Second-graders' social, intellectual, and affective development in varied group discussions about narrative texts: An exploration of participation structures

Abstract

The 14-week study described in these pages explored the extent to which participation structure mediates participants' literacy development (i.e., social, intellectual and affective development) in the context of reading group discussions about literature. Six second-grade volunteer public school teachers whose reading group discussions exhibited a history of an initiate-reply-evaluate structure (I-R-E) and a select group of their students (n = 8; N = 48) were assigned to one of three participation structure conditions: a control condition (teacher-led, I-R-E interaction) and two experimental conditions (two variations of an approach designed to facilitate movement from teacher-led participation structures toward more open structures in which students become the sole managers of the group discourse). Data sources included transcribed videotaped records, fieldnotes, perceptions scales, marginal annotations (scribed by the students while reading), retellings, interviews, and two group process transfer measures (i.e., discussion problem-solving tasks).

The results suggest that increased levels of responsibility mediated the following social, intellectual, and affective characteristics: (a) higher degrees of communicative competence in open discussion, (b) greater sequential efficiency and accuracy of students' mental models of text, and (c) positive shifts in student and teacher perceptions related to discussion as a literacy activity.

Three instructional implications emerged. First, while recitation-like structures mediate intellectual development, more open discussion structures mediate social, intellectual, and affective development simultaneously. Second, instructional interventions should focus upon change at the level of participation structure, should promote simultaneous social, intellectual, and affective development, and should be conceptualized as points-of-departure rather than as means to a prescribed end. Third, some doubt is cast upon the efficacy of interventions which gradually release teachers' responsibility of the group process to students.