Compelling student voice: dialogic practices of public confession

ABSTRACT

Encouraging and developing voice in the classroom is a key aim of dialogic pedagogy, but teachers’ elicitation of student voices is not always experienced as empowering. This case study investigates a sixth grade literacy lesson discussion about responding to peer group social ostracism. The teacher pressed students to adopt and articulate a stance on this socially and morally charged issue, resulting in a series of student public confessions. Using linguistic ethnographic micro-analytic methods, we examine the realization of voice in these events. Though some confessions were student-initiated, their contents were firmly directed by the teacher and dominated by her voice. Students were compelled to take a stand, and to express improper thoughts or actions, in an appropriate voice, or be challenged and/or judged inadequate. This case study shows how attempts to empower voice can back-fire; we argue that dialogic pedagogy should include a right to remain silent.

KEYWORDS:

• Voice
• confession
• dialogic pedagogy
• classroom discourse
• pedagogy
• linguistic ethnography

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Adam Lefstein http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9686-2662

Notes

1 The original Hebrew transcription is available from the authors.