastic go-ahead, followed by Carol’s extended telling of her PBS (Public Broadcasting Station) viewing experience. As can be seen, Carol has employed a highly sophisticated use of the presequence to launch her contribution to further illustrating a vocabulary item relevant to an ongoing classroom activity. In displaying her knowledge of ‘re-

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enact’, Carol also shifts her discourse identity from information receiver into that of information giver and makes relevant her ‘transportable identity’ as a well informed PBS viewer (Zimmerman 1998). Her move temporarily stalls the teacher’s agenda to move on but is embraced by the latter nevertheless. Thus, at the action level, Carol uses the pre-sequence initiation to display her knowledge as a PBS viewer, thereby contributing to the class’s understanding of ‘re-enact’. Learners can also begin a new sequence without the pre-expansion, requesting assistance with issues of pronunciation, vocabulary or grammar (data not shown here), but not all initiations done in this position involve language-related issues. The following segment begins with the teacher finishing writing the homework assignment on the board, after which Mindy launches her question that queries the presupposition of the assignment. Mindy’s initiative in fact leads to an extended discussion on the topic, which the teacher only plans to have after the students have completed their journals:

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(02) personality transformation 25 30 35 40 45 50 55

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T: Mindy: ? T:

((finishes writing the journal topic on BB: something along the lines of personality and speaking in L2)) You think that one’s personality can change when you talk in a different language? ((shrugs and palms out)) (0.2) I think mine does. (0.2) So if you disagree, then – then that’s >something you can write about.< (0.5)-((nods))

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Note that in the context of homework assignment where the students are asked to perform certain tasks, Mindy’s ‘social act’ of reversing the table and essentially asking the teacher to perform the same task is clearly not in keeping with her student identity (Ochs 1993). Even within the very brief snippet here, one can sense the teacher’s apparent reluctance to engage in the discussion. His actual response in line 8 is prefaced by the non-committal gestures in line 6 as well as the (0.2) second delay in line 7. He also withholds providing any account for his own affirmative response in the (0.2) second gap in line 9. Further, in lines 10–11, with the upshot-indicating ‘so’ (Raymond 2004), he treats Mindy’s question as an implicit disagreement and directs her to voice that disagreement in her journal as opposed to sharing it ‘now’. What we are witnessing here then is some emerging tension between learner interest and teacher agenda. Tensions such as this have been documented elsewhere as well. In Yoshida’s (2007) ethnographic study on a Japanese as a foreign language class in Australia, she found that the learner’s self-expressive speech (i.e., talk outside the IRF) is only positively evaluated by the teacher when it promotes his agenda and negatively evaluated when it involves joking, giving unique answers or arguing with the teacher. Learners can also take upon themselves to extend an existing sequence with a post-expansion. The following extract, which is a continuation of Segment (02)

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above, showcases two post-expansions done first in line 5 by Mindy and then in lines 11 and 13 by Daisy and Angie: (03) tell us 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

T:

Mindy: ? T: Daisy: ? T: Angie: ? T:

u:m (1.0) so, (0.5) I mean yeah everybody – everybody will have a different answer to this.° an’ so °I’ll- I’ll be curious to see °wh- what you say abo[ut- ° [maybe we didn’t reali:se ° th- ° (0.5) that before. (0.8) Well, maybe, maybe. It’s u:h I mean for- for m"e: ° well ° (0.2) [Tell us. ] [>I really wanna] talk about this on [Wednesday.quite funny because< ((continues))

A (1.0) second gap emerges after the teacher’s elicitation in lines 4–5. One might argue that since the teacher has asked a question and Daisy is answering that question in line 7, there is no initiative to be spoken of. However, insofar as the teacher has directed his question to ‘you guys’, the entire class is selected as the next speaker, and this creates a problem for the multiple incumbents of the category of ‘you guys’. Everyone is selected, but no individual is nominated. Ultimately, self-selection among the multiple incumbents is in order, and that takes initiative. In this particular case, Daisy steps in as the class representative. By providing a negative answer that calls the textbook joke ‘not funny’ to the teacher’s yes/no question that prefers a yes answer, she also asserts a critical voice vis a vis both the authority of the text and that of the teacher. Step in also occurs when one appropriates a slot entirely designed for another. In the following segment, the class is engaged in an activity of producing a timeline of great inventors, and Thomas Edison is the inventor of this segment:

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(05) make the story short 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Betty: Carol: ? Betty: Carol: T2: Carol: T2:

((to T1)) he was living in New York? Not n- [he:: he born in Ohio, e:::h and then, he= [((turns to Carol)) =moved to Michigan, and e::h he got a job as a::: yeah thank you but I want to make the story short? ah okay. Where was the first city that was lit by his bulb. light bulbs.

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Note that in line 2, Carol self-selects when the teacher is clearly being selected via Betty’s gaze. Carol’s cut-off at her turn-beginning may be done to secure Betty’s gaze (Goodwin 1979). As can be seen, Betty turns to Carol immediately

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after the cut-off. Moreover, Carol’s turn beginning ‘Not’ is specifically hearable as a response to Betty’s question although it is quickly abandoned for a more lengthy/ roundabout account. As soon as it becomes clear that Carol’s contribution would be more than minimal, the teacher intercepts to ensure that the activity progresses as planned. By answering on behalf of the teacher, Carol is momentarily shifting into the teacher identity. Moreover, by offering background information on the inventor, Carol also assumes certain expertise by displaying knowledge on the subject, thus taking on the role of an information giver traditionally associated with the teacher identity. This identity-stretching, however, is immediately curtailed by the teacher whose agenda is to follow a tight template of questions that call for short answers with regard to each inventor. Unlike Segment (03) above, where in post-expansions the students persisted and succeeded in pushing the teacher to share his personal experience, Carol here swiftly acquiesces to the teacher’s redirection (‘ah okay’.). Activate source (B2) Learners can also showcase their initiatives by offering responses where responses are not clearly called for. Schegloff’s (2007) discussion of retro-sequence is relevant here (217–219). Unlike adjacency pairs where the first pair-part projects the second, retro-sequences are ‘activated from their second position’ and invoke a ‘source/outcome’ relationship. Trouble source and its repair initiation, for example, would form a retro-sequence. In my data, these ‘activating’ responses are often done light-heartedly. In general, there seems to be an element of surprise in that these responses are not projected by the prior turn upon its completion. For example, in one class, a student jokingly responds to the teacher’s closing-implicative ‘Thank you very much’, which does not project any response, with ‘Any time’. The segment below occurs at the very beginning of the class when the teacher comments on the small number of students in the classroom:

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T: Jose: ?

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((passes out a handout; announces plan to review simple present)) Okay, (0.8) the:re’s only two of you. (0.3)-((Jose hands out head tilts with 1 slight shake and a smile)) No problem. Arrive in two minutes. (0.2) c"oming. °>the people’s< com[ing.° ["hm huhhhh it’s seven tw"enty. (0.2) I’m gonna need to start it. (syl syl) people we don’t know wh"en they’re going to be here. So< his major invention WA:::s? (0.2) (his) (0.8)

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Eddie: T:

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He was a par::t of a group who invented TV but they call him uh (guru) ( ) main person who [ °( )° [mm hm the person who created? the television that we all watch.

In line 7, Eddie goes beyond his assigned task (as done in lines 1–3) and begins a new sequence, volunteering extra information about Zworykin, which is treated by the teacher as potentially digressive as she in line 9 formulates the upshot of Eddie’s account with a so-prefaced elicitation (Raymond 2004) that highlights ‘his major invention’. As can be seen, Eddie’s attempt at displaying knowledge beyond what is asked for runs counter to the teacher’s agenda to stay focused on the pre-assigned elements of the ‘great inventor’ activity. This may remind one of Segment (04) earlier where Carol’s initiation to elaborate on Thomas Edison’s background was curtailed by a similar refocusing move from the teacher. Offer the unfitted (C2) Learners also utilise their speaking opportunities to make contributions that are unfitted to the turns thus assigned. One way of providing an unfitted response when called upon is to launch an insertion-sequence, as Jose does in the following segment. The class has been doing an activity where students take turns to draw pictures on the board as the rest of the class guesses the vocabulary item related to the picture. There are only three students in class on that particular day. In line 04, Jose is being asked to do the same activity the second time:

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(09) again 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

T: Jose: T: Jose: ? T: Jose: LL:

((S draws pix on bb based on word on card; others guess. Abby just finished, which completes the first round)) Okay, Jose:. (syl syl) (0.2) You can d"o it. Go ah"ea:[d. [again?= =Y"es. Ag"ai:n. [It’s only three of you.] [((smiles and gets up))] huh huh huh

Note that Jose is clearly selected by the teacher with a first pair-part that limits the legitimate respondents. Instead of complying with a response, however, Jose’s initiation transforms his discourse identity from a respondent to an initiator. Note that when selected to do X, one is most likely pigeon-holed into a second or responding position. Offer the unfitted presents a resource for subverting that discourse identity. In delaying his compliance with ‘again?’ followed by his smile and subsequent compliance in line 10, Jose also instils a tone of playfulness into a routine classroom activity. That Jose’s playfulness does succeed in transforming the classroom atmosphere is in part evidenced in the group laughter in line 11. Consider another example taken from an advanced class where pairs were asked to create ads and present them to the class. In line 2, in response to the teacher’s

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request to present their ad – i.e., reporting on what is being advertised – Steve offers instead a sequence-initiating assessment on the quality of the picture in their ad: (10) beer chicken

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T: Steve: ? LL: T:

Can you guys maybe stand up, and show the ad? This picture looks terrible. ((laugh)) Mm. very good. ((claps hands)) bee:r chicken. Nice picture. (0.8) ‘kay, anyone want to eat some beer chicken? (that’s in the ad?)

The ‘unfittedness’ of Steve’s response is in part evidenced in its ensuing laughter. There is an element of unexpectedness here similar to that in activating source, except that in doing the unfitted, no relationship between the current and the prior turn is activated or claimed. In sum, Type C learner initiative can accomplish actions such as displaying knowledge beyond what the teacher is asking for and creating a jocular learning atmosphere. These initiatives create learning opportunities again by pushing the boundaries of participation and by exploiting the use of humour, or more generally, language play, the value of which to language learning has been well documented (e.g., Bell 2005). Conclusion I have shown that learner initiative is not a straightforward concept. It cannot be narrowly defined as simple self-selection. Minimally, it can be understood by reference to two cross-cutting dimensions: turn-taking and sequence. A self-selected turn manifests initiative, and so does a sequence-initiating turn. Three types of learner initiatives were considered: (1) initiate a sequence (Type A); (2) volunteer a response (Type B); (3) exploit an assigned turn (Type C). Learners exercise initiatives in a variety of ways beyond the obvious – by stepping in on behalf of another, by responding when no responses are called for, and by using a given opportunity to do more than what is expected or the unexpected. They display great sophistication in making their voices heard within the constraints of the classroom. It is also important to note that these are broad initial categories that can be helpful in identifying examples of initiatives. The picture is certainly more complex. In addition, since the typology is developed from my particular data set, there is no doubt that it awaits revisions from future work in this area. When working on a typology such as this one, the temptation is to speculate on its distribution patterns. For example, is there any correlation between the type of initiatives and the pedagogical focus at the time? It is conceivable that frequencies and types of learner initiatives may vary by classroom context: ESL vs. EFL, communicative-focused vs. language-focused, etc. No categorical statements can be made at this point except for some very preliminary observations. While all three types involve knowledge display, Type A initiative tends to be more tightly tied to the main business of the classroom with its focus on seeking and pursuing understandings while Types B and C exhibit a greater tendency to laminate a conversational tone onto the institutional context of a classroom. Future research may yield further insights into these variations.

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As mentioned earlier, my discussion of how these initiatives constitute learning opportunities draws upon various theoretical assumptions of what promotes learning: participation, agency, symmetry, humour and language play. What these assumptions have in common is the great value placed on language use; that is, it is in language use, or more precisely, in the continuing expansion of language use, that language learning takes place. As shown in the above analysis, learner initiatives are done to joke, resist, redirect, plead, persuade, assert stances, display knowledge, seek and pursue understandings or import casual conversations into the classroom. In these specific instances of language use then, learners stretch the extent of their participation and gain access to various learning opportunities. By actively seeking and contributing to understandings of various issues, for example, they assert ownership of their own learning process. The importance of agency in language learning is highlighted in social cultural theory, where in exercising agency, learners ‘actively transform their world and do not merely conform to it’ (Donato 2000, 46). By pursuing understandings against the teacher’s agenda and by shifting into identities such as a PBS viewer, learner initiatives also succeed in achieving a sense of symmetry characteristic of the type of classroom interaction conducive to language learning (van Lier 1996). And by engaging in humour and language play, learner initiatives contribute to creating a jocular learning environment that facilitates participation and destabilises the interlanguage system (Bell 2005; Tarone 2000). Given the value of learner initiatives in structuring learning opportunities, the issue of how to facilitate learner participation is clearly relevant and pressing, and we know there is no simple answer to this as the tension between controlling order and facilitating participation is convincingly illustrated in Paoletti and Fele (2004). The above analysis can perhaps inspire some initial thoughts on how such facilitation may be accomplished. For example, understanding the initiative-potentials in a range of sequential environments may be a useful starting point for developing practices that nurture learner voices. Beyond that, becoming cognisant and appreciative of learner sophistication in exercising initiatives through, for example, responding when responses are not expected or exploiting an assigned opportunity would go a long way to enhancing teacher effectiveness in facilitating such initiatives. Two final observations are in order. First, what promotes interaction goes far beyond the ‘meaning negotiation’ that involves clarification requests, confirmation requests, and comprehension checks (Long 1983). Learners exercise initiatives to participate in a variety of activities, some of which are ostensibly language-learning (e.g., questions about vocabulary and grammar), and some are engagements with language use that ultimately drive language learning. Second, although some learner initiatives forward the teacher’s agenda, some clearly do not. Learner initiatives can in fact incur visible tensions as the teacher attempts to pull the learner back on track, so to speak. How to strike a delicate balance between advancing teacher agendas and promoting learner participation then becomes a crucial pedagogical puzzle for the practising teacher. In short, understanding the intricacies of learner initiatives can contribute to our continuing efforts to unlock the ‘black box’ of learning, thereby greatly enhance the pedagogical knowledge of language teachers. Notes on contributor Hansun Zhang Waring is assistant professor of Linguistics and Education at Teachers College, Columbia University, where she teachers conversation analysis, advanced

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conversation analysis, and discourse analysis. Her work has appeared in journals such as Research on Language and Social Interaction, Journal of Pragmatics, Text and Talk, Discourse Studies, Applied Linguistics, Language Learning, and The Modern Language Journal. She is the author (with Jean Wong) of Conversation analysis and second language pedagogy (Routledge, 2010).

References Allwright, D. 2005. From teaching points to learning opportunities and beyond. TESOL Quarterly 39, no. 1: 9–32. Bell, N.D. 2005. Exploring language play as an aid to SLL: a case study of humor in NSNNS interaction. Applied Linguistics 26, no. 2: 192–218. Boulima, J. 1999. Negotiated interaction in target language classroom discourse. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Brouwer, C.E., and J. Wagner. 2004. Developmental issues in second language conversation. Journal of Applied Linguistics 1, no. 1: 29–47. Clift, R. 2001. Meaning in interaction: The case of ‘actually’. Language 77, no. 2: 245–91. Donato, Richard. 2000. Sociocultural contributions to understanding the foreign and second language classroom. In Sociocultural theory and second language learning, ed. J.P. Lantolf, 27–50. New York: Oxford University Press. Ellis, Rod. 1998. Discourse control and the acquisition-rich classroom. In Learners and language learning, ed. W. Renandya and G. Jacobs, 145–71. Singapore: RELC. Firth, A., and J. Wagner. 1997. On discourse, communication, and (some) fundamental concepts in SLA research. Modern Language Journal 81: 285–300. Firth, A., and J. Wagner. 2007. Second/foreign language learning as a social accomplishment: Elaborations on a reconceptualized SLA. The Modern Language Journal 91: 800–19. Ford, Celia E., B. Fox, and S.A. Thompson. 2002. Constituency and the grammar of turn increments. In The language of turn and sequence, ed. Cecilia E. Ford, Barbara A. Fox, and Sandra A. Thompson, 14–38. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Frazier, S. 2007. Tellings of remembrances ‘touched off’ by student reports in group work in undergraduate writing classes. Applied Linguistics 28: 189–210. Gardner, Rod, and J. Wagner, eds. 2004. Second language conversations. London: Continuum. Goodwin, Charles. 1979. The interactive construction of a sentence in natural conversation. In Everyday language: Studies in ethnomethodology, ed. G. Psathaas, 97–121. New York: Irvington. Goodwin, M.H. 2007. Occasioned knowledge exploration in family interaction. Discourse and Society 18, no. 1: 93–110. Hall, J.K., and M. Walsh. 2002. Teacher-learner interaction and language learning. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics 22: 186–203. He, A.W. 2000. The grammatical and interactional organization of teacher’s directives: implications for socialization of Chinese American children. Linguistics and Education 11, no. 2: 119–40. He, A.W. 2004. CA for SLA: arguments from the Chinese language classroom. The Modern Language Journal 88, no. 4: 568–82. Hellermann, J. 2006. Classroom interactive practices for developing L2 literacy: a microethnographic study of two beginning adult learners of English. Applied Linguistics 27, no. 3: 377–404. Hellermann, John. 2008. Social actions for classroom language learning. Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters. Jacknick, Christine. 2009. A conversation analytic account of student-initiated participation in an ESL classroom. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Teachers College, Columbia University. Jefferson, G. 1983. Notes on some orderliness of overlap onset. Tilburg, Netherlands: Tilburg papers in language and literature no. 28. Jefferson, G. 1993. Caveat speaker: preliminary notes on recipient topic-shift implicature. Research on Language and Social Interaction 26: 1–30. Kasper, G. 2004. Participant orientations in German conversation-for-learning. The Modern Language Journal 88, no. 4: 551–67.

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Kasper, G. 2006. Beyond repair: Conversation analysis as an approach to SLA. AILA Review 19: 83–99. Kasper, Gabriel. 2008. Discourse and socially shared cognition In Encyclopedia of language and education. 2nd ed. Vol. 6, Knowledge about language, ed. Cenoz and N.H. Hornbberger, 59–77. Springer Science+Business Media LLC. Lee, Y-A. 2006. Respecifying display questions: interactional resources for language teaching. TESOL Quarterly 40, no. 4: 691–713. Lerner, G.H. 2003. Selecting next speaker: the context-sensitive operation of a context-free organization. Language in Society 32, no. 2: 177–201. Long, M. 1983. Native speaker/non-native speaker conversation and the negotiation of comprehensible input. Applied Linguistics 4, no. 2: 126–41. Markee, N.P. 2008. Toward a learning behavior tracking methodology for CA-for-SLA. Applied Linguistics 29: 404–27. Mori, J. 2002. Task design, plan, and development of talk-in-interaction: an analysis of a small group activity in a Japanese language classroom. Applied Linguistics 23, no. 3: 323–47. Mori, J. 2004. Negotiating sequential boundaries and learning opportunities: a case from a Japanese language classroom. The Modern Language Journal 88, no. 4: 536–50. Mori, Junko., and J. Zuengler. 2008. Conversation analysis and talk-in-interaction in the classroom. In Encyclopedia of language and education, 2nd edition. Vol. 3, Discourse and education, ed. M. Martin-Jones, A.M. de Mejia and N.H. Hornberger, 15–26. New York: Springer. Mortensen, K. 2009. Establishing recipiency in pre-beginning position in the second language classroom. Discourse Processes 46, no. 5: 491–515. Ochs, E. 1993. Constructing social identity: a language socialization perspective. Research on Language and Social Interaction 26, no. 3: 287–306. Orletti, Franca. 1981. Classroom verbal interaction: a conversational analysis. In Possibilities and limitations of pragmatics, ed. H. Parret, M. Sbisà and J. Verschueren, 531–49. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Paoletti, I., and G. Fele. 2004. Order and disorder in the classroom. Pragmatics 14, no. 1: 69–85. Pavlenko, Aneta, and J.P. Lantolf. 2000. Second language learning as participation and the (re)construction of selves. In Sociocultural theory and second language learning, ed. James P. Lantolf, 155–77. New York: Oxford University Press. Pomerantz, Anita. 1984. Agreeing and disagreeing with assessments: some features of preferred/dispreferred turn shapes. In Structures of social action, ed. M. Akinson and J. Heritage, 57–101. New York: Cambridge University Press. Raymond, G. 2004. Prompting action: The stand-alone ‘so’ in ordinary conversation. Research on Language and Social Interaction 37, no. 2: 185–218. Richards, K. 2006. Being the teacher: identity and classroom conversation. Applied Linguistics 27, no. 1: 51–77. Richards, Keith, and P. Seedhouse, eds. 2004. Applying conversation analysis. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Sacks, H., E.A. Schegloff, and G. Jefferson. 1974. A simplest systematics for the organization of turn-taking in conversation. Language 50: 696–735. Sahlstrom, J.F. 2002. The interactional organization of hand raising in classroom interaction. Journal of Classroom Interaction 37, no. 2: 47–57. Schegloff, E.A. 1980. Preliminaries to preliminaries: ‘Can I ask you a question?’ Sociological Inquiry 50, no. 3–4: 104–52. Schegloff, E.A. 2007. Sequence organization in interaction: Vol. 1, A primer in conversation analysis, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Seedhouse, P. 1996. Classroom interaction: possibilities and impossibilities. ELT Journal 50, no. 1: 16–24. Sfard, A. 1998. On two metaphors for learning and the dangers of choosing just one. Educational Researcher 27, no. 2: 4–13. Sinclair, John M., and M. Coulthard. 1975. Towards an analysis of discourse: The English used by teachers and pupils. London: Oxford University Press. Tarone, Elaine. 2000. Getting serious about language play: language play, interlanguage variation and second language acquisition. In Social and cognitive factors in second

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language acquisition: Selected proceedings of the 1999 Second Language Research Forum, ed. B. Swierzbin, F. Morris, M.E. Anderson, C. Klee and E. Tarone, 31–54. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press. ten Have, Paul. 2007. Doing conversation analysis. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. van Lier, Leo. 1988. The classroom and the language learner. London: Longman. van Lier, Leo. 1996. Interaction in the language curriculum. London: Longman Group Limited. van Lier, Leo. 2008. Agency in the classroom. In Sociocultural theory and the teaching of second languages, ed. J. Lantolf and M. Poehner, 163–86. London: Equinox. Walsh, S. 2002. Construction or obstruction: teacher talk and learner involvement in the EFL classroom. Language Teaching Research 6, no. 1: 3–23. Walsh, S. 2006. Investigating classroom discourse. New York: Routledge. Waring, H.Z. 2008. Using explicit positive assessment in the language classroom: IRF, feedback, and learning opportunities. The Modern Language Journal 92 no. 4: 577–94. Waring, H.Z. 2009. Moving out of IRF: A single case analysis. Language Learning 59, no. 4: 796–824. Wells, G. 1993. Reevaluating the IRF sequence: A proposal for the articulation of theories of activity and discourse for the analysis of teaching and learning in the classroom. Linguistics and Education 5: 1–37. Yoshida, R. 2007. Perceptions of a learner’s self-expressive speech by an instructor and the learner. Foreign Language Annals 40, no. 4: 622–34. Young, R.F., and E.R. Miller. 2004. Learning as changing participation: discourse roles in ESL writing conferences. The Modern Language Journal 88, no. 4: 519–35. Zimmerman, Don. 1998. Discourse identities and social identities. In Identities in talk, ed. C. Antaki and S. Widdicombe, 27–106. London: Sage.

Appendix: transcription notations 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85

(.) underline CAPS " . ? , : = ? [] °soft° >< ( ) (syll) (words) .hhh $words$ (( )) {(( ))words.} T L LL BB:

untimed perceptible pause within a turn stress very emphatic stress high pitch on word sentence-final falling intonation yes/no question rising intonation phrase-final intonation (more to come) a glottal stop, or abrupt cutting off of sound lengthened vowel sound (extra colons indicate greater lengthening) latch highlights point of analysis overlapped talk spoken softly/decreased volume increased speed (empty parenthesis) transcription impossible count of unclear syllables uncertain transcription inbreath spoken in a smiley voice comments on background, skipped talk or nonverbal behavior { } marks the beginning and ending of the simultaneous (indicated by the dash) occurrence of the verbal/silence and nonverbal; the absence of { } means that the simultaneous occurrence applies to the entire turn. teacher (T1 and T2 when the class is co-taught) unidentified learner multiple learners blackboard