by H de Silva Joyce · 2000 · Cited by 17 — Talk in casual conversation flows in and out of these highly interactive chat segments to the more monologically structured chunk segments of talk. Chat segments
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WHY SHOULD I DO ACTION RESEARCH?WHAT TEACHERS SAY É ÔThe challenge and stimulation from sharing in the energy and professionalism of other teachers on the research team and particularly with another teacher/researcher from my college was very enjoyable.Õ ÔI think it is important to be involved in action research projects Ñ I felt less isolated, more accountable and part of something happening.Õ TEACHING CASUALCONVERSATION National Centre for English Language Teaching and Research This is the sixth volume of the TeachersÕ Voices series which offers first-personaccounts by teachers of their involvement in collaborative classroom-based action research. The research project in this volume focused on investigating the teaching of casual conversation and the nine teachers involved in the project provide accounts of their research. The teachersÕ accounts are prefaced by a comprehensive background paper on thenature of casual conversation and the implications for teaching from the research coordinator and consultant. The five sections of this volume look at a range of topics such as Casual conversation teaching materials for low level learners ,Taking a close look at student performances , Teaching casual conversation for workplace communication, Teaching casual conversation at a distance , Teaching sequences for casual conversation. Each section contains a number of teachersÕaccounts on different aspects of the section topic.This book will be directly relevant to those teachers and trainee teachers interestedin exploring the nature of casual conversation in a range of contexts.MACQUARIE UNIVERSITY SYDNEY AUSTRALIAISBN 1-86408-615-79 781864086157
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TeachersÕ voices 6:Teaching casual conversationPublished and distributed by theNational Centre for English Language Teaching and Research Macquarie University Sydney NSW 2109© Macquarie University 2000The AMEP Research Centre is a consortium of the National Centre for English Language Teaching and Research(NCELTR) at Macquarie University in Sydney, and the National Institute for Education at La Trobe University in Melbourne. The Research Centre was established in January 2000 and is funded by the Commonwealth Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs.TeachersÕ voices 6: Teaching casual conversation Bibliography ISBN 1 86408 615 7 1. English language Ð Study and teaching Ð Australia Ð Foreign speakers. 2. English language Ð Spoken English. I. De Silva Joyce, Helen. II. National Centre for English Language Teaching and Research (Australia).428.349507094 CopyrightThis book is sold subject to the conditions that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisherÕs prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.All rights reserved. No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, inany form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.The publishers wish to acknowledge the following for providing copyright permission: Table on page ix, Categories of spoken interactions, reprinted with permission of Suzanne Eggins from the paperÔThe analysis of spoken dataÕ NCELTR 1990Text on pages x and xi reprinted with permission of Darrell Hilton Productions from We are what we talkby deSilva Joyce and Hilton 1999Text on page x listing genres in casual conversation and the table on page xii reprinted with permission of SuzanneEggins from Analysing casual conversationby S Eggins and D Slade © Cassell 1997Table on page xiii reprinted with permission of NSW AMES from Interchange32 October 1997 by Helen de SilvaJoyce and Diana Slade and competency 8 on page 19 reprinted with permission of NSW AMES from CertiÞcates inSpoken and Written English I and II1998Diagram on page 47 reprinted with permission of Suzanne Eggins from the paper ÔThe analysis of spoken dataÕNCELTR 1990Production Supervisor: Kris ClarkeDesign: Vanessa Byrne DTP: Lingo Publications Printed by: Southwood Press Pty Ltd
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iiiContentsAbbreviationsiv Introduction and acknowledgmentsv The nature of casual conversation: Implications for teachingvii Helen de Silva Joyce and Diana SladeSection One: Casual conversation teaching materials for low level learners1 1Casual conversation texts in Listening to Australia3Anthony Butterworth2Dealing with attitude in casual conversation for low level students11 Patti NicholsonSection Two: Taking a close look at student performances15 1Measuring student performance in casual conversation17 Peter Banks2Lost opportunities29 Helene ReadeSection Three: Teaching casual conversation for workplace communication43 1Towards informal work talk: Investigating the teaching of casual conversation in the workplace45 Penny McKay, Lynette Bowyer and Laura Commins 2The role of chat in negotiating a problematic spoken exchange55 Ruth Wirth Section Four: Teaching casual conversation at a distance61 1Casual conversation by distance63 Jane Graham2Teaching casual conversation at a distance: The challenges71 Linley JoomjaroenSection Five: Teaching sequences for casual conversation87 1CALL and casual conversation89 Dorothy Waterhouse 2Talking about a Þlm96 Julie Williams
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AbbreviationsABCAustralian Broadcasting Commission AMEPAdult Migrant English Program ASLPRAustralian Second Language ProÞciency Rating CALLcomputer-assisted language learning CSWECertiÞcates I, II and III in Spoken and Written English ELLSEnglish Language and Literacy Services ESLEnglish as a Second Language IOTYItÕs over to you (distance learning course)L1Þrst language NCELTRNational Centre for English Language Teaching and Research NESBnon-English speaking background NSW AMESNew South Wales Adult Migrant English Service OHToverhead transparency QUTQueensland University of Technology TAFETechnical and Further Education TESOLTeaching English to Speakers of Other Languages VETABVocational Education, Training and Accreditation Board iv
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Introduction and acknowledgmentsThis volume of papers is the sixth in the series TeachersÕ voices . In 1999 ten teachersfrom South Australia and New South Wales took part in the National Centre for English Language Teaching and Research (NCELTR) Special Project Ð Investigating theteaching of casual conversation. Helen de Silva Joyce of the NSW Adult Migrant EnglishService (NSW AMES) coordinated the project and Dr Diana Slade of the University of Technology, Sydney was a consultant to the project. The project was conducted through a series of workshops. Diana Slade conductedtwo workshops in each state: an introductory workshop into the structure and characteristics of casual conversation; and a second workshop exploring the dimensions of casual conversation in more depth and the implications of recent research for teaching.Over a period of six months the teachers met to explore their questions about casual conversation and the focus of their research. The consultant and I attended some of these workshops. Nine papers in this volume are the result of the teachersÕ work. An additional paper by Dr Penny McKay, Lynette Bowyer and Laura Commins has been edited from a longer report for another NCELTR Special Project Ð Towards informal work talk: Investigating the teaching of casual conversation in workplace English.This was a parallel project on the teaching of casual conversation that a team from Queensland University of Technology conducted in 1999 in conjunction with personnel from the Southbank Institute of TAFE in Brisbane. Over recent years I have had the privilege to be part of a number of NCELTR action research projects. In each one I have worked with dedicated teachers who are interested in exploring the dimensions of their own work. I am always impressed with their honesty and their ability to look at their teaching objectively. In an era of rapid change in the Adult Migrant English Program (AMEP) I am also impressed with the teachersÕ continued commitment to their students and to improving their practice. This NCELTR action research project and the project conducted through QUT show that teachers are concerned to remain abreast with recent research into spoken language and to modify their classroom practice to take account of new knowledge and new technologies. The teaching of casual conversation is an area of increasing interest and it is through papers such as the ones in this volume that we can see how teachers are dealing with this complex area of language teaching. As coordinator of the project and editor of this volume I would like to thank Diana Slade for sharing her knowledge and research. I would also like to acknowledge the teachers who participated in the project, and Peter Banks and Stephanie Claire who brought the groups together in the two states. Thanks also go to Penny McKay and the QUT team for making their paper available for this volume. My thanks also go to Pam McPherson and Geoff Brindley at NCELTR for supporting the project and to the AMEP section of the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs for the funding that made the project possible.Helen de Silva Joycev
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The nature of casual conversation: Implicationsfor teachingHelen de Silva Joyce and Diana SladeÉwe are clear about one thing: no progress will be made towards animproved ESL pedagogy without a clear understanding of the realities of English conversation.(Crystal and Davy 1975:4)Until recently, most research into language focused on written texts or on examples of what were considered to be well-formed instances of language. However, in the past decade, the interest in casual conversation as the primary form of language use has increased dramatically. This interest in the study of conversation is leading to new approaches in the classroom and to the development of innovative teaching materials. For the improved ESL (English as a second language) pedagogy called for byCrystal and Davy, it is necessary to investigate in some detail the nature of casual conversation and the areas of casual conversation which cause learners difÞculties. It is also necessary for teachers to experiment with different methodologies for teaching casual conversation and to contribute to the development of pedagogic approaches, as the teachers in this volume have done.The types and structure of spoken interactionsSpoken interactions can be broadly categorised as interpersonally motivated or pragmatically motivated. In many social contexts we produce texts which are a mixture of both, as McKay, Bowyer and Commins point out in their paper in this volume. For teaching purposes it is helpful to work with a typology such as the following one developed by Eggins (1990) in which she labels interpersonally motivated interactions ÔconversationÕ and pragmatically motivated interactions ÔencountersÕ, and sets out a number of subcategories.TeachersÕ voices 6 viii
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The nature of casual conversationix(Eggins 1990, adapted from Burns, Joyce and Gollin 1996:12)Language programs generally include pragmatic interactions because their morepredictable structures and formulaic language make them easier to teach. Teachers are able to show students the generic structure of such discourse with its easily recognisable ways of beginning, progressing and ending. On the other hand, teachers often consider that casual conversation is toounstructured to teach in ESL classrooms. However, more recently, studies have demonstrated that casual conversation does have a consistent and describable structure (Eggins and Slade 1997). Slade (1997, and in Eggins and Slade 1997) argues that casual conversation consists of different types of talk which she has labelled the ÔchunksÕ and the ÔchatÕ. The chunks are those types of talk that have an identiÞable generic structure. The chat sections are those parts of casual conversation which do not display such text structure and require an analysis that can describe the move by move unfolding of talk. To analyse casual conversation we need to be able to describe both the chunks and the chat. Talk in casual conversation ßows in and out of these highly interactive chat segments to the more monologically structured chunk segments of talk.Chat segments are defined as highly interactive segments of talk which ofteninvolve multiple speakers who manage the interaction turn by turn. In these chat segments speakers compete for turns and establish topics, as in the following extract where three friends establish the topic of banks. CategorySubcategorySubclassiÞcation Conversation1 Casual1a Polite Conversations where the Interactions where little previous participants have equal power and/or future contact is likely and in the interaction.therefore affective feelings between the participants will not be well developed.1b ConÞrmingInteractions where the participants are in close or continual contact and therefore have developed affective attitudes or feelings towards each other.2 FormalConversations where there is unequal power between the participants in the interaction.Encounters 1 Factual Interactions which are predominantly oriented towards giving or seeking information.2 TransactionalInteractions which involve obtaining or supplying goods and services.
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People who participate as competent interactants in casual encounters know whenthey can claim a turn and when to relinquish a turn. When a participant wants to claim the ßoor he or she needs to indicate this with the appropriate linguistic signals and, once the other participants give consent, the speaker then proceeds to develop a chunk segment. In other words, the participants in casual conversation weave in and out of telling stories, gossiping, exchanging opinions, telling a joke and so on.Slade (1997) used the concept of genre to deÞne and describe the different kinds ofchunks used in casual conversation in English. Genre is Ôa socially ratiÞed way of using language in connection with a particular type of social activityÕ (Fairclough 1995:14). It is an institutionalised language activity which has evolved over time to have a particular text structure. Slade (in Eggins and Slade 1997) outlines the different genres which occurred in 27 hours of workplace casual conversations she collected and analysed. The different genres were: ¥narrative; ¥anecdote;¥recount;¥exemplum (a story that illustrates the validity of shared social values); ¥observation/comment;¥opinion;¥gossip;¥joke-telling.Narratives, recounts, anecdotes and exemplums are four different kinds of storytelling texts. These genres each have identiÞable generic structures. The following recount about banks illustrates these generic structures.TeachersÕ voices 6 xValerie:What I donÕt understand is that yearly the banks declare a massive proÞt. Terry:Billions.Darrell:I know, [billions.Valerie:[Billions, thatÕs right and our charges keep going up.Darrell:Yes I know so that the shareholders can get more proÞt. [ThatÕs why.Terry:[But I mean there was a time when the banks had a human face. [They were like youknowÉValerie:[Well there used to be a time when you could go in and use a teller. TheyÕre discouragingthat. YouÕve got to use this bloody [machine.Terry:[But I mean for all the money these days we get nothing back [at all.Gillian:[WellÉnow they are starting to do some stuff, oh I mean some of the banks are startingto have open days now cause theyÕve Þnally worked out that a lot of old people arenÕtusing the ATMsÉValerie:[And me.Gillian:[Écause theyÕre frightened of them, and you, and so, you know, theyÕre having likeclasses for them to help them learn how [to use them.Darrell:[WellÉthatÕs the point, thatÕs exactly what they should be doing. They should be doingmuch more of that.(de Silva Joyce and Hilton 1999:85)[ = overlap
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