Reframing Classroom Research: A Lesson from the Private World of Children

Abstract

Research on classroom discourse typically focuses on the public statements of teachers and children. In this article, Adrienne Alton-Lee, Graham Nuthall, and John Patrick describe findings from a project in which sixth-graders' public and private statements,to themselves and to peers, were recorded using individual microphones. The authors analyzed the children's utterances as data about the children's cognitive and emotional responses to the ongoing lesson. The data reflect how the children perceived and responded to subtle cultural and gender biases in the curriculum and in the teacher's presentation. Their study allows us to better understand children's actual experiences as they struggle with the overt and covert messages of the curriculum.