German 727, Professor Monika Bilal Humeidan Field Project II Classroom Language Use I.

Ecology of class:

Tuesday, October 09, 2012

This is a third-semester Arabic class taught by a male Moroccan graduate student who is a native speaker of Arabic (NS). This teacher has been teaching Arabic for four years. During these four years, he taught first-year and second-year levels. In this class, there are 16 students, 5 male students and 11 female students. In this recorded part of the class, 7 students were captured, 2 male students and 5 female students. The recording took place on Monday, October 08, 2012, at 11:00am and it was was about 25 minutes long(including the teacher-student conversation and time spent in peer work). The class was held at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in Social Science building. Interlocutors position: This class was a teacher-fronted class. The teacher stood up in front of the students for the whole period of class and there was a considerable distance between him and the students except when students were working in groups when the teacher walked between them to check and guide them. The class began by the teacher greeting his students and asking them about what they did in their weekend. Then he divided the class into groups to work on a handout that he distributed. The handout contains a drill on relative pronouns. After the teacher gave them enough time to do the drill he picked random examples and did them together with the whole class.

Important: There were three relative pronouns discussed in class which are keywords in this conversation: -Allathi that used with definite singular masculine nouns (human + nonhuman) -Allati that used with definite singular feminine nouns, and used with nonhuman plural nouns (masculine and feminine) -Allathiina that used with definite human plural nouns.

II. Transcript 01 T: 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 So we will talk today about what you did in this past weekend. (students stood up and started talking about the weekend) (Teacher walking around to check on students) FS1: I go to my familys house. T: I go? FS1: Oh, I went to my familys house. T: excellent (students talking in English) T: thank you, thank you T: today we will a review., what does review mean? FS2: (saying the meaning of the word). T: yes, we will the relative pronoun, that was in the homework of Frdiay, we will also review the negation. T: we use Allathi that with ..what? MS1: with masculine T: with masculine,.. FS2: with singular T: with masculine, singular, and what about allati that? FS3: with feminine T: excellent , ok when do we use allathiina that? with ..? MS2: with plural T: yes, with plural. Ok, can we use allati with plural? FS1: yes but only with non-human plural T: yes, we only use it with nonhuman plural T: the man, we use . FS2: allathi T: Excellent, what about a man, we use (no answer) T: we use nothing, because MS2: it is indefinite.

28 T:

29 groups) 30 T: hey guys! speak only in Arabic 31 (students are speaking slower than in English, more hesitantly) 10 minutes later, 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 T: FS1: T: FS4:

excellent. (Teacher speaking in English: because it is an indefinite noun) (Teacher giving them handout and giving them about 10 minutes to do it in

ok, who can read number 1 this the house that I was born in (the student used allathi) yes, Beth, why allathi (in a hesitant way) because the house is masculine and definite (she used the English word for definite? T: and how do say definite in Arabic? FS4: definite (used the Arabic word) T: great, ok sentence 2. FS5: where is the newspaper that you read (the student used Allati) T: why allathi? FS5: because it is feminine.

III. Measuring Language use: 3.1 What is the ratio of student to teacher turns?/What is the ratio of student to teacher words? The teacher took more turns than students and his turns were quite longer than students turns. The teachers portion of turns in this part of class was 22 turns, whereas the students portion was 18 turns. The teacher used more words in his turns when he was asking questions and giving examples. In this part of class, the teacher uttered 135 words in his turns as a total whereas students uttered 65 words. 3.2 What types of turns prevail for students as compared for the teacher? The manifested type of turn taking was the IRF pattern. The teacher initiated almost all the turns and when a student would respond the teacher would give the feedback. The main pattern of turn allocation was invitation to reply without calling on students. That type of

turn allocation made students comfortable and unanxious There was only one case individual nomination in line 33 when he asked Beth a direct question. The student then was anxious, hesitant, and shy when she responded. 3.3 What The ratio of LI to L2 use for the teachers and students Teacher used the target language (Arabic) more than English, students first language, except when a student does not understand his Arabic explanation on a grammatical structure as in line 28. Whereas, student used their first language more than the target language. It was obvious that they feel more comfortable when speaking in English during peer work. Later, the teacher asked students to speak in Arabic (line 29) during their peer work and the students then became quieter and less enthusiastic.

IV. Judging the segment as a conversation: 4.1 Predictability was manifested from both sides. Students predicted the task the teacher assigned them. When he told them that they were going to talk about the weekend they stood up by themselves and started talking in pairs as in line 2 above. On the other hand, the teacher predicted areas of confusion for students. That was clear when he was repeating when to use each relative pronoun and when encountering an indefinite noun as in lines 23-26. 4.2 There were some instances of repetition by the teacher when correcting students pronunciation. The key words (relative pronouns) were repeated extensively to ensure that students grasp this new grammatical structure. The teacher has also repeatedly used hand gestures when he was explaining the use of each of the relative pronoun.

4.3 Distribution of information was mainly done by the teacher when explaining grammar and giving feedback on students answers. Since the topic of the class was about grammar, the teacher was giving information and students were the receivers of information. 4.4 The structural and thematic control was dominated by the teacher, he was the interlocutor who would initiate and close conversations. He also determined the topic and the transition between themes such as shifting between talking about the weekend and talking about relative pronouns. 4.5 The teachers role can be described as the lecturer and the main source of information, and the students are the receivers of information or participants in the conversation. Or the teacher can be described as the sailor and the students as the sailboat itself that is directed by the sailor to any direction he wishes.