172 173 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) GENDER PERSPECTIVE ON TEACHER-PUPIL CLASSROOM INTERACTION: FEEDBACK AND EVALUATION M a r g a r e t a B A Š A R A G I N , S v e n k a S A V I Ć Womens’ Studies and Research, Novi Sad, Serbia; Faculty of Philosophy, University of Novi Sad, Serbia Bašaragin, M., Savić, S. (2019). Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction: Feedback and evaluation. Slovenščina 2.0, 7(2): 172–196. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4312/slo2.0.2019.2.172-196 Various studies confirm the existence of gender bias in classroom interaction and the unequal treatment of boys and girls. The aim of this paper is to deter- mine the differences in the type of teacher feedback after female and male pu- pils’ speech contribution and explore whether the varied reactions contribute to the development of different linguistic, gender and cultural identities of pupils in Serbian and Hungarian classes. The corpus was collected during the final year of a bilingual primary school in Subotica (Vojvodina) in 2015, and consists of the fine transcripts of two audio and video recordings of mother tongue les- sons in Serbian and Hungarian classes. The results confirm the differences in feedback distribution and type in both classes regarding the pupils’ gender. The teachers’ feedback supports the higher status of male pupils in the group (class) and in relation to the teachers. Keywords: classroom interaction, feedback, gender, Hungarian language, Serbian language 1 I N T R O D U C T I O N Classroom talk is a form of complex group dialogue between a teacher and pupils with their predetermined roles, social positioning and individual spe- ech styles. It is a staged communicative event, directed towards the fulfilling of teaching and learning goals and objectives, which occurs under controlled conditions within a limited time and space. Classroom discourse refers to the 173 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction language used between teachers and pupils. Its traditional structure consists of Initiation-Response-Evaluation/Feedback (IRE/F) cycles and it allows a teacher to control who, when and how they speak, as well as the topic and very structure of classroom talk (McHoul, 1978; Swann, 1997; Cazden, 2001; Lefstein and Snell, 2011; Walsh, 2011).1 McHoul examines in what ways the rules of turn-taking management for na- tural conversation (Sacks et al., 1974) are to be modified to account for the organization of turn-taking in the classroom, and concludes that “only the teacher can direct speakership in any creative way” (McHoul, 1978, p. 188). Classroom talk is always pre-allocated: the teacher begins a ‘talk-unit’ (les- son) and corrects any deviation from the pattern Teacher-Pupil(s)-Teacher. Pupils’ participation rights are limited to the choice between continuing or selecting the teacher as the next speaker. McHoul also listed technical diffe- rences between classroom talk and natural conversation: 1. the potential for gaps and pauses is maximized, 2. the potential of overlaps is minimized, and 3. the permutability of turn-taking is minimized (McHoul, 1978, p. 188). Lefstein and Snell (2011) indicate that the IRF/E model supports the uncriti- cal acceptance of teachers’ authority and teaching objectives, and therefore li- mits the development of pupils’ thinking and their socialization. They propose the dialogic model of classroom discourse practice which focuses on the equal responsibility and equal opportunities of all participants to freely exchange ideas, to take an active role in meaning-making and to develop a collaborative and supportive learning community (Lefstein and Snell, 2011, p. 170). Different contexts regulate classroom talk. The primary context is a lesson in a classroom, so that changes in classroom activities directly influence the way the language is used. Betsy Rymes (2008) distinguishes three dimensions of classroom discourse. The wider social context includes the social factors outside the immediate interaction that influence how words function in that interaction: the national education policy and curriculum, socioeconomic, ethnic and cultural backgrounds of pupils and teachers, and gender and other social norms. Interactional context refers to the sequential or other patterns of talk within an interaction that influence what can and cannot be said, and how 1 This three-part structure was first put forward by Sinclair and Coulthard in 1975 and is also known as a recitation script or tryadic structure (Walsh, 2011, p. 17). 174 175 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) others interpret it within classroom discourse. Individual agency refers to the influence an individual can have on how language is used and interpreted in an interaction (Rymes, 2008, p. 31–32). The teacher’s language use is affected by the communicative event and social role in a given context, that is their personal (education, cultural and social status, ethnic group, age, sex/gender) and professional characteristics (atti- tudes and expectations, educational style), which may be more or less general or individual. They control and decide on the topics and who, when, how and how much a person speaks. The pupils’ language use is also affected by the gi- ven communicative event and social role and their individual characteristics: age, sex/gender, ethnic group, family milieu, and previous knowledge (Ernst, 2002; Veith, 2005; Szépe, 2011). The holistic theoretical approach provides the following conceptualization of classroom interaction. First, the linguistic production is seen as essenti- ally dialogic, formed in the process of social interaction, so that the meaning emerges in the process of active understanding and response (Bakhtin, 1973). Second, gender itself is constituted trough verbal and nonverbal interaction (West and Zimmerman, 1987), and gender identities and power relations are highly contextualized and (re)produced through ‘schooled language’ (Swann, 2003). This is the language of teaching and learning, of a school and a classro- om organization. It is part of the formal and informal (‘hidden’) curriculum which affects the socio-cognitive development of boys and girls as ‘schooled subjects’ and their experience of education (Swan, 2003). As a form of social interaction classroom talk directly and indirectly forms gender, cultural, eth- nic and other components of pupils’ identities. It is an important vehicle for learning “socially appropriate behaviour (including gender-appropriate beha- viour)” (Swann, 1997, p. 18). The feedback is information provided by a teacher regarding aspects of a pu- pil’s performance or understanding. It occurs typically after instruction that seeks to provide knowledge and skills or to develop a particular attitude (Ha- ttie and Timperley, 2007, p. 102). The feedback is an important feature of the three-part exchange, since it allows pupils to see whether their response has been accepted or not. Frequently, feedback entails some kind of evaluation, such as good, right, ok (Walsh, 2011, p. 17) and can be positive as well as 175 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction negative. Any constructive encouragement in form of feedback can be motiva- tional for pupils to improve their learning abilities and skills, to increase their knowledge and efforts, and to enhance self-esteem. It also regulates pupils’ behaviour during class activities, i.e. reinforces desirable and discourages un- desirable behaviour (Burnett, 2002, p. 6). Teachers should avoid being jud- gmental and especially forming feedback as negative critique related to pupils’ personality and individual psychosocial features. The teacher’s feedback and evaluation is usually connected with their own expectations of the pupils’ classroom performance. The so called ‘Pygmali- on effect’ in the classroom suggests that teachers form initial expectations of pupils, who then behave in ways that confirm these (Brophy and Good, 1974; Kostović, 2008; Sadker and Zittleman, 2009): higher expectations thus lead to an increase in performance and low expectations lead to a decrease in per- formance. If teachers expect certain pupils to perform poorly because of some their characteristics (e.g. race, gender, intelligence scores, or economic sta- tus), then the pupils will indeed perform poorly because teachers will interact less and possibly more harshly with those students. This kind of approach fails to take into account the active, participatory role of the pupils in the interacti- on (Jones and Dindia, 2004, p. 456). 2 P R E V I O U S R E S E A R C H Various studies confirm the existence of gender bias in classroom interaction and the unequal and different treatment of boys and girls. They also show that teacher perceptions are consistent with stereotypes of gender differences in learning performance and abilities between boys and girls (Spender, 1990; Tiedemann, 2002; Frawley, 2005; Sadker and Zittleman, 2009). Thus, Alyson Julé (2002, 2005) studied the amount of talk used by girls as opposed to boys in a grade 2 ESL classroom located in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia in teacher-led classroom lessons. Data were collected thro- ugh videotaped observations and then transcribed. The findings revealed a particular lack of linguistic space in the girls’ experience: they were limited in language in use and their silence appeared partly influenced by the teacher’s response to their comments, which may impact language learning opportuni- ties. Julé (2004) examined also how silence in language classrooms affects the 176 177 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) construction of gender roles and how classroom habits create certain consis- tent behaviours. Her empirical studies confirmed that teachers ignore girls for long periods of time and that boys call out and dominate classroom talk, in addition to dominating the actual physical space. Joachim Tiedemann (2002) studied the hypothesized biasing effect of tea- chers’ gender role stereotypes on their impressions of their students’ mathe- matical abilities and effort resources in mathematics. A total of 48 teachers participated in the study and responded to the questionnaires concerning their perceptions of about 300 of their third and fourth grade students. The findings confirmed the influence of stereotypes on teachers’ perceptions of their students’ mathematical abilities and effort, that boys have more develo- pmental resources in mathematics. Denn and others (2015) evaluated patterns of teacher-student interaction in German elementary schools during mathematics instruction. The authors studied differences in teachers’ feedback behaviour regarding boys and girls. The results show that boys received more teacher reaction than girls, with the teachers also reacting more often to boys’ misbehaviour and praising girls more often. Hsiao-Ching She (2000) analysed the cross-relationships among a Taiwanese seventh-grade biology teacher’s beliefs, practices and classroom interactions with either male or female students. She used classroom observation to de- termine gender-based differences during classroom interaction. The findings revealed the unequal distribution of direct questions, unbalanced feedback and encouragement, and a lack of restrictive control on calling out answers. Tannen (1993) pointed out the differences in speech styles that boys and girls adopt when using language within their peer-groups, and considers them as different cultural groups. Speer (2005) concluded that variations in conversa- tional patterns and speech styles are not solely determined by speakers’ sex/ gender or by their belonging to a particular cultural group. In this paper, we deal with a far more complex phenomenon that occurs du- ring classroom interaction. We ask what this looks like in primary school classrooms in Vojvodina (Serbia) today, especially in bilingual ones, where two typologically different languages, Serbian and Hungarian, are taught and 177 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction since greater gender equality has been declared as one of the aims of primary education in Serbia2 (Bašaragin, 2016; Bašaragin and Savić, 2016). The existing Serbian literature on classroom discourse focuses primarily on improving the academic achievement of pupils, and classroom interaction is studied only from the teaching-methodological perspective, aiming to imp- rove professional competence of engaged teachers. The gender differences in classroom discourse have never been considered an issue in Serbian research papers. Therefore, we decided to deal with the complexity of classroom disco- urse by combining two approaches: discourse analysis (Ehlich, 1993; Savić, 1993) and gender studies (West and Zimmerman, 1987). The aim of this paper is to determine the differences in the type of the teacher feedback and evaluation sequences after the female and/or male pupils’ spe- ech contribution, and to explore whether the diverse teacher’s reactions con- tribute to the development of different linguistic, gender and cultural identi- ties among pupils in Serbian and Hungarian classes during the final year of bilingual primary schools in Subotica (Vojvodina) in 2015. In addition to Serbian, on the territory of Vojvodina (Serbia) there are nine other languages in official use that are spoken by the ethnic communities that live there: Bulgarian, Montenegrin, Czech, Croatian, Hungarian, Ma- cedonian, Romanian, Ruthenian and Slovak. For some of these ethnic com- munities, depending on the number of children in a class, both primary and secondary education is organized in their mother tongues (this right is granted by the Serbian constitution). However, at the same time they are obligated to attend instruction in Serbian, the language of ethnic majority. For these people Serbian as an official language is termed a “non-mother tongue”. There is no clear definition of this term in the literature, but it is usually considered a language adopted or learned in addition to the mother tongue: the second language. Why should one compare Serbian and Hungarian classes in Vojvodina regar- ding gender issues? The classroom discourse and gender interaction within a 2 The Law on Basic Education System (National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, 2019), Article 44, allows the implementation of the principle of equal opportunities and prohibition of discrimination in content and form of textbooks. 178 179 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) classroom setting are underrepresented as research objectives in Serbian lite- rature. Hungarian and Serbian are not only two typologically different langu- ages, but Serbian is also the language of majority and Hungarian the language of “others”. This opens up the possibility of different linguistic behaviour in the same context – classroom discourse. The primary research questions are: 1. What types of feedback sequences are present in Serbian and Hungarian classes? 2. Are there differences in feedback distribution regarding gender between Hungarian and Serbian classes? 3. Do the teachers evaluate the pupils’ speech contributions differently regarding pupils’ gender and the type of language used in the classroom? 3 T R A N S C R I P T I O N M E T H O D O L O G Y The transcription methodological framework is based on the discourse pro- cedures in the transcription for verbal interaction (Savić, 1993) and partly on the HIAT2 transcription system for nonverbal communication and action (Ehlich, 1993).3 3.1 Corpus The corpus consists of the fine transcript of two audio and video recordings of mother tongue lessons in Serbian (length 187’22’’) and Hungarian classes (length 164’50’’) during the final year of primary4 schools in Subotica, Voj- vodina5. The recordings6 were made in the spring of 2015, with two movable cameras, placed in the left and right corners of the classrooms, facing pupils diagonally next to the teacher’s desk, and a tape recorder placed on the chair at the back of the classroom. The classroom setting is traditional, set up with five or six rows all facing the front. The teacher’s desk is in front and so are the chalkboards. The aisles have enough space between them for the teacher to walk up to each pupil. This setup allows all the pupils to see the teacher and the board. In the Hungarian classroom there is also a computer in the right 3 Symbols used for transcription are given in the Appendix. 4 Primary school lasts eight years in Serbia, in the final year pupils are 14–15 years old. 5 Subotica is a town in the northern part of Serbia, in the province of Vojvodina. 6 We gained a written permit for video recording from the local educational advisor, directors of primary schools, as well as parents’ approval. 179 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction corner facing the teacher and an overhead projector above the teacher’s desk facing the wall behind the teacher. The Serbian class consists of 13 male and 7 female pupils and the Hungarian class of 7 male and 10 female pupils. Both teachers are women, the homeroom teachers for these classes, and they teach mother tongue lessons. During the recorded lessons pupils in both classes were working on literary texts: the main tasks were text comprehension and analysis (theme, genre, ideas, structure, and similar), but there were also some reading exercises. The lessons have the form of group discussions; they are frontal, teacher-centred and verbal. The Serbian lesson was about the poem by a Serbian author, Jovan Jovanović Zmaj, “Svetli grobovi” (“Bright Graves”). It talks about the promise of descen- dants to continue what their ancestors began, a continuous sacrifice of many generations for a noble cause, and about a difficult but glorious past which helps new generations to find the right path into the future. The Hungarian lesson was about a play by a Hungarian playwright, Spiró György, called “Esti műsor” (George Spiro: “Evening Program”). This modern drama is about the everyday life of the Hungarian middle class. There are four characters: two married couples, Bella and Béla, and Géza and Gizi, are having dinner to- gether, watching TV. The focus is on their family life and their marriage problems. 3.2 Unit of analysis The basic unit of analysis is one IRF/E-cycle presented in turn, consisting of multiple or single speech contributions of actors, which are further divided into single utterances as the smallest units of analysis (Excerpt 1). Excerpt 17 0328 N VA I da li sada, deco, razumete∫ [And do you, children, understand it now∫]7 NA o- - - - - -stands by the desk, fa, loo at - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - 0329 VA ∫po čemu su, deco, njihovi grobovi svetli? (..) [∫why, children, are their graves light? (..)] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 7 All translations into English are done by the author. 180 181 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) 0330 VA Pa na osnovu čega,∫ [Well, why,∫] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 0331 VA ∫koće da nam kaže? [∫who is going to tell us?] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - -o 0332 Un VA Na osnovu njihovih dela. [Because of their works.] NA (many talking at once) 0333 N VA Na osnovu njihovih dela koje su ostavili za vreme svog života,∫ [Because of their works which they left behind during their lives,∫] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 0334 VA ∫je l‘ tako? [∫isn’t it so?] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - -o 4 R E S U L T A N D D I S C U S S I O N 4.1 Quantitative results The quantitative results show differences in feedback distribution between the Serbian and Hungarian class and also differences regarding pupils’ gender. The total amount of teacher feedback sequences in the Serbian lesson is 98, which makes up about 11% of the overall teacher’s verbal activity during the lesson. While providing feedback, she addresses male pupils for 30% of her verbal activity, female pupils 26%, male and female pupils 14%, the whole class 30%, and she evaluates her own speech contributions three times. A male pupil once gives feedback on a female pupil’s answer. In the Hungarian class the teacher’s feedback sequences make up about 13% of her overall verbal activity (54 sequences). She directs her feedback to male pupils for 57% of her verbal activity, female pupils 34%, male and female pupils 3%, the class 5%, and twice to herself. A male pupil once gives confirmatory fe- edback to a female pupil and once a female pupil gives the same to a male pupil. The majority of the teacher’s feedback sequences to male pupils in the Hunga- rian class is directly connected with the disproportion between the number of 181 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction male and female pupils and their verbal activity: six out of seven male pupils and nine out of ten female pupils participate in the classroom discourse. A similar thing applies to the Serbian class, where male pupils exceed the num- ber of female pupils: eight out of thirteen male pupils are verbally active as opposed to six out of seven female pupils. The analysis reveals several basic types of teacher feedback and evaluation sequences in the form of the discourse strategies (Table 1). These can be la- belled as: (1) Positive: repetition of pupils’ responses, addition of a response, con- firmation, praising and thanking, and (2) Negative: rejection of response, rebuke, ironic comment, criticism. Table 1. Relative frequency of teacher feedback in Serbian and Hungarian class per 45-minute class period with regard to gender. Feedback type m f m+f class Teacher positive feedback in the Serbian class Repetition of pupils’ responses 0.21 0.06 0.12 0.17 Confirmation 0.08 0.15 0.02 0.1 Praising 0.01 - 0.02 0.05 Teacher positive feedback in the Hungarian class Repetition of pupils’ responses 0.15 0.11 - 0.02 Addition of a response 0.17 0.02 - - Confirmation 0.19 0.15 0.02 - Praising 0.06 0.02 0.02 0.04 Thanking 0.02 0.02 - - Teacher negative feedback in the Serbian class Rejection of response 0.07 - - - Rebuke 0.07 0.14 - - Ironic comment 0.07 0.21 - 0.21 Criticism - 0.21 - - m=male pupils, f=female pupils, m+f=male and female pupils We detected the positive evaluation types of ‘addition of a response’ and ‘than- king’ only in the Hungarian class (Table 1). On the other hand, we identified a larger amount of negative feedback in the Serbian class, while there is only one feedback sequence in Hungarian class that contains this kind of feedback (the rejection of a female pupil’s comments on lesson content). 182 183 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) The relative frequency of teacher feedback in the Serbian and Hungarian clas- ses per 45-minute class period in relation to gender is shown in Table 1. The collected data reveal that male pupils receive more teachers’ positive feed- back in both classes than female pupils. The negative feedback types of ‘ironic comment’ and ‘criticism’ seem to be reserved only for female pupils in the Serbian class. These results correspond with the data in the literature which show that female pupils experience different treatment in classrooms (Spen- der, 1990; Denn et al., 2015). 4.2 Positive feedback 4.2.1 The confirmation and repetition of pupils’ answers The confirmation and repetition of pupils’ answers in order to evaluate them as correct are the most prevalent types of feedback in both classes. The Serbi- an teacher mostly uses the expressions dobro, mh, naravno, tako je (good, hm, of course, that is it) and the Hungarian teacher much the same, mh, igen, jó, igaz (hm, yes, good, that is it) in order to evaluate the pupils’ answers as correct. The positive reaction is directed more at the male pupils in both clas- ses (Table 1). The following example (Excerpt 2) explains how this feedback is performed in classroom discourse. In the Serbian lesson the teacher requests from the pupils to name some “glo- rious people” of Serbian history and culture. The pupils name mostly male authors and scientists: Milutin Milanković, Nikola Tesla, Vuk Karadžić, Mi- hajlo Pupin, etc. Excerpt 2 is a part of this larger exchange related to naming famous people. At this moment, the teacher wants to hear another represen- tative of the glorious Serbian past (0302). The male pupil U5 gives the name of the same Serbian author whose poem is analysed in the lesson (0303). The teacher repeats the answer and confirms its correctness by adding “Dobro” (Good., 0304–0305). 183 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction Excerpt 2 0302 N VA Onda? [Then?] NA o- - - - - - leaning against the board, fac, loo at Un - - - - - -- - - - o 0303 U5 VA I Jova Zmaj. [And Jova Zmaj.] NA o- - - - - - - -loo at N - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 0304 N VA Čika Jova Zmaj. (..) [Uncle Jova Zmaj] NA o- - - - - - leaning against the board, fac, loo at Un - - - - - - - - - - - 0305 VA Dobro.(..) Dobro,∫ [Good. (..) Good,∫] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o The confirmation and repeating of the pupils’ answers similarly occur in the Hungarian class. 4.2.2 Praising Surprisingly, the teachers praise very seldom in both classes, although praise plays a very important role in the process of learning and socio-cognitive de- velopment of pupils (Burnett, 2002; Maclellan, 2005). The literature suggests that older pupils perceived praise after success or neutral feedback after fa- ilure as an indication that the teacher perceived their ability to be low. When given criticism after failure and neutral feedback after success, they percei- ved that the teacher had evaluated their ability to be high and their effort low (Hattie and Timperley, 2007, p. 97). The corpus reveals the following results. The Serbian teacher praises four times: twice the whole class with “Vi to lepo znate” (You know that very well, 0463) and “Lepo ste to zaključili” (You’ve concluded that very nicely, 0535), twice male pupils U3 and U5 with “Odlično” (Excellent, 0593) and once the male pupil U5 and female pupil Ua4 also with “Odlično” (Excellent, 1029). This praise is related to the pupils’ good academic achievement, i.e. accurate conclusions about the topic they were discussing. The next example in Excerpt 3 demonstrates how the Serbian teacher within only one complex IRF/E-exchange treats a male and female pupil differently, after right answering her question. 184 185 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) In Excerpt 3 the Serbian teacher asks a question about the keywords from the poem (0794–0795). She addresses the whole class, using personal pronoun and a verb for the 2nd person plural (vi mislite) and without inserting any names. So, any pupil having an appropriate answer may begin and give an answer. The female pupil Ua4 answers correctly (0796). At that moment, the male pupil U5 turns back toward Ua4 because she sits in the back row and he in the middle row (0797). That tells us how much he is interested to see whether she is going to give correct answer or not, because the same female pupil succeeded several times before in giving correct answers and his own attempts failed. The teacher repeats the female pupil’s answer and evaluates it as correct (0798). Then she requires further responses from the whole class (because she uses “children”) (0799–0800) and the same male pupil U5 repli- es correctly (0801). The teacher’s reaction is praise, with “excellent” (0802). Pupil U5 is very pleased with this positive evaluation, and he happily shakes his head and smiles (0803). The praise was omitted when the female pupil gave the correct answer, and thus the male pupil feels that his correct answer has higher value and his higher position in the class hierarchy is confirmed. Excerpt 3 0794 N VA ∫<Šta vi mislite∫ [∫ [∫what are those keywords?>] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 0796 Ua4 VA Svetli grobovi. [Light graves.] NA o- - - - loo at N- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o =================== 0797 U5 VA NA % turns back toward Ua4 o- - loo at Ua4 - - - - - - - o 0798 N VA Tako je, svetli grobovi.∫ [That’s right, light graves.∫] NA o - - - -stands in front of the table, fac, loo at Un- - - - - - - - - - - -o ........................................................................................................ 185 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction 0799 N VA ∫Dalje. (..) [∫Next. (..)] NA o- - - - fac, loo at Un- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 0800 VA Šta bismo rekli, deco? [What would we say, children?] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 0801 U5 VA Ideali.∫ [Ideals.∫] NA o- - - - loo at N- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 0802 N VA ∫*Odlično*, ideali. (...) [∫*Excellent*, ideals. (...)] NA o- - - - fac, loo at U5- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 0803 U5 VA NA o- - -shaking head, smiling - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - o The Hungarian teacher praises five times: twice the whole class with “Így van, nagyszerű” (That’s right, excellent, 048) and “Ügyesek vagytok” (You are clever, 050) for correct answering; once the male pupils T1 and T3 with “Nagyszerű! Jó.” (Excellent! Good., 419) for taking the initiative in role assi- gnment, and once the group of male and female student with “Nagyszerű” (Excellent, 510) after a reading exercise. 4.2.3 Thanking One of the most interesting features of feedback sequences in the Hungari- an class is the use of thanking, and we did not find this phenomenon in the Serbian lesson. On two occasions, both after reading exercises, the Hungarian teacher expresses thanks to the active female and male pupils for their efforts. She uses the expression “Jó, köszönjük” (Good, we thank you, 174) and the similar “Jó, elég, köszönjük szépen” (Good, that’s enough, we thank you very much, 613). These expressions are in the first-person plural. The teacher tries in this way to create an atmosphere of equal participation and mutual encou- ragement in classroom activities, and perhaps to underline belonging to same social (and cultural?) group. The use of thanking as type of feedback sequence in classroom talk is in our opinion a linguistic and cultural phenomenon of Hungarian speakers. It 186 187 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) allows the consideration of every speaker as equal regardless his/her actual conversational status. Unfortunately, there is still no research conducted on this to support this conclusion. 4.3 Negative feedback 4.3.1 Criticism As we already mentioned, we detected the teacher’s negative reaction only in the Serbian class. The most interesting type of negative feedback is criticism, because it applies the negative personal evaluation of pupils – it disrespects pupils’ personalities and presents an assault on their integrity (Arsenović Pa- vlović et al., 2017; Burnett, 2002). The collected data reveal only one occasion of critical feedback to one female pupil in the Serbian class. The following example in Excerpt 4 shows how the Serbian teacher criticizes the female pupil while at the same time not taking the opportunity to do the same to a male pupil. The poem analysed in the Serbian lesson dates from 19th century, and there- fore contains lot of archaic words. In Excerpt 4 the Serbian teacher asks a qu- estion about any archaic words that the pupils do not understand, addressing the whole class (0951). The male pupil U5 gives an answer first, slightly after the teacher ended her turn (0952). But this answer has nothing to do with the question asked, so the teacher ignores it. Then, the female pupil Ua2 gives an answer (0953). The teacher repeats it, beginning with “Hm” (0954). In this way she clearly shows her attitude towards its content: she is not satisfied with it. The teacher’s following comment is in fact a form of a negative critique, because she criticizes the female pupil’s lack of knowledge (0955–0956). The teacher does not give any explanation of these words in the following lines, and the female pupil continues with giving further examples of archaic and incomprehensible words. 187 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction Excerpt 4 0951 N VA Koje su to reči?∫ [What are these words?∫] NA o- - - - -stands l by the table, glasses in ha, fac, loo at Un - - - - - -o 0952 U5 VA ∫To je pogrešno. [∫That is wrong.] NA o- - - - loo at N- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 0953 Ua2 VA Golemo, ogromno, ***∫ [∫Tremendous, huge, ***] NA o- - - - - - - loo at textbook- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - -o 0954 N VA ∫ Hm. Golemo i ogromno∫ [∫Hm. Tremendous and huge∫] NA % smiles o- - - - -stands l by the table, glasses in ha, fac, loo at Ua2 - - - - - - 0955 VA ∫∫ [∫that this is// that this is an unknown word.>∫] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 4.4 Feedback omission The omission of the teacher feedback can have negative effects on pupil’s sel- f-esteem, and this strategy can be used for different treatment of male and fe- male pupils (Frawley, 2005; Tannen, 1993). Spender (1990, p. 102–131) claims based on her own classroom discourse research that female pupils’ spoken con- tributions to classroom discussions are largely ignored by teachers. They receive not only less attention from the teacher but must also wait longer to get it. In this way female pupils become invisible and less respected in the classroom. The following examples in Excerpt 5 and Excerpt 6 illustrate the different treatment of male and female pupils when it comes to feedback practices in classroom discourse. The part of the Hungarian lesson is dedicated to reading exercises and to improving reading comprehension. Three female pupils and two male pupils 188 189 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) read the play aloud from the textbook. The excerpts below show two situati- ons when one female pupil (TL3, Excerpt 5) and two male pupils (T3 and T1, Excerpt 6) assign themselves the roles they want to read. Excerpt 5 372 TŐ VA ∫azt szeretném hogy megcsinálnám // [∫I would like to do //] NA o- -stands by the desk, fac Tn, loo at textbook, r ha holding the text- book - ========= 373 TL3 VA =Gizi leszek.= [=I will be Gizi.=] NA o- - -smiling - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - % looks up at TŐ 374 TŐ VA Leszel? [Will you?] NA % looks up at TL3 o- -stands by the desk, fac, loo at TL3, holding textbook in r ha - -o 375 TL3 VA =Igen.= [=Yes.=] NA - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o % loo at Tn 376 Tn VA NA o- - -some turning towards TL3, smiling - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - o Excerpt 6 415 T3 VA ∫ [∫] NA o- - -finger-rising, loo at TŐ- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o ==== 416 TŐ VA Gizi // NA o- - -stands by the desk, fac, loo at TL3 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o ==== 189 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction 417 T1 VA ∫∫ [∫∫] NA o- - -finger-rising, loo at TŐ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 418 T3 VA ∫Én meg a Béla.] [∫And I will be Bela.] NA o- - - -loo at TŐ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -o 419 TŐ VA Nagyszerű! Jó. [Excellent! Good.] NA o- - -stands by the desk, loo at T1 and T3- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - o These two situations differ in the context and timing of occurrence. At the point when TL3 interrupts the teacher no one has mentioned any reading exercises or role assignment. The teacher explains at that moment some fe- atures of the dialogic forms in the text and then the female pupil interrupts her (372–373). That tells us two things. First, reading exercises are a common classroom activity, something that pupils expect to do when some new literary text or writer are introduced, and the teacher assumes with all certainty that she does not have to give any information about the activity. Secondly, the excerpts show that the female pupil (TL3) decides to act by interrupting the teacher’s turn and expressing her willingness and desire ‘to be’ a character who she likes. She is the one who takes initiative first. In Excerpt 6 the teacher, at that moment, carries out the actual role assi- gnment. In the previous exchanges she had assigned the role of one female character and the narrator to two girls (TL8 and TL9). Now with an attempt at “Gizi//” (416) she wants to confirm the participation of TL3 (because she expressed this wish before, Excerpt 5). The male pupil T3 uses her intra-turn pause to state his wish to participate in the reading exercise in the form of a question (415), followed by the male pupil T1 who states also in the form of question that he wants to read the lines of one male character (417). Then T3 immediately extends his previous turn with the same wish as T1 (418). In both examples the teacher’s turns are interrupted, she stops her verbal activity and focuses on the questions posed by all the pupils. The difference lies in how she reacts. When the female pupil interrupts her, she responds in the form of the yes-no-question (374). She is not willing to get an answer (although the TL3 answers with “yes”, 375), because feedback or evaluation is 190 191 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) omitted. Therefore, TL3 doesn’t actually know whether she is going to read or not. The teacher continues with further explanations. TL3 spoke when it was not allowed and got punished for it. On the other hand, the teacher’s reaction to the male pupils’ interruption is “Excellent! Good.” (419). We can read this as: You did well, I am happy and proud of you and I support your initiative. 5 C O N C L U S I O N The analysis of teachers’ feedback sequences in the Serbian and Hungarian classes showed differences in feedback type and distribution between the Serbian and the Hungarian class regarding pupils’ gender. The ‘confirmation’ and ‘repeating of pupils’ answers’ in order to evaluate them as correct are the most prevalent types of feedback. Moreover, male pupils receive more positive feedback from teachers in both classes than female pupils. The positive feedback types of ‘addition of a response’ and ‘thanking’ appear only in the Hungarian class. The use of thanking as type of feedback sequen- ce in classroom talk is in our opinion a linguistic and cultural phenomenon of Hungarian speakers. It allows the consideration of every speaker as equal regardless of his/her actual conversational status. Unfortunately, there is still no research conducted on this phenomenon to support this conclusion. The negative feedback types ‘ironic comment’ and ‘criticism’ seem to be re- served only for female pupils in the Serbian class. The omission of feedback is also more commonly used after the correct answers of female pupils. The teachers not only fewer evaluations of female pupils’ performance (regar- ding the number of male and female pupils in the classes) but also criticize female pupil’s lack of knowledge, as in the Serbian lesson. They also ignore the poor performances or the wrong answers of male pupils and praise them more directly. Male pupils thus experience different treatment and receive more opportunities to participate in classroom discourse. That influences the positioning and image of male and female pupils in the classroom hierarchy, and the development of specific psychosocial features that support the higher status of male pupils in the group (class) and in relation to the teachers. The limitations of this research are connected with the fact that a relatively small corpus (only two lessons in two classes) was analysed, so any kind of 191 M. BAŠARAGIN, S. SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction generalisation is excluded. It is necessary to conduct a wider research project, especially because the classroom discourse and gender interaction within a classroom setting are at this point more than underrepresented as research objectives in Serbian literature. 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SAVIĆ: Gender perspective on teacher-pupil classroom interaction Appendix: Symbols used in transcription N, TŐ teacher Ua, TL female pupil U, T male pupil VA verbal activity NA nonverbal activity 0001-... number of sequences .................. beginning and ending of IRE/F cycles o- - - -o duration of NA % momentariness of NA , . ? ! punctuation (..) short pause (...) longer pause (.n) very long pause *text between these signs* particularly emphasized -text between these signs- loudly pronounced =text between these signs= quietly pronounced quickly pronounced >text between these signs< slowly pronounced // unfinished sequence, (self)repair ====== overlap ∫ latching [] translation loo looking at fac facing ha hand(s) r right l left 196 197 Slovenščina 2.0, 2019 (2) VIDIK SPOLA PRI RAZREDNI INTERAKCIJI MED UČITELJI IN UČENCI: POVRATNE INFORMACIJE IN OCENJEVANJE Različne raziskave potrjujejo, da pri izmenjavah v učilnici prihaja do neenake obravnave fantov in deklet. Namen članka je določiti razlike v učiteljskem odzivu po govornem udejstvovanju šolarjev in šolark, hkrati pa ugotoviti, ali različni tipi odzivov učitelja pomagajo krepiti različne jezikovne, spolne in kul- turne identitete učencev v srbskih in madžarskih razredih. Korpus je bil leta 2015 sestavljen iz prispevkov zadnjega razreda dvojezične osnovne šole v Sub- otici (Vojvodina), sestoji pa iz transkripcij dveh zvočnih in video posnetkov pouka maternega jezika v srbskih in madžarskih razredih. Rezultati potrjuje- jo razlike pri tipu in distribuciji povratnih informacij učitelja v obeh razredih glede na spol. Povratne informacije učiteljev podpirajo višji status fantov v sku- pini (razredu) v v razmerju do učitelja. Ključne besede: interakcija v razredu, povratne informacije, družbeni spol, madžarščina, srbščina To delo je ponujeno pod licenco Creative Commons: Priznanje avtorstva-Deljenje pod enakimi pogoji 4.0 Mednarodna. / This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share- Alike 4.0 International. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/