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Scaffolding in teacher-student interaction: exploring, measuring, promoting and evaluatingscaffolding

van de Pol, J.E.

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Citation for published version (APA):van de Pol, J. E. (2012). Scaffolding in teacher-student interaction: exploring, measuring, promoting andevaluating scaffolding.

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Download date: 04 May 2020

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Scaffolding in small-group work: an intervention study

SCAFFOLDING IN SMALL-GROUP WORK: AN INTERVENTION STUDY

PHASE 3: PROMOTING

SCAFFOLDING CHAPTER 6

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SCAFFOLDING IN SMALL-GROUP WORK: AN INTERVENTION STUDY12

AbstractAdapting support contingently to students’ needs by diagnosing students’ existing understanding first – i.e., scaffolding – is considered a crucial aspect of excellent teaching. However, performing diagnostic strategies and using the information in subsequent support is found to be difficult and rare in classroom practice. Therefore, the aim of the current experimental classroom study was to investigate whether and how a model of contingent teaching (consisting of the following steps: using diagnostic strategies, checking the diagnosis, giving contingent support and checking students’ learning) promoted teachers scaffolding behaviour. Seventeen teachers participated in an intervention programme based on the model of contingent teaching whereas thirteen teachers did serve as a control group. All teachers (prevocational education, social studies) taught the same five-lesson project on the European Union and their development of the quantity and quality of the steps of contingent teaching was investigated. Not so much the quantity but the quality of the steps of contingent teaching appeared to increase while working with the model of contingent teaching; this included contingent support. The model of contingent teaching proved to be a powerful tool in promoting teachers’ scaffolding behaviour and can therefore fulfil an important role in future scaffolding research as well as in future teacher education.

12 This chapter is based on: Van de Pol, J., Volman, M., Oort, F., & Beishuizen, J. (resubmitted). Teacher scaffolding in small-group work: An intervention study.

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INTRODUCTION

Scaffolding or adaptive support is recognised as a distinct feature of excellent teaching (Borko, Mayfield, Marion, Flexer, & Cumbro, 1997; Seidel & Shavelson, 2007; Wittwer & Renkl, 2008). Ausubel recognised this more than four decades ago: “If I had to reduce all of educational psychology to just one principle, I would say this: The most important single factor influencing learning is what the learner already knows. Ascertain this and teach him accordingly” (Ausubel, 1968, p. vi). Scaffolding is found to be an effective way of helping learners (Mattanah, Pratt, Cowan & Cowan, 2005; Pino-Pasternak, Whitebread & Tolmie, 2010; Pratt, Green, McVicar, & Bountrogianni, 1992). In addition, the metaphor of scaffolding attracts both teachers and researchers because of the powerful nature of the metaphor: it appeals to the imagination (Mercer & Littleton, 2007; Saban, Kocbeker, & Saban, 2007).

However, because scaffolding is not just any support but support that is temporary, tailored to students’ needs and aimed at transferring responsibility, performing it is rather challenging. Several studies have found that – when adhering to this definition of the concept – scaffolding in classroom practice is scarce (Elbers, Hajer, Jonkers, & Koole, 2008; Lockhorst, Wubbels, & van Oers, 2010). Especially first diagnosing students’ understanding and then using that information in order to tailor the support is difficult, particularly when more than one student is involved such as in supporting small groups of students (Elbers, et al., 2008; Nathan & Petrosino, 2001; Van de Pol, Volman, & Beishuizen, 2011; Webb, Nemer, & Ing, 2006; Wittwer, Nückles, & Renkl, 2010).

Therefore, finding ways to promote teachers’ scaffolding skills is vital. However, to our knowledge, few studies have investigated how scaffolding can be stimulated. We conducted an experimental study involving 30 teachers to investigate the effects of a professional development programme (PDP) aimed at promoting scaffolding. The model of contingent teaching – in which diagnosing students’ understanding before giving support stands central – (Van de Pol, Volman, & Beishuizen, 2012) formed the basis of this programme. The goal of the current study was to investigate how teachers – who worked with the model of contingent teaching – differed in their ways of teaching compared to teachers who did not work with the model. The research question of this study was: What are the effects of a PDP based on the model of contingent teaching on teachers’ scaffolding behaviour?

The Concept of Scaffolding

The concept of scaffolding is related to Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory and

Scaffolding in small-group work: An intervention study

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especially to Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development or ZPD (1978). The ZPD describes the difference between what a learner can do alone (actual level of performance) and what a learner can do with support (potential level of performance). The concept of scaffolding was coined in 1976 by Wood, Bruner, and Ross and was used to describe support that a tutor could give to a tutee to succeed at a task that he or she could otherwise not perform (Wood et al., 1976, p. 90). Scaffolding can thus be seen as support that helps learners reaching a potential level of performance.

Scaffolding can be characterised by three main features: (1) adaptivity or contingency, (2) fading of support over time, and (3) transfer of responsibility for a task or for learning to the student (Van de Pol, Volman, & Beishuizen, 2010). Contingency refers to adapting support to a student’s needs (e.g., Wood, Wood, & Middleton, 1978). In addition, support needs to be faded over time in order to transfer the responsibility for learning or for a task to the learner. To be able to be adaptive, estimating or diagnosing a student’s current understanding first before giving support is crucial (e.g., Snow & Swanson, 1992; Wittwer & Renkl, 2008).

Diagnosing Students’ Understanding

Diagnosing students’ understanding is inheritably connected to the concept of scaffolding (Pea, 2004; Puntambekar & Hübscher, 2005). To be able to tailor support to students’ understanding, this students’ understanding should be explored first, for example by asking questions (Wittwer & Renkl, 2008). Asking diagnostic questions appears important as teachers’ more general estimates of learners’ understanding often appear inaccurate (e.g., Begeny, Krouse, Brown, & Mann, 2011; Chi, Siler, & Jeong, 2004). Teachers often do not first diagnose students’ understanding before providing support (Elbers et al., 2008; Lockhorst et al., 2010; Nathan & Petrosino, 2001; Van de Pol et al., 2011; Webb et al., 2006; Wittwer et al., 2010). Reasons for lack of using diagnostic questions are, amongst others, (1) deficient diagnostic skills, (2) using more general information about the students (e.g., “this student is a bad reader” or “this students cannot concentrate well”), (3) helping directly is an automatic reaction, and (4) time constraints (Elbers et al., 2008; Morrison & Lederman, 2003; Wittwer et al., 2010).

And if teachers diagnose students’ understanding, using this information while giving support also appeared to be difficult (Ruiz-Primo & Furtak, 2007). Moreover, the few diagnostic questions that are being asked are mostly of low quality, i.e., questions that elicit claims of understanding (e.g., “I get it”) only (Wittwer et al., 2010) or low-level factual recall questions (Chin, 2007; Morrison & Lederman, 2003; Roth, 1996). More open diagnostic questions that elicit demonstrations (e.g., students’ explanations) and questions that elicit more than just factual recall (i.e., focus on conceptual understanding)

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will give teachers more detailed information about the students’ understanding and provoke deeper reasoning and could therefore be considered of higher quality. These types of questions are known to be related to higher students’ achievements (Barnes, 1975; Redfield & Rousseau, 1981; Ryan, 1973). Promoting the use of diagnostic strategies and especially high quality diagnostic strategies is thus crucial. However, little is known about how to promote teachers’ diagnostic skills; the few available studies on fostering diagnostic strategies are conducted in (peer) tutoring contexts (e.g., King, Staffieri, & Adelgais, 1998; Roscoe & Chi, 2007), not in classroom contexts.

Creating Common Understanding

Before giving support, creating common understanding is an important aspect of the scaffolding process. To prevent misconceptions of the students’ current understanding, a teacher can actually check whether his or her understanding of the students’ understanding is correct; i.e., checking the diagnosis. The purpose here is not to support students, but to check one’s own understanding of the students’ understanding; checking the diagnosis is thus different from what many researchers (Yifat, & Zadunaisky-Ehrlich, 2008) call revoicing or recasting for which the main goal is giving feedback.

Creating common understanding is for example stressed in a teaching method that is closely linked to scaffolding; the Socratic Dialogue (Heckman, 1981). In a Socratic Dialogue, students’ learning is guided and directed by a facilitator using certain ground rules of communication. One import ground rule is using a check on whether the student’s meaning is understood correctly (Knežiç, 2011). Knežiç (2011) is one of few who investigated the effects of a Socratic Dialogue intervention on – amongst other things – the use of this checking step. Her experimental study showed that teachers who participated in the PDP increased their use of this step significantly more than the teachers who did not participate in this programme. The overall use, however, in both conditions stayed considerably low. Increasing the use of this check thus seems possible, but still progressions could be made as this is an important step in the scaffolding process. In addition, no attention has been paid to the quality of this step yet.

Contingent Support

When information on the students’ understanding is collected and checked, a teacher can proceed with giving support that is using and/or adapted to the diagnostic information that is gathered; i.e., giving contingent support.


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Contingency is recognised as a crucial characteristic of effective support, also in the context of small-group work (Blatchford, Baines, Rubie-Davies, Bassett, & Chowne, 2006; Chiu, 2004; Webb, 2009) and it is pointed out as a crucial predictor of the success of support given (Mattannah et al., 2005; Pino-Pasternak et al., 2010; Pratt et al., 1992). Contingency is considered as a necessary condition for scaffolding; if fading or transfer of responsibility takes place in a noncontingent way, we cannot speak of scaffolding. Therefore, we focus in this study on the aspect of contingency. Contingency is defined as the adaptation of a teacher’s support to students’ responses. Note that the definition of contingency does not include any notion of the effects or effectiveness of contingent support on students’ understanding. We distinguish between two interrelated types of contingency: (1) the tailoring of the degree of control that is exercised in support to the students’ understanding; contingency-control, and (2) the degree to which the teacher reacts to and uses (i.e., takes up) what students say; contingency-uptake.

Wood and his colleagues elaborated the concept of scaffolding by emphasising that the support (in terms of degree of control) needed to be tailored to the understanding of the students, in order for the students to reach a deeper level of understanding (e.g., Wood et al., 1978). Help with a high degree of control was for example modelling the answer whereas help with a low degree of control was for example a general verbal encouragement. Scaffolding does not represent just any support, but support that is tailored; the level of control exercised in the support given should be increased when a learner fails and decreased when the learner succeeds (Wood & Middleton, 1975). This principle was called the contingent shift principle and it is highly related to the other key characteristics of scaffolding, namely fading and transfer of responsibility (cf. Wood, 1991). That is, following the learners’ successful progression, the tutor fades the degree of control which gives the learner more responsibility.

Another type of contingency is contingency-uptake. Adapting support to students’ responses can also be done by acknowledging and using what the students have said during the conversation; i.e., uptake (e.g., Nystrand, Wu, Gamoran, Zeiser, & Long, 2003; Wells, 2010). If uptake takes place the student influences the course of the conversation and he/she makes a contribution to that conversation. It means that the teacher has to listen carefully to what students say in order to be able to incorporate this into the ongoing conversation; the teacher’s response is depending on and tailored to the students’ responses (Nystrand et al., 2003).

Tutors (in one-to-one situations) seem to be able to give contingent support – if they receive information on students’ understanding (Wittwer & Renkl, 2008). However, Ruiz-Primo and Furtak (2007) found that teachers in classroom situations had difficulties using the diagnostic information; the teachers in their study did gather information on students’ understanding, but found it difficult to use in their support. In a classroom

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situation, using the information gathered thus seems more difficult and this calls for finding out ways of promoting this important skill. However, how to stimulate teachers’ degree of contingency is not clear yet.

Checking Students’ Learning

A final step in the scaffolding process is that of checking students’ learning. This is different from the initial phase of diagnosing students’ understanding in that it no longer focuses on students’ initial understanding but on students’ new understanding or learning as it developed in the course of the conversation. Checking students’ learning is also different from creating common understanding in that it focuses on the students’ understanding, not the teacher’s understanding of the students’ understanding. Checking students’ learning is mainly performed by asking questions, preferably those questions that elicit a demonstration (e.g., a students’ explanation or elaboration), rather than only a claim of understanding (e.g., “I get it!”) (Koole, 2010; Sacks, 1992). Only if a demonstration is given, the teacher can determine how a student understood the new subject-matter and whether he or she can transfer the responsibility back to the student. In addition, it appeared that students often have difficulty in gauging their own understanding and often overestimate this (Freund & Kasten, 2012). Therefore performing such a check while eliciting demonstrations is a vital part of scaffolding. However, when using this check in classroom practice, teachers appear to mainly elicit short and simple answers (Kao, Carkin, & Hsu, 2011), as opposed to demonstrations. Finding ways to promote this skill – as a part of scaffolding behaviour – thus seems important.

The Model of Contingent Teaching

A model that integrates the four aforementioned crucial aspects of the scaffolding process are summarised in the model of contingent teaching (Van de Pol et al., 2011; based on Ruiz-Primo & Furtak, 2007) (Figure 1).


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Figure 1. Model of contingent teaching

This model contributes to the current conceptualisations of scaffolding as it provides a concrete step-by-step operationalisation of the theoretical concept of scaffolding. Following the modelling of contingent teaching, teachers should first diagnose students’ current or actual understanding by for example asking diagnostic questions or reading the work of the students. Second, teachers can check their diagnosis with the student, to increase common understanding. Third, the teacher can then support the student contingently, using the gathered information. Finally, the teacher can check the students’ new (potential) understanding or the students’ learning. Examples of each step can be found in the results section in Excerpt 1 and Excerpt 2. This model of contingent teaching stood central in the PDP that was used in the current study to promote teachers’ scaffolding behaviour. Emphasis on gathering diagnostic information and checking the diagnosis is assumed to facilitate contingent support (e.g., Chiu, 2004). Applying these steps in a high quality manner can be seen as scaffolding.

The Current Study

In the current study, we investigated the extent to which the model of contingent teaching promoted teachers’ scaffolding or provision of contingent support. The model of contingent teaching can be seen as the curriculum for the participating teachers in order to learn how to scaffold. The PDP itself was informed by knowledge from recent reviews on factors that enhance the effectiveness of PDPs (Darling-Hammond & Bransford, 2005; Loucks-Horsley & Matsumoto, 1999; Timperley, 2007; Van Veen, Zwart, & Meirink, 2012). The programme was designed using the following features: (a) learner centred (i.e., focus on and connect to the learners’ (i.e., teachers’) prior knowledge); (b) knowledge centred (i.e., teachers need to have opportunities to develop well-organised bodies of knowledge, e.g., by using a central conceptual framework); (c)

3. Intervention strategies

Student’s response

4. Checking student’s learning


1. Diagnostic strategies


2. Checking the diagnosis


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assessment centred (opportunities for reflection, feedback, & revision); (d) immersion (engaging with the actual learning materials); (e) integration of knowledge and practice; (f) collaborative work, e.g., with externals such as scientists or researchers; and (g) use of various vehicles (e.g., workshops, coaching etc.). The PDP was developed in a small-scaled, exploratory study (Van de Pol et al., 2012).

The subject area of focus in the current study is that of social studies. This subject area is a largely untouched area of study; scaffolding research has mostly focused on students’ developing literacy (Van de Pol, et al., 2010). However, scaffolding may also be a useful teaching approach in social studies, as students have difficulties in understanding and using substantive concepts13 in this domain (e.g., Kneppers, Elshout-Mohr, van Boxtel, & van Hout-Wolters, 2007; Limon, 2002; Van Drie & van Boxtel, 2008). Van Drie and van Boxtel (2003) showed that students find understanding and using substantive concepts difficult because of their abstract and theoretical nature. Studies focusing on students’ understanding of substantive concepts showed that generally this knowledge is rather meagre and limited (Van Drie & van Boxtel, 2008). As scaffolding is expected to be an effective way of supporting students, this teaching method is expected to support students in this problematic area of social studies.

In the current study, we investigated to what extent and in what ways the model of contingent teaching promoted teachers’ supporting behaviour in social studies lessons. The study had an experimental design; about half of the teachers participated in the PDP on scaffolding (scaffolding condition) whereas about half of them did not (nonscaffolding condition). All teachers were prevocational social studies teachers who taught the same five-lesson project on the EU in year 8 (age 12-14). For diagnostic strategies (step 1), checking the diagnosis (step 2), and checking students’ learning (step 4), we had relatively similar hypotheses. These steps are crucial parts of the scaffolding process and are hypothesised to stimulate and facilitate contingent support (step 3). Because these steps stood central in the PDP, we expected firstly that the quantity of these steps would increase (hypotheses 1a, 2a, and 4a).

Secondly, we expected that the quality of these steps would increase in terms of the focus of the steps: a focus on conceptual understanding is considered of higher quality than a focus on facts and we therefore expected a shift towards a focus on conceptual understanding in the scaffolding condition (hypotheses 1b, 2b, and 4b).

Thirdly, we expected that the quality of step 1 (diagnostic strategies) and step 4 (checking students’ learning) would increase in terms of the mode that is elicited: a more extensive mode of expression (i.e., demonstrations) is considered of higher quality as it provides the teacher with more information on the students’ understanding

13 Substantive concepts refer to “historical phenomena, structures, persons, and periods” (Van Drie & Van Boxtel, 2008). Examples are democracy, internal market, and export.


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and it forces the student to elaborate his or her understanding compared to for example a claim of understanding (e.g., “I get it”). Therefore, we expected that the teachers’ elicitations would shift more towards the elicitation of demonstrations in the scaffolding condition compared to the nonscaffolding condition (hypothesis 1c and 4c). We did not have this expectation for step 2 (checking students’ learning): it is in the nature of this step that most of the times quite a short answer will be elicited (e.g., “Am I correct that you understand internal market as the marketplace on Saturday?”).

With regard to step 3 (intervention strategies), we had different hypotheses. The quantity of this step is not the problem; it’s the quality that is often too low (Chiu, 2004). Therefore, we focused on the quality of this step in terms of contingency. As hypothesised by others (e.g., Chiu, 2004; Webb, 2009), diagnosing students’ understanding will facilitate teachers to tailor their support to the students’ understanding because they have more information about the students’ understanding. Therefore, working with the model of contingent teaching – with an emphasis on diagnostic strategies – is hypothesised to enhance teachers’ contingency. Teachers have more information to: (1) decide what level of control is needed (i.e., contingency-control) and (2) use and refer to when giving support (i.e., contingency-uptake).

With regard to contingency-control we hypothesised that the teachers who worked with the model of contingent teaching (i.e., scaffolding condition) show a greater increase in their control adaptation than teachers who did not work with the model (nonscaffolding condition) (hypothesis 3a; control). With regard to contingency-uptake, we hypothesised that the teachers who worked with the model of contingent teaching (i.e., scaffolding condition) show a greater increase in uptake than teachers who did not work with the model (nonscaffolding condition) (hypothesis 3b; uptake).

METHODS

Participants

Thirty teachers from 20 schools participated in this study; 17 teachers (of 11 schools) in the scaffolding condition and 13 teachers (of 9 schools; always between 1 and 3 teachers per school) in the nonscaffolding condition. Nine schools were for prevocational education only; eleven schools were also for higher levels of education. The schools were spread over the Netherlands. Of the participating teachers, 20 were men, 10 were women. The teachers taught social studies in the 8th grade of prevocational education. The average teaching experience of the teachers was 10 years. Each teacher participated with one class, so a total of 30 classes participated.

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The mean class size was 27 students and the lessons lasted 53 minutes on average. During the project lessons that all teachers taught during the experiment, students worked in small groups. The total number of groups was 184 and the average number of students per group was 4.15. A total of 768 students participated in this study, 455 students in the scaffolding condition and 313 students in the nonscaffolding condition. The students all were between 12 and 15 years old: the average age was 13.7. Of the 768 students, 385 were boys and 383 were girls.

The conditions appeared to be comparable in terms of type of school (prevocational education only or more types of education), years of experience teacher, gender teacher, the teachers’ knowledge of the subject-matter14, the extent to which the class and the teacher were used to group work15, the track of the class16, class size, and duration of the lesson: t-tests for independent samples showed nonsignificant results.

Procedures

For this experimental study, we used a between-subjects design. We recruited teachers by sending out a call both directly to schools and to several Dutch online-community newsletters. The information in the call was limited, so that the teachers would not know the exact purpose of the study. The teachers were informed that the study encompassed conducting a five-lesson project on the EU that would be provided by the researchers and that the study focused on students’ learning in small groups. The teachers that showed interest in the study were contacted and visited to discuss participation. The teachers were consecutively allocated to the conditions according to the order of the visits: all teachers of the first school that was visited were allocated to the scaffolding condition; all teachers of the second school that was visited were allocated to the nonscaffolding condition and so forth. The experiment took place between September 2009 and March 2010. In each term, about six teachers (three of the scaffolding condition and three of the nonscaffolding condition) taught the project lessons. All teachers were fully informed on the purpose and the outcomes after the study.

14 Teachers’ knowledge was measured with a test that consisted of 17 multiple choice questions (each with four possible answers). The test was intended to cover the subject matter of the five project lesson (cf. Van de Pol, Volman, Oort, & Beishuizen, submitted).15 For the degree to which the teacher and the class were used to group work, teachers could indicate on a five point likert scale ranging from never to always, to what degree they made use of group work with the participating class.16 Within Dutch prevocational education, several tracks exist. These tracks are of increasing difficulty. Most classes (95%) were of the higher tracks (combined or theoretical track).


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Project lessons

All teachers taught the same project on the European Union (EU). This project consisted of five lessons in which the students made several assignments in groups of four (e.g., a poster, a letter about advantages and disadvantages of the EU etc.). Normally, one project lesson was given per week. The project was piloted in a previous study of the authors (Van de Pol et al., 2012). Groups were composed by the teacher and consisted of boys and girls and of students with different performance levels. Only the first and last lessons of the project were used for analyses (respectively premeasurement and postmeasurement). In the first lesson, the students made a brochure about what the EU means for children and young people in their everyday lives, while using important concepts related to the EU. In the last lesson, the students worked on an assignment called Which Word Out (Leat, 1998). Three related concepts had to be chosen from a list of concepts on the EU and thereafter, one concept had to be left out using two arguments. Both tasks can be considered open-ended discussion tasks because reasoning was important, not so much the right answer. The students were stimulated to collaborate by the nature of the tasks (e.g., the students needed each other in order to finish the task) and by rules for collaboration that were introduced in all classes (such as encourage each other to participate, make sure everybody understands it, ask each other first for help before you ask the teacher, etc.). After the premeasurement, all teachers (of both conditions) participated in a meeting in which the project lessons were discussed and prepared.

Scaffolding programme

The scaffolding PDP was developed and piloted in the year previous to this experimental study (cf. Van de Pol et al., 2012). The PDP consisted of a theoretical session of two hours and four lesson opportunities for successively implementing the steps of contingent teaching including video-reflections of 45 minutes with the first author. Before the start of the PDP, the first author videotaped the first project lesson of each teacher which served both as a premeasurement and as footage for the theoretical session.

The scaffolding PDP was carried out by the first author who was experienced at teaching this programme. All sessions took place at the teachers’ schools. The reflection sessions took place individually (teacher + 1st author) and always on the same day as the observation of the project lesson. In the first project lesson, we asked the teachers to teach as they would normally do. In the theoretical session, the first author and the teachers: (a) discussed theory of scaffolding and the steps of contingent teaching, (b)

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watched and analysed video examples of scaffolding, and (c) discussed and prepared the project lessons. In the subsequent four project lessons, the teachers implemented the steps of contingent teaching cumulatively; they started with a focus on step 1 (diagnostic strategies) only in project lesson 2, and a focus on step 1 and 2 (check of the diagnosis) in project lesson 3. In project lesson 4, the teachers focused on step 1, 2 and 3 (intervention strategies) and in the last project lesson, the teachers focused on all four steps of the model of contingent teaching (including step 4 which is checking students’ learning). In the corresponding reflection sessions, several fragments were viewed and discussed in terms of the step(s) of focus for that lesson and in terms of scaffolding.

Measures

Lesson observations

All interactions that a teacher had with a small group of students about the subject-matter (in the premeasurement and postmeasurement) were selected for analyses and were called interaction fragments. In most cases an interaction fragment started when the teacher approached a group and ended when the teacher left.

A random selection of two interaction fragments on the subject-matter of the first project lesson and two interaction fragments on the subject-matter of the last project lesson per teacher was used for analyses and these interaction fragments were transcribed. A criterion for the selection of an interaction fragment was, that the teacher helped the students (using step 3 of the model of contingent teaching). One teacher (in the nonscaffolding condition) did not have any interaction fragments on the subject matter at all in the postmeasurement. Therefore, interaction fragments of the remaining 29 teachers were used. The total number of selected interaction fragments was 10817 consisting of 4073 turns.

Steps of contingent teaching

Each teacher turn in the selected interaction fragments was coded as a diagnostic strategy when the teacher used it “to discover the level of the student’s ability to perform without assistance” (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988, p. 59). We defined step 2 (checking the

17 If a teacher did not have more than 1 interaction fragment on the subject-matter within the lesson, only one interaction fragment was used. Four fragments in total were missing in the scaffolding condition (2 in the premeasurement, 1 in the postmeasurement) and four fragments in total were missing in the nonscaffolding condition (2 in the premeasurement, 2 in the post-measurement


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diagnosis) as a teacher’s verification of whether he/she has understood the student correctly and coded turns according to this definition. We coded a turn as intervention strategy (step 3) when it contained a strategy used to support the student. A step 4 turn was one in which the teacher attempted to discover a student’s understanding of a concept or theme on which he or she had already received assistance in the interaction fragment (cf. Van de Pol, Volman, Elbers, & Beishuizen, 2012). Examples of step 1, 3, and 4 can be found in Excerpt 1. An example of a turn that would be coded as step 2 is: “so if I understand you correctly, you think that an internal market is about the market on Saturday?”. All turns that could not be coded as step 1, 2, 3, or 4, were coded as no step. Ten percent of the data was coded independently by two observers. With a Krippendorff’s Alpha of .74, the interrater reliability for the steps of contingent teaching was considered acceptable (Krippendorff, 2004). For the quantity hypotheses, percentages for each step per teacher and per measurement occasion (relative to all teacher turns that were coded as no step’or as one of the four steps of contingent teaching) were used in the analyses.

The quality of teacher turns was further specified in two ways. First, the mode that was elicited with the turn was determined for those turns that were coded as step 1 (diagnostic strategies), step 2 (checking the diagnosis), and step 4 (checking students’ learning). A turn could elicit: (1) a claim of (not-) understanding (e.g., “Do you get it?”), or (2) a demonstration (e.g., “Can you explain why the EU was grounded?”). Turns that did not elicit an answer, were coded as no elicitation. To establish interrater reliability, 10% of the data was coded independently by two coders. With a Krippendorff’s Alpha of .77, the interrater reliability for the level of cognitive complexity was considered acceptable (Krippendorff, 2004). The percentage of turns per step coded as demonstration relative to the total amount of turns coded as the step of interest (per teacher and per measurement occasion) was used for the analyses. For example for step 1, we calculated the percentage turns (of only those turns coded as step 1) that were coded as demonstration

Second, the focus of the turn was determined for all teacher turns that were coded as step 1 (diagnostic strategy), step 2 (checking the diagnosis) or step 4 (checking students’ learning). The focus was factual, conceptual, or noncontent (partly based on Krathwohl, 2002). A turn was coded as eliciting factual knowledge when it focused on basic elements that students must know to be acquainted with a discipline such as knowledge of terminology and knowledge of specific details and elements (e.g., “What does internal market mean?”). A turn was coded as eliciting conceptual knowledge when it focused on the interrelationships among the basic elements within a larger structure such as knowledge of classifications and categories (e.g., “To what extent are the European Union and the European Coal and Steel Community similar and

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different?”). A turn was coded as noncontent when no answer was elicited at all (e.g., when an explanation was given) or when the turn was about the working process (e.g., task order) or about off-task issues (e.g., organisational issues).

To establish interrater reliability, 10% of the data was coded independently by two coders. With a Krippendorff’s Alpha of .86, the interrater reliability for the focus was considered substantial (Krippendorff, 2004). The percentage of turns per step coded as a focus on conceptual understanding relative to the total amount of turns coded as the step of interest (per teacher and per measurement occasion) was used for the analyses. For example for step 1, we calculated the percentage turns (of only those turns coded as step 1) that were coded as focus-conceptual.

Contingency-control

The contingency-control type of contingency was established by using the contingency framework (see Van de Pol et al., 2012; based on Wood et al., 1978). The basis of this framework is relating the degree of control exercised in a teacher support turn to the degree of control in the subsequent teacher support turn while taking into account the students’ understanding. The unit of analyses was therefore a teacher turn – a student turn – the subsequent teacher turn (= a three-turn sequence). As we are interested in the contingency of the teachers’ support, at least one of the turns of a three-turn sequence needed to be a turn that was coded as step 3 (intervention strategy). So either both teacher turns of a three-turn sequence were support-turns or the first or the last teacher turn of a three-turn sequence was a support turn and the other turn was a diagnostic strategy (step 1) or a check of students’ learning (step 4). Coded examples can be found in Excerpt 1 and Excerpt 2. For the analysis of contingency, three variables needed to be coded: the degree of control a teacher exercised in his or her support, the students’ understanding and the students’ mode of expression.

First, all teacher turns that belonged to a three-turn sequence were coded in terms of the degree of control that the teacher exercised ranging from 0 to 5 where 0 represented no control (e.g., when the teacher was not with a group of students) and five represented high control (e.g., giving an explanation) (see Appendix L). To establish the interrater reliability, over five percent of all interaction fragments was coded independently by two coders. With a Krippendorff’s Alpha of .87, the interrater reliability for degree of control was considered substantial (Krippendorff, 2004).

Second, all students’ turns that were part of a three-turn sequence were coded with regard to the degree of understanding. The students’ understanding was coded into one of the following categories following Nathan and Kim (2009) and Pino-Pasternak et al. (2010): not on content, no understanding can be determined, poor/no


172

Chapter 6

understanding, partial understanding, and good understanding (see Appendix M). Over five percent of the data was coded by two coders to establish the interrater reliability for students’ understanding. With a Krippendorff’s Alpha of .70, the interrater reliability was considered acceptable (Krippendorff, 2004).

Third, all students’ turns that were part of a three-turn sequence were coded with regard to the mode of expression using two categories: claim of understanding (e.g., “I get it”), a demonstration of understanding (e.g., a student explanation). This distinction was made because only demonstrations give teachers enough information to act contingently upon. Over five percent of all interaction fragments was coded independently by two coders to establish the interrater reliability for students’ mode of expression. With a Krippendorff’s Alpha of .74, the interrater reliability was considered acceptable (Krippendorff, 2004). Finally, the rules of the contingency framework were applied to each of the three-turn sequence turns of the interaction fragments (see Appendix H). Percentages of contingent three-turn sequences relative to the total amount of three-turn sequences (contingent and noncontingent) per teacher and per measurement occasion were used in the analyses.

Contingency-uptake

The contingency-uptake type of contingency was established by coding all teacher turns that had been coded as intervention strategy (i.e., step 3) into either uptake or no uptake. Based on the coding schemes of Wells (2010) and Nystrand et al. (2003) for uptake, we coded a teacher support-turn as uptake if the teacher connects to what the students have said within that interaction fragment. This could be done for example by asking for an elaboration or explanation of what the student just had said (a follow-up question) or by using a student’s response in an explanation. In any case, an uptake-turn elaborates on what a student has said or elicits a student’s elaboration of what he or she has said. As opposed to Wells and Nystrand et al., an explicit acknowledgement of what the student has said (e.g., “interesting”, or “brilliant”) was not needed for a turn to be coded as uptake. Elaborating on or asking for an elaboration was considered as an acknowledgement in itself. A teacher support-turn was coded as no uptake when the teacher did not connect to what students had said within that interaction fragment. Examples of no uptake are cases in which the teacher only acknowledged a student’s contribution (e.g., “interesting” or by only repeating a student’s response), or only gave an evaluation (e.g., “good”). Ten percent of all interaction fragments was coded independently by two coders to establish the interrater reliability for contingency-uptake. With a Krippendorff’s Alpha of .90, the interrater reliability was considered substantial (Krippendorff, 2004). Percentages of the number of turns coded as uptake relative to

173

the total number of support turns coded as uptake or no-uptake (per teacher and per measurement occasion) were used in the analyses.

RESULTS

The number of interaction fragments on the subject matter and other interactions can be found in Table 1.

Table 1Number of Interaction Fragments on the Subject-matter and Other Interactions

Interaction fragments on the subject-matter

Other interactions (e.g., on collaboration, organisation, procedures etc.)

Total pre measurement

Total post measurement

Pre Post Pre PostScaffolding condition 92 131 362 120 454 251Nonscaffolding condition 91 81 277 214 368 295

Total 183 212 639 334 822 546

The total number of interaction fragments decreased in both conditions from premeasurement to postmeasurement; presumably because the students had gotten used to the project and needed less help. Furthermore, the interactions on the subject-matter increased in the scaffolding condition, whereas no such increase was observed in the nonscaffolding condition. This is probably related to the fact that teachers in the scaffolding condition were encouraged to focus on contingency on a content level. Overall, students in both conditions received about the same amount of help in the postmeasurement condition, however, with a different focus.

We will first provide two interaction fragments; a scaffolding example and a nonscaffolding example. After that, the hypotheses for each of the steps of contingent teaching will be tested and the scaffolding and nonscaffolding examples will be used to illustrate the different phases of the scaffolding process.

Scaffolding Example

In Excerpt 1, the scaffolding process is nicely illustrated in the facets of: (1) the steps of contingent teaching, (2) contingency-control, and (3) contingency-uptake. The excerpt stems from the postmeasurement of a teacher in the scaffolding condition. When the teacher arrived at this group, the students had been working on a series of


174

Chapter 6

Exce

rpt 1

– S

caffo

ldin

g ex

ampl

e

Step

Focus

Mode elicited

Control

Understanding

Student mode

Cont. control

Cont. uptake

1St

uden

t 1: (

rais

es h

and)

2Te

ache

r: al

right

, I’m

goi

ng to

list

en. W

hat i

s th

e st

ate

of a

ffairs

? 1

02

3S1

: thi

s4

T: th

is, e

xpla

in1

02

5S1

: wel

l, w

e ha

ve th

ese

(poi

nts)

. And

we’

ve d

one

thes

e (p

oint

s)6

T: y

es0

7S1

: we

have

that

one

and

that

one

and

we’

ve d

one

that

one

(poi

nts)

8T:

yes

, tha

t and

that

and

that

, yes

?1

22

9S1

: EEC

, EC

SC a

nd th

e EU

10T:

yes

011

S1: a

nd th

en w

e sa

id th

at th

e EU

can

be

left

out

12T:

yes

013

S1: b

ecau

se th

e EE

C a

nd th

e EC

SC a

re a

com

mun

ity14

T: y

es0

15S1

: and

the

EU is

n’t,

it do

esn’

t say

so

in th

e lis

t of c

once

pts

16T:

alri

ght

0

17S1

: and

we

also

thou

ght (

read

s fro

m o

wn

wor

k) “b

ecau

se th

e EE

C a

nd E

CSC

has

rela

tions

to

mor

e ot

her c

ount

ries

than

the

EU”

18T:

oka

y. It

is a

n in

tere

stin

g co

mbi

natio

n. F

irst,

you

have

to e

xpla

in w

hy th

ey a

re re

late

d, o

kay?

C

an y

ou a

lread

y do

that

? Be

caus

e no

w y

ou a

re w

orki

ng o

n [th

e ne

xt s

tep]

12

2

19S2

: it’s

all

in th

e EU

20T:

oka

y an

d w

hat?

12

21

175

21S3

: it a

ll st

arts

with

an

E1

11

22S1

: no!

It a

ll st

arts

with

an

E (im

itate

s st

uden

t 3 w

ith a

funn

y vo

ice)

23T:

yes

, wha

t. It

all b

egin

s w

ith a

n E.

that

is tr

ue, t

hat’s

wha

t the

y ha

ve in

com

mon

. Tha

t E th

at’s

in th

ere,

cou

ld y

ou a

lso

expl

ain

to m

e w

heth

er th

at is

alw

ays

equa

lly la

rge

in a

ll th

ose

thre

e co

ncep

ts?

32

22

1

24S3

: ***

Eur

opea

n U

nion

is b

igge

r ***

*25

T: o

nce

agai

n ve

ry c

lear

ly s

o ev

eryb

ody

can

hear

it0

26S3

: with

this

one

, tha

t’s a

bout

the

Euro

pean

com

mun

ity o

f coa

ls a

nd s

teel

so

that

one

is m

ore

abou

t coa

ls a

nd s

teel

21

1

27T:

yes

, yes

, oka

y (s

tarts

cou

ntin

g ex

plic

itly

with

his

fing

ers)

028

S3: a

nd w

ith th

e EE

C, t

he E

urop

ean

Econ

omic

Com

mun

ity, t

hat o

ne is

abo

ut e

cono

mic

s2

11

29T:

yes

030

S3: a

nd th

e Eu

rope

an U

nion

is m

ore

abou

t Eur

ope,

so

21

131

S2: a

bout

law

s an

d st

uff

21

1

32T:

oka

y. So

they

all

have

an

E, if

I un

ders

tand

you

cor

rect

ly, th

ey h

ave

an E

, and

stu

dent

3 n

ow

disc

over

ed, w

ith a

hin

t of m

ine

that

ther

e is

a d

iffer

ence

bet

wee

n th

ose

thre

e be

caus

e sh

e sa

ys

on th

e on

e ha

nd it

’s ab

out,

whe

re w

as it

abo

ut?

(look

s at

stu

dent

2)

42

21

33S2

: eh

34S1

: coa

ls a

nd s

teel

21

135

T: c

oals

and

ste

el3

10

30

36S2

: eco

nom

ics

11

037

S1: E

urop

e an

d ec

onom

ics

11

0

38T:

oka

y, so

that

’s a

diffe

renc

e, ri

ght?

So

wha

t is

the

com

mon

ality

, afte

r thi

s st

ory,

in th

ose

thre

e co

ncep

ts?

Is th

at re

ally

that

E?

Or i

s th

ere

som

ethi

ng e

lse?

3

22

11

39S1

: But

act

ually

, if y

ou th

ink

abou

t it l

ike

that

, Eur

ope

then

, it h

as to

do

with

Eur

ope

and

not w

ith

coal

s an

d st

eel a

nd th

en o

ne th

inks

that

tran

spor

ts m

aybe

thos

e pr

oduc

ts to

the

peop

le w

ho a

re

with

the

EU. S

o ab

out E

urop

e, s

tuff

01

1


176

Chapter 6

Step

Focus

Mode elicited

Control

Understanding

Student mode

Cont. control

Cont. uptake

40

T: Y

es, b

ut th

at’s

getti

ng q

uite

com

plic

ated

with

tran

spor

t and

stu

ff. I

thin

k yo

u ha

ve a

nic

e se

ries

of c

once

pts,

thos

e th

ree.

But

now

we

will

thin

k ab

out w

hat y

ou’re

goi

ng to

writ

e do

wn

ther

e to

geth

er. F

irst,

we

have

to th

ink

abou

t why

they

go

toge

ther

and

you

r firs

t poi

nt w

as (r

eads

from

th

e st

uden

ts’ w

ork)

“the

EU

can

be

left

out b

ecau

se th

e ot

hers

are

a c

omm

unity

”. Is

n’t t

he E

U a

co

mm

unity

?

31

23

1

41S:

it’s

a un

ion

01

1

42T:

a u

nion

. Oka

y. So

you

exp

erie

nce

the

EU d

iffer

ent t

han

a co

mm

unity

. Wha

t is

a un

ion

in y

our

unde

rsta

ndin

g?

31

22

1

43S2

: I d

on’t

know

00

144

T: a

nd y

ou (s

tude

nt 4

), w

hat i

s a

unio

n?

31

22

145

S4: I

don

’t kn

ow0

01

46T:

you

don

’t kn

ow. S

tude

nt 3

, a u

nion

?3

12

21

47S3

: a c

lub

or s

omet

hing

? 2

11

48T:

a c

lub,

yes

, tha

t is

a ni

ce o

ne, d

on’t

you

thin

k? U

nion

-clu

b, c

lub-

unio

n3

10

30

49S1

: but

then

that

is a

ctua

lly a

lso

a co

mm

unity

!2

11

50T:

her

e, w

hat d

id s

tude

nt 1

say

? W

hat c

ould

thus

be

a re

ason

why

you

’ve

put t

hem

all

toge

ther

? Be

caus

e th

ey a

re a

ll3

22

4

51S1

: com

mun

ities

21

152

T: w

ell,

stud

ent 4

, is

that

con

clus

ion

corre

ct?

42

23

53S3

: (no

ds)

54T:

can

you

exp

lain

it to

me

then

, in

your

ow

n w

ords

42

55S3

: yes

, I d

on’t

know

56T:

wel

l, gi

ve it

a g

o, w

hat d

id s

he s

ay?

Som

ethi

ng n

ew th

at m

akes

you

thin

k ho

w it

all

fits

toge

ther

42

177

57S4

: (lo

ng p

ause

)58

T: w

hy d

o yo

u re

ad th

at d

iffer

ently

now

, tha

t firs

t rea

son?

4

259

S2: b

ecau

se w

e no

w k

now

that

they

are

all

com

mun

ities

60T:

yes

, and

now

stu

dent

4 o

nce

agai

n. W

hat i

s no

w th

e co

mm

onal

ity?

Why

do

they

go

toge

ther

? 4

22

161

S4: e

h, b

ecau

se th

ey, e

h, a

bout

the

Euro

pean

, are

abo

ut E

urop

e or

som

ethi

ng?

62T:

I ju

st h

eard

a w

ord

that

you

’ve

used

in y

our fi

rst r

easo

n, d

o yo

u re

mem

ber t

hat w

ord?

3

21

31

63S4

: yes

20

164

T: o

kay,

so n

ow y

ou tr

y to

exp

lain

why

they

go

toge

ther

and

you

use

that

wor

d4

22

165

S4: b

ecau

se th

ey a

re a

ll co

mm

uniti

es66

T: a

nd w

hat d

oes

that

mea

n th

en?

42

67S4

: I d

on’t

know

68T:

wel

l, ex

plai

n4

269

S1: i

t’s a

gro

up70

T: a

gro

up a

nd w

hat d

o th

ey d

o to

geth

er?

Wha

t do

you

do to

geth

er?

32

23

171

S4: d

elib

erat

e0

10

72T:

del

iber

ate

and

32

23

073

S1: c

omm

unic

ate

01

074

T: c

omm

unic

ate,

sup

er. W

hat e

lse?

Wha

t els

e ar

e yo

u do

ing?

3

22

30

75S2

: tal

king

01

176

S1: d

iscu

ssin

g0

11

77T:

talk

ing,

dis

cuss

ing

and

coll…

.3

22

40

78S4

: col

labo

ratin

g2

11

79T:

righ

t, st

uden

t 4 s

aw it

com

ing.

So

that

mig

ht b

e th

e ch

arac

teris

tic o

f a c

omm

unity

, yes

. So

wha

t cou

ld it

then

be?

A re

ason

to le

ave

one

out o

r?

42

23

1

80S3

: eh

81S1

: to

put t

hem

toge

ther

21

1


178

Chapter 6

Step

Focus

Mode elicited

Control

Understanding

Student mode

Cont. control

Cont. uptake

82T:

So

stud

ent 1

and

I sa

y th

at it

mig

ht b

e a

reas

on to

put

them

toge

ther

. Bec

ause

they

are

all

com

mun

ities

. Alri

ght?

Do

we

have

a p

oint

? Pe

rfect

sta

rting

poi

nt. N

ow w

e kn

ow w

hy th

ey g

o to

geth

er. H

ave

a lo

ok a

t you

r rea

son

then

. 3

20

1

Step

: 1=

diag

nost

ic s

trate

gy, 2

= c

heck

ing

the

diag

nosi

s, 3

= in

terv

entio

n st

rate

gy, 4

= c

heck

ing

stud

ents

’ lear

ning

; Foc

us: 0

= n

onco

nten

t, 1

= co

nten

t fac

tual

, 2

= co

nten

t con

cept

ual;

Mod

e el

icite

d: 0

= n

o el

icita

tion,

1 =

cla

im, 2

= d

emon

stra

tion;

Deg

ree

of c

ontr

ol: 0

= n

o co

ntro

l, 1

= lo

wes

t lev

el, 2

= lo

w, 3

= m

ediu

m,

4 =

high

, 5 =

hig

hest

; Stu

dent

und

erst

andi

ng: X

= n

o un

ders

tand

ing

can

be d

eter

min

ed, 0

= p

oor/n

o un

ders

tand

ing,

1 =

par

tial u

nder

stan

ding

, 2 =

goo

d un

ders

tand

ing;

Stu

dent

mod

e: 0

= c

laim

, 1 =

dem

onst

ratio

n; C

ontin

genc

y-co

ntro

l: 0

= no

t con

tinge

nt, 1

= c

ontin

gent

; Con

tinge

ncy-

upta

ke: 0

= n

o up

take

, 1

= up

take

179

concepts, i.e., European Economic Community (EEC), the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), and the European Union (EU). The assignment was to choose three related concepts and then leave out the concept that is least related to the others and give two reasons for leaving that concept out. In this interaction, the students mainly deepened their understanding of the concept of community.

Although it did take a while, the teacher encouraged the students to think very actively and he made sure he himself learned about the students’ understanding. He took the students seriously and gave them room to explain their own thoughts and understanding. Eliciting demonstrations seemed to facilitate the teacher to act contingently on what the students said; after having elicited these demonstrations he was able to adapt the degree of control to the students’ understanding while taking up the students thoughts and ideas. The different phases of the scaffolding process will be elaborated upon more when testing the hypotheses.

Nonscaffolding Example

The following example is an example of nonscaffolding support, stemming from the postmeasurement of a teacher in the nonscaffolding condition (Excerpt 2). The students came up with the series: European Parliament, European Committee and European Council of Ministers.

This interaction fragment is typical for the interactions the teachers in the nonscaffolding conditions had with their students in that: (a) the interaction was relatively short, and (b) the teacher did not explore the students’ current understanding and therefore did not create the opportunity for acting contingently. In addition, no explicit concept development of a particular concept takes place in this interaction. In the following, we will test the hypotheses per step with regard to its quantity and quality, while elaborating on the scaffolding and nonscaffolding example.

Diagnostic Strategies (Step 1)

To test all our hypotheses, repeated measures ANOVAs were used with condition as between variable, measurement occasion as within variable and the percentages per variable of interest as dependent variable. To test the hypotheses, the interaction effect between condition and measurement occasion was inspected.

Hypothesis 1a (teachers in the scaffolding condition increase the amount of diagnostic strategies (step 1) more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could not be confirmed. The interaction effect between condition and measurement occasion


180

Chapter 6

Exce

rpt 2

– N

onsc

affo

ldin

g ex

ampl

e

Step

Focus

Mode elicit

Control

Understanding

Student mode

Cont. control

Cont. uptake

1T:

(hea

rs th

e st

uden

ts ta

lk) v

ery

good

, whi

ch o

ne d

o yo

u ha

ve?

12

22

S2: w

e ha

ve3

T: w

hich

one

do

you

have

? 1

22

4S2

: we

don’

t kno

w w

hich

con

cept

to le

ave

out

5S1

: no,

that

isn’

t so

diffi

cult

6T:

(rea

ds th

e w

ork

of th

e st

uden

ts) T

hat’s

a g

ood

one.

You

sho

uld

also

hav

e a

look

at w

here

they

ar

e se

ated

32

04

0

7S3

: oka

yX

8S1

: o, i

n Br

usse

ls!

01

0

9T:

But

you

hav

e a

clev

er o

ne b

ecau

se it

’s al

so in

the

corre

ctio

n bo

ok. S

o yo

u re

ally

gav

e it

a th

ough

t3

20

30

10S:

yes

X0

011

T: a

nd th

ese

are

of c

ours

e al

l ins

titut

ions

that

hav

e to

do

with

the

EU o

kay?

The

y re

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take

.


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was not significant (F(1,27) = 2.56, p = .12; see Table 2). Although the teachers in the scaffolding condition showed a greater increase in the use of diagnostic strategies compared to the teachers in the nonscaffolding condition, the difference in this increase was not significant. Table 2Means and Standard Deviations for Quantity and Quality of Diagnostic Strategies (Step 1)

Diagnostic strategies (Step 1)Nonscaffolding condition

(N=12)Scaffolding condition

(N=17)Pre Post Pre PostM SD M SD M SD M SD

Quantity .11 .08 .16 .10 .13 .10 .25 .09

Qua

lity

Fo

cus Non content .38 .39 .59 .34 .17 .27 .28 .20

Content Factual .10 .25 .04 .10 .15 .34 .13 .15Content Conceptual .44 .35 .36 .33 .44 .45 .59 .23

Qua

lity

Mod

e El

icite

d No elicitation .14 .18 .29 .37 .07 .25 .05 .07Claim .00 .00 .18 .36 .03 .08 .04 .05Demonstration* .78 .31 .53 .41 .67 .45 .92 .07

*p < 0.05

Hypothesis 1b (teachers in the scaffolding condition increase the amount of diagnostic strategies (step 1) aimed at students’ conceptual understanding more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could not be confirmed. The interaction effect between condition and measurement occasion was not significant (F(1,27) = 1.6 , p = .22; Table 2). The teachers in the scaffolding condition did increase their focus on students’ conceptual understanding when using step 1 whereas the teachers in the nonscaffolding condition did not show an increase when using this step. However, this effect was not significant.

Hypothesis 1c (teachers in the scaffolding condition increase the amount of diagnostic strategies (step 1) with which demonstrations are elicited more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could be confirmed (F(1,27) = 9.78, p = .00). The effect size can be considered medium; partial eta squared was .27 (Cohen, 1992). The teachers in the scaffolding condition thus increased the elicitation of demonstrations while using diagnostic strategies (step 1) whereas the teachers in the nonscaffolding condition showed a slight decrease in elicitations of demonstrations when using this step (Table 2). When performing step 1, teachers in the nonscaffolding condition moved more towards the elicitation of claims.

183

No significant interaction-effects were found for diagnostic strategies (step 1) coded as noncontent, content-factual, no elicitation or claim

Scaffolding example (line 1-22)

In the first part of Excerpt 1 (line 1-22), the teacher uses many diagnostic strategies. In most cases, the teacher focuses on the students’ conceptual understanding, i.e., relations between concepts. Furthermore, the teacher elicits mainly demonstrations when using this step. The quantity and quality of the diagnostic strategies can be considered high in this example.

What we (and the teacher) discover here is that the students found a series of concepts that are in principle related. However, they did not seem to understand what a community is, as they contend that a union (EU) is something different than a community (EEC and ECCS). Then, the teacher takes a step back and asks them whether they can explain what the three concepts have in common (line 18). Student 3 makes a seemingly superficial remark in line 21, that all concepts start with an E. However, this E of course represents something (i.e., European) and the teacher takes the comment seriously; he takes it up and tries to take a next step together with the student while using and building on that remark (line 23). So starting with the students’ conceptual understanding, the teacher discovers here that their factual understanding of the concepts is not sufficient yet.

Nonscaffolding example (line 1 – 6)

In the first part, the teacher does ask some diagnostic questions. However, these questions provide her with little information on the students’ actual understanding. She does elicit (short) demonstrations but the students do not explain their understanding and the teacher does not persist in making the students’ understanding explicit. All she finds out is what the students have written down, namely the three concepts. We (and the teacher) do not know whether and how the students understand the three concepts of European Parliament, European Committee and European Council of Ministers, which are quite complicated concepts.

Checking the diagnosis (Step 2)

Hypothesis 2a (teachers in the scaffolding condition increase the amount of checks of the diagnosis (step 2) more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could be confirmed: there was a significant interaction effect of condition and measurement


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occasion the use of checking the diagnosis (step 2; F(1,27) = 4.30, p = .048). The effect size can be considered small; partial eta squared was .14 (Cohen, 1992). The frequency of the use of checks of the diagnosis (step 2) increased more in the scaffolding condition from premeasurement to postmeasurement than in the nonscaffolding condition (Table 3).

Table 3Means and Standard Deviations for Quantity and Quality of Checking the Diagnosis (Step 2)

Checking the diagnosis (Step 2)Nonscaffolding condition



Quantity* .01 .02 .02 .04 .00 .01 .05 .06

Qua

lity

Fo

cus Non content .08 .29 .08 .29 .00 .00 .14 .33


*p < 0.05

Hypothesis 2b (teachers in the scaffolding condition increase the amount of checks of diagnosis (step 2) aimed at students’ conceptual understanding more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could not be confirmed. The interaction effect between condition and measurement occasion was not significant (F(1,27) = 3.0 , p = .10; Table 3). The teachers in the scaffolding condition did increase their focus on students’ conceptual understanding when using step 2 more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition. However, the difference in increase was not significant.

No significant interaction-effects were found for checks of diagnoses (step 2) coded as noncontent, content-factual, no elicitation or claim.

Scaffolding and nonscaffolding examples

In both examples, the teachers do not check their diagnosis. In the scaffolding example, the teacher could have checked his diagnosis in the transition between the diagnostic phase and providing support. The teacher’s question in line 23 –coded as step 4 (checking students’ learning) – for example does contain an element of checking the diagnosis in the part where he says: “So they all have an E, if I understand you correctly, they have an E, and student 3 now discovered, with a hint of mine that there is a difference between those three because she says on the one hand”. However, this

185

turn is not coded as a check of the diagnosis (step 2) because the teacher does not give the students the opportunity to give a reaction (which is a prerequisite of this step). In the nonscaffolding example, we do not see opportunities for checks of the diagnosis simply because the teacher did not use any diagnostic strategies.

Contingent Support (Step 3)

Hypothesis 3a (teachers in the scaffolding condition show a greater increase in their control adaptation than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could be confirmed (F(1,27) = 16.95, p = .00). The effect size can be considered large; partial eta squared was .39 (Cohen, 1992). The teachers in the scaffolding condition thus became more contingent with regard to adapting their degree of control to the students’ understanding than the teachers in the nonscaffolding condition, who stayed about the same (Table 4).

Table 4Mean Percentages of Contingent Interaction Fragments

Nonscaffolding condition (N=12)

Scaffolding condition (N=17)

Pre Post Pre PostM SD M SD M SD M SD

Contingency Control* .42 .22 .45 .15 .43 .26 .87 .08Contingency Uptake* .29 .24 .20 .16 .31 .27 .52 .20

*p < 0.05

Furthermore, hypothesis 3b (teachers in the scaffolding condition show a greater increase in uptake than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could also be confirmed (F(1,27) = 7.78, p = .01). The effect size can be considered medium; partial eta squared was .22 (Cohen, 1992). The teachers in the scaffolding condition increased their use of uptake more when supporting students compared to teachers in the nonscaffolding condition who showed a slight decrease (Table 4).

Scaffolding example (line 23-51)

In the first part of the support phase (line 23-38), we can see that the teacher refers back to the comment of the students about the E. In addition, he starts taking up their new thought that is explained by student 3 in lines 26-30. We could say that the teacher was contingent here as he acknowledged the students’ remark and – more importantly – built on that to take the students a step further. This action is not only contingent with


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regard to uptake, but also with regard to the adaptation of the degree of control. The teacher’s question in line 18 (part 1 of the first three-turn sequence) is an open ended, low control question. The student’s answer (“they all start with an E”; second part of the first three-turn sequence) is coded as partially correct as the answer is not wrong, but it’s also not the answer the teacher is satisfied with and/or aiming for. The teacher’s question in line 23 (third part of the first three-turn sequence) is somewhat more closed than the question in line 18, but still quite open ended. Since the teacher increased his degree of control in reaction to the students’ partial understanding, this three-turn sequence is considered contingent.

The teacher and the students discuss the differences between the three concepts and with that they deepen their understanding of the three concepts. The teacher takes up this new knowledge in line 32 by asking another student to repeat what has been said. In line 36, he takes up both thoughts of the students (about the ‘E’ and about the differences between the concepts), weaves that together and asks again what the concepts have in common. He uses what the students had come up with, but he also steers the students as their understanding is not deep enough yet. In this phase, the teacher and the students deepen the understanding of the concept of community together. In line 40, the teacher explicitly asks them whether a Union is not the same as a community and as it appears that they think it is something different, the teacher really explores the students’ understanding of a community and a union. In line 49, student 1 makes a next step in understanding the concept while listening to the conversation. We can see here that the understanding of the concept of community has progressed.

With regard to contingency-control and contingency-uptake, we can see that teacher is acting quite contingent. In the second bit of this support phase (line 38-51), the teacher steers a bit more as the students are not getting there and he helps the students discover that a union is the same as a community.

Nonscaffolding example (line 9-21)

In this interaction, the teacher uses quite a high level of control in general, elicits only one demonstration but focuses mainly on the conceptual understanding. The teacher tries to draw attention to some aspects of the concepts, that is: (1) the location of each institution, (2) each institution’s task, and (3) the composition of each institution. Especially the last aspect contains a very important concept or idea central to the theme of the EU, namely that of democracy. However, these three aspects and the additional aspect of democracy are only shortly touched upon by the teacher and not further elaborated, questioned or discussed.

In most cases, the teacher acts noncontingently – both when looking at how she

187

adapts the degree of control and when looking at uptake. It seems that mainly because she does not elicit demonstrations of students’ understanding, she has little information that she can use to decide how to adapt her level of control. In addition, as hardly any demonstration occurs, this does not give her the opportunity to take up students’ responses and build on them.

Checking Students’ Learning (step 4)

Hypothesis 4a (teachers in the scaffolding condition increase the amount of checks of students’ learning (step 4) more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could not be confirmed. The interaction effect between condition and measurement occasion was not significant (F(1,27) = 1.27 , p = .27; Table 5). The teachers in the scaffolding condition did show a small increase in their use of this step whereas the teachers in the nonscaffolding condition did not; however, this difference was not significant.

Table 5Means and Standard Deviations for Quantity and Quality of Checking Students’ learning (Step 4)

Diagnostic students’ learning (Step 4)Nonscaffolding condition



Quantity .03 .04 .02 .04 .03 .05 .06 .07

Qua

lity-

Fo

cus Non content .33 .49 .23 .43 .17 .34 .26 .40


Qua

lity

Mod

e El

icite

d No elicitation .02 .07 .00 .00 .00 .00 .00 .00Claim .00 .00 .18 .36 .03 .08 .04 .05Demonstration* .08 .29 .00 .00 .06 .17 .41 .45

*p < 0.05

Hypothesis 4b (teachers in the scaffolding condition increase the amount of checks of students’ learning (step 4) aimed at students’ conceptual understanding more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could not be confirmed. The interaction effect between condition and measurement occasion was not significant (F(1,27) = 1.4 , p = .24; Table 5). The teachers in the scaffolding condition did increase their focus on students’ conceptual understanding when using step 4 more than teachers in the


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nonscaffolding condition. However, the difference in increase was not significant. Hypothesis 4c (Teachers in the scaffolding condition increase the amount of

checks of students’ learning (step 4) with which demonstrations are elicited more than teachers in the nonscaffolding condition) could be confirmed. (F(1,27) = 7.46, p = .01). The effect size can be considered medium; partial eta squared was .22 (Cohen, 1992). The teachers in the scaffolding condition thus increasingly elicited demonstrations while using the step of checking students’ learning (step 4) whereas the teachers in the nonscaffolding condition showed a slight decrease in elicitations of demonstrations when using this step (Table 5).

No significant interaction-effects were found for checks of student learning (step 4) coded as noncontent, content-factual, no elicitation or claim.

Scaffolding example (line 52 – 82)

In the scaffolding example, the teacher uses the step of checking students’ learning (step 4) relatively often. In most cases, the teacher focuses on the students’ conceptual understanding, i.e., relations between concepts. Furthermore, the teacher mostly elicits students’ demonstrations; the teacher makes sure the students extensively demonstrate their understanding and he involves several students in the interaction. In line 54 for example, we can see that the teacher does not accept the claim of understanding that was given in line 53; he elicits a demonstration of student 3 on the understanding of the concept of community. In this case, we can see that that was a fruitful strategy since it appears that student 3 (and student 4) still struggle with the concept. Therefore, towards the end, the teacher gives some more support as to make clear what exactly a community is. This part is quite noncontingent as he does not take up student’s answers (he does not elicit demonstrations) and he uses too little control compared to the students’ understanding. Overall, however, the quantity and quality of the checks of students’ learning can be considered high in this example.

Nonscaffolding example (line 15)

In the nonscaffolding example, the teacher uses a check of the students’ learning once, in line 15. With this question (“but the reason why they go together is clear right?”), she elicits a claim of understanding, not a demonstration. In addition, the students do not respond to that question and the teacher does not persist in getting a demonstration of their understanding. Instead, she herself gives an explanation of why the concepts go together. The quantity and the quality of this step can be considered relatively low in this interaction.

189

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

In this study, we investigated the effects of a PDP based on the model of contingent teaching (consisting of the four steps: (1) diagnostic strategies, (2) checking the diagnosis, (3) intervention strategies, and (4) checking students’ learning) on teachers’ scaffolding behaviour. Whereas previous scaffolding studies mostly used highly structured tasks in one-to-one or lab-situations, we studied scaffolding in the classroom context using open-ended tasks. Furthermore, hardly any experimental studies on scaffolding in classroom situations exist; we conducted such a study with a relatively large sample size. The model of contingent teaching was used in a PDP to teach teachers how to scaffold.

The model of contingent teaching appeared to be a powerful tool in learning how to act contingently upon students’ understanding. The teachers who participated in the PDP learned to perform high quality steps of contingent teaching. They elicited student answers with a higher quality mode (demonstrations of understanding instead of claims of understanding) than the teachers who did not participate in the PDP when using diagnostic strategies (step 1) and when checking students’ learning (step 4). Furthermore, the support they gave was more contingent, both in terms of adapting the level of control to students’ understanding and in terms of the extent of uptake of students’ contributions. An overview of the findings can be found in Table 6 and the findings per step of contingent teaching will be discussed into more detail in the following.

Table 6Overview of the Findings of this Study

Quantity Quality-focus (more conceptual level)

Quality-mode (more demonstrations)

Diagnostic strategies (step 1) + (NSa) + (NS) + (Sig)

Checking the diagnosis (step 2) + (Sigb) + (NS) NA

Intervention strategies (step 3) NA Contingency-control: + (Sig)

Contingency-uptake: + (Sig)Checking students’ learning (step 4) + (NS) + (NS) + (Sig)

aNot SignificantbSignificant

Using the step of diagnostic strategies (step 1) was promoted by the PDP in this study mainly in terms of quality. Teachers in the scaffolding condition elicited more extensive answers (i.e., demonstrations) from students when diagnosing their actual


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understanding. Eliciting demonstrations in students’ answers provides teachers with more information about the students’ understanding and facilitates contingent support. Teachers who participated in the PDP also used more diagnostic strategies and increased their focus on conceptual understanding in this step compared to teachers who did not participate; however, these effects were not significant. The step of diagnosing students’ understanding is considered very difficult by teachers (e.g., Wittwer & Renkl, 2008) and is considered to be one of the most important teaching skills (e.g., Seidel & Shavelson, 2007). It is a contribution of this study that it demonstrated that the quality of this skill can be increased and that a programme was developed for teaching it.

The step of checking the diagnosis (step 2) was used more often by teachers who participated in the PDP than teachers who did not participate. However, overall, the occurrence of this step still stayed relatively low. This outcome is comparable to the outcome of the study of Knežiç (2011), who also found that the use of this step – although it increased – stayed relatively low. Future research should investigate reasons for the relatively low occurrence of this step. Investigating teachers’ attitudes towards this step might prove useful as attitudes appear to be highly related to teachers’ behaviour (Avalos, 2011). Previous research (Van de Pol et al., 2012) showed that teachers who had negative attitudes towards this step – they felt this step was redundant because they already performed many diagnostic strategies – used this step to a much smaller extent than teachers who a positive attitude – they felt that with this step they showed interest and it made their teaching more efficient. As opposed to previous research, we did not only investigate the quantity of this step, but also the quality in terms of focus (factual or conceptual). Although the teachers who participated in the PDP did increase the quality of this step (they increased their focus on conceptual understanding) compared to the teachers who did not participate, this effect was not significant. This is probably related to the fact that the same effect for diagnostic strategies (step 1) was neither significant; if a teacher diagnoses students’ factual understanding, the check of the diagnosis (step 2) will consequently also be on students’ factual understanding, not on their conceptual understanding.

The most prominent finding of this study is that when providing support (i.e., step 3), we found that the teachers who worked with the model of contingent teaching, increased the contingency of their support significantly more compared to teachers who did not work with the model. In other words; the quality of this step increased significantly. Adapting support and building upon the students’ understanding has been proven to be difficult for teachers in previous research (e.g., Ruiz-Primo & Furtak, 2007). The teachers who worked with the model, however, learned to adapt the support given to the understanding of the student (i.e., contingency-control) and to what the students said (i.e., contingency-uptake). The model of contingent teaching and especially

191

diagnosing and checking while electing demonstrations stimulated this contingency.Using the step of checking students’ learning (step 4) was promoted by the

PDP mainly in terms of its quality. Teachers who participated in the PDP elicited demonstrations (instead of just claims) of understanding from students more often when checking whether students’ understanding had improved through the support given, compared to teachers who did not participate in the PDP. Teachers who participated in the PDP also used this check more frequently and focused more on students’ conceptual understanding (as opposed to factual understanding) compared to teachers who did not participate. However, these effects were not significant. Previous research showed that when checking students’ learning, teachers mostly elicit short and simple answers (Kao et al., 2011). Therefore, having found a way to increase the quality of this step in terms of mode elicited is an improvement. The fact that teachers who worked with the model of contingent teaching did not increase their focus on conceptual understanding compared to teachers who did not work with the model, might be explained by the fact that when the whole conversation was on factual understanding, it seems illogical to suddenly shift to checking students’ conceptual understanding. So because the effect was not significant for the first step (diagnostic strategies), it makes sense that this effect was also nonsignificant for the subsequent steps of contingent teaching.

Overall, an increase in quality for teachers who worked with the model of contingent teaching was mainly found in the fact that the teachers elicited demonstrations more often when using the steps of contingent teaching; not so much through a shift in focus towards conceptual understanding. It could be the case that exploring and checking students’ understanding on a conceptual level and simultaneously thinking of how to use the gathered information in the support that is to follow was just too much for the teachers in the scaffolding condition. Feldon (2007) for example suggests that teachers might suffer from cognitive overload when both having to deal with complex subject matter and with exploring another person’s understanding of that subject-matter at the same time. Focusing on conceptual knowledge can be considered as more complex than factual knowledge which might explain our finding. Future research could explore ways to reduce the load for teachers by for example using visual representations of the students’ understanding built together with the students. However, on the other hand, staying at a factual level may have been the right level for the students. Maybe exactly because the teachers in the scaffolding condition used diagnostic strategies and elicited students’ demonstrations before giving support they might have found out that moving to a conceptual level was not appropriate yet and therefore might have not moved the focus to a conceptual level. Particularly for teaching substantive concepts, scaffolding and especially diagnosing and eliciting demonstrations seems a valuable approach as scaffolding reveals and anticipates the students’ understanding of rather


192

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abstract and theoretical concepts.

Limitations

The duration of the intervention was relatively limited, namely 8 weeks. The teachers in the scaffolding condition had four lessons to practice their scaffolding skills. Slavin (2008) for example advised an intervention to last at least 12 weeks as changing one’s teaching practice is known to be difficult and time-consuming (Loucks-Horsley & Matsumoto, 1999). A longer programme gives the teachers more opportunities for practicing several steps and reflecting on their lessons. On the other hand, the PDP was already quite labour-intensive. The first author filmed five lessons of each teacher that participated in the programme and in addition, reflected on each of those lessons together with the teacher. As reviews on characteristics of effective PDP’s indicate (e.g., Loucks-Horsley & Matsumoto, 1999; Timperley, 2007; Van Veen et al., 2012), working collaboratively in a community (e.g., with colleagues) can be very effective. Future research should therefore focus on the possibilities of integrating this aspect in the PDP. In that way, the work-load for the teacher educator can be reduced while the length of the programme could be increased.

Experimental studies naturally suffer from unexpected events that happen in practice. Because we more or less disturbed an existing routine in the classrooms of the scaffolding condition, the teachers who participated in the study had much to cope with. Keeping good discipline in the classroom, for example, is probably a necessary condition to be able to perform scaffolding. However, we got the impression that keeping good discipline is more difficult when changing one’s teaching practice because the teachers need to focus on the new (in this case scaffolding) behaviour. Furthermore, while some teachers in the scaffolding condition seemed to have really incorporated the scaffolding style of teaching, some other teachers still seemed to struggle with it towards the end of the intervention. However, overall, the teachers who worked with the model of contingent teaching did increase the quality of the steps of contingent teaching, including their degree of contingency which indicates a true absorption of the idea of scaffolding; not the mere performance of a trick.

Conclusion

With this study, we have shown that the model of contingent teaching is an effective tool for promoting teachers’ scaffolding behaviour. Especially the promotion of the quality of diagnostic strategies and of teachers’ contingent behaviour is noteworthy as this is known to be a highly difficult, but also crucial teaching skill (e.g., Ausubel,

193


1968; Ruiz-Primo & Furtak, 2007). A contribution of this study to both research (e.g., scaffolding effectiveness

research) and practice (e.g., teacher professional development), is that it concretised the scaffolding process into discrete steps of contingent teaching and showed that working with these steps, can result in more than just using the steps: For the teachers involved in this study it resulted in true contingent behaviour.

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