When Learner Inquiries Arise: Marking Teacher Cognition as It Unfolds “In-The-Moment”

Abstract

With the understanding that teacher cognition itself is ever-emergent, originating and framed by engagement with social activities (Johnson & Golombek, 2011), the current study examines one expert English as a Second Language (ESL) teacher’s micro-analysis of her classroom practices when addressing learner inquiries in-themoment, and how such analysis leads the teacher to alter her conscious awareness of what it means to teach language even at an advanced point in her career. Bridging the methodologies of conversation analysis and ethnographic analysis, two distinct practices were used by the teacher when addressing learner inquiries: doing answering and modeling exploration. Each practice is detailed with a focus on their varied constructions and the speciic verbal and nonverbal communicative cues found to inluence their uses. Numerous and simultaneous factors are shown to afect the teacher’s management of learner inquiries, factors both paralleling and contradicting her perceptions of teaching. he paper concludes with a discussion on how the indings not only connect to the current teacher cognition literature but also advocates for opening up the methodological tools used in SLTE to more fully understand teacher learning.

Keywords

• teacher cognition
• teacher expertise
• conversation analysis
• ethnography
• esl