Enhancing Classroom-based Talk provides an overview of the major research and theoretical perspectives that underpin the development of classroom-based talk. It provides strategies on how to promote student to student and student to teacher discourse during classroom-based activities, and elaborates on how teachers’ dialogic discourse can challenge children’s thinking and scaffold their learning. This comprehensive and practical book provides an overview of the empirical research and the theoretical perspectives that inform developments in classroom-based talk and is a a valuable asset to university and college teachers concerned with promoting classroom-based talk.

Enhancing Classroom-based Talk provides an overview of the major research and theoretical perspectives that underpin the development of classroom-based talk. It outlines specific dialogic strategies and elaborates on the key role that teachers play in promoting interactions, challenging thinking and scaffolding the learning of students.

While it is important to know how different dialogic approaches can enhance students’ interactions and learning and the effects they have on students’ social, emotional and cognitive development, it is also important to understand how students’ interactions promote understanding and learning during small group discussions. Throughout the book, teachers will be shown how to embed different dialogic approaches in their classrooms to promote discourse, with chapters covering:

• Interest in classroom-based talk
• The teacher’s role in promoting dialogue in the classroom
• Dialogic approaches to teaching
• Strategies to promote students’ interactions, thinking and learning
• Help seeking and help giving behaviours
• Creating environments that promote classroom-based talk

Enhancing Classroom-based Talk will be a valuable asset to all those concerned with promoting classroom-based talk, as well as postgraduate students, teachers and academics who are regularly called upon to assist in developing classroom interventions that provide for the academic and social needs of students.