Conversation Reflection and Evaluation - Scholarship Essay Example

Conversation Reflection and Evaluation Conversation Evaluation The first conversation involved Dunia from Saudi Arabia, Am from Thailand, both students, and I, Yasmeen, the teacher. It was about feelings and emotions with “bottle up everything (inside you)”, “let it all out”, and “self-control” being the target phrases. The conversation ran for just 12mins, 59secs. About 7 minutes of the time were used by the two students in discussing and responding. This gives 40:60 TTT: STT. We achieved the ratio by allowing the two students enough time to discuss and respond to the questions I asked them throughout the conversation. To increase or improve the TTT: STT ratio, I would allocate more time for the conversation and get more students (Susan & Herbert, 1996: 1496). I ensured that the students know and could correctly use the target phrases of the conversation by allowing them to discuss the phrases as a pair. They discussed the phrases and once they had arrived at some common point, I would join them to make them understand it better, by defining the phrases using simpler terms. The talking points of this conversation were in form of questions addressed to the students. The first question was whether the students thought it was good to express one’s emotions in public. The second talking point question that of any four jobs in which letting it all out was necessary or unnecessary. The last question was the kind of advice that could be given to people who did not have self-control. They discussed the first and second questions in pairs within a very short time, and then were ready to respond. I allowed them to give individual views on the talking point questions before engaging both of them together. For third and final question, the students, acting in pairs suggested that the individuals who lacked self control could seek the help of a psychologist, and also ensure they were not exposed to people or situations that made them hungry. I joined in the conversation once the students had brainstormed on each of the talking point questions. So the three of us were all talking and responding to random sub-questions of the talking point questions. This was a monitoring strategy that helped me follow up on the ideas they had on the questions. As the teacher of the conversation session, I took control and deliberately applied some techniques to ensure it was a success, harmonious and productive. The tools included: Eliciting examples was also a deliberate strategy I used in the conversation. From the start to the end of it, we kept using examples to make points understood. Creating pairs was the best approach to give a discussion in which students were not native speakers of English. This was a way of helping out one another in case there was something they found difficult to understand. Active monitoring was a way of ensuring that there was as much order and harmony in the conversation as possible. Setting time limits. I allocated a maximum of three minutes for the students to discuss and respond to the conversation questions. Strengths I had a good conversation plan which provided a clear transition from one issue to another during the conversation. Weaknesses We had limited time for the conversation. The conversation lasted less than 18 minutes. Turn taking was poor. At some point, we were all talking which isn’t appropriate for an effective conversation. Conversation 2 Evaluation Maha from Thailand, Am from Kuwait and I, Yasmeen Madkaly had a conversation about shopping with target phrases being “treat myself”, “retail therapy”, and “on a shoestring”. All through the conversation, I was keen not to be the dominant character, so I gave Maha and Am a considerably fair share of the 17 minutes which the conversation lasted. They, together, consumed about 10 minutes of the time, while I had the remainder of the time. That yields an TTT: STT of 30:70. More STT could be achieved by making the discussion much more student centered and only coming on board when it was necessary, such as when I needed to clarify something. I could also get more students for the conversation, and thus more time allocated for the conversation. I ensured that the students knew and could the target phrases correctly by ensuring they got the correct meanings of the phrases, and the contexts within which they would be suitably applied (Sacks& Schegloff, 1974). This I did by exhausting all the three phrases first within the discussion, then asking the students to make sentences using them at the ending bit of it. It worked because in the end, Maha and Am could make correct sentences using two of the three key phrases. There were two talking points of the conversation. The first one was a question about what the students thought were the reasons behind rise in shopping over the last 30 years, while the second question was if the students thought that online shopping would substitute normal shopping in the future. For the first question, they responded as a pair, while for the second one, they responded as individuals. For both questions, I joined the students in the conclusion bits. The decision stage had the question as to how the students could ensure that any retail business they started could be successful. The responses were given by the students in their pairs, and then I joined them to wrap it up. For this second conversation, I applied the same techniques I used for the first one, but in a much better way. Unlike the first conversation where I didn’t allow the students to engage as a pair much, they worked as a pair on most of the question of the second conversation. I was not as rigid with time limits in the second conversation as I was in the first one. I didn’t dictate much the duration within which the students could discuss and respond to the discussion questions. Active monitoring was a way of ensuring that there was as much order and harmony in the conversation as possible (Heijden, J., 2007). Eliciting examples was also a deliberate strategy I used in the conversation, making it easier for the students to understand the phrases and their application, (Have, 2007). Strengths The conversation ran for over 17 minutes. This was an improvement on the nearly 13 minutes of the first conversation. The conversation plan was okay. There was harmony all through the conversation session. There was great improvement in turn-taking, better than the first conversation. Weaknesses We had a very short time, probably because I only had two students. It should have lasted a little longer anyway. 13 minutes was just too short a duration. Turn-taking was poor. We weren’t talking in turns at some instances. There were times the three of us were all talking, but without intercepting or interrupting each other in a rude manner. References Anderson, H., 2008. Conversation, Language, and Possibilities: A Postmodern Approach to Therapy. California, CA: Basic Books. Auer, P., 2013. Code-Switching in Conversation: Language, Interaction and Identity. New York, NY: Routledge. Have, P., 2007. Doing Conversation Analysis. London: Sage. Heijden, K., 2011. Scenarios: The Art of Strategic Conversation. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons. Sacks, H. & Schegloff, E., 1974. A Simplest Systematics for the Organization of Turn-Taking for Conversation. Philadelphia: Linguistic Society of America. Schegloff, E., 2007. Sequence Organization in Interaction: Volume 1: A Primer in Conversation Analysis. London: Cambridge University Press. Susan, B. & Herbert, C., 1996. Conceptual pacts and lexical choice in conversation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, Vol 22(6): 1482-1493. Read More