Classroom dialogue: a systematic review across four decades of research

Abstract

Recognizing that empirical research into classroom dialogue has been conducted for about 40 years, a review is reported of 225 studies published between 1972 and 2011. The studies were identified through systematic search of electronic databases and scrutiny of publication reference lists. They focus on classroom dialogue in primary and secondary classrooms, covering the full age range of compulsory schooling. The methods of data collection and analysis used in the studies are described and discussed, with changes and continuities over time highlighted. Study results are then summarized and integrated to present a succinct picture of what is currently known and where future research might profitably be directed. One key message is that much more is known about how classroom dialogue is organized than about whether certain modes of organization are more beneficial than others. Moreover, epistemological and methodological change may be required if the situation is to be remedied.

Keywords:

• dialogue
• classroom interaction
• systematic review

Notes

1. In a rather paradoxical fashion, our confidence over representativeness has been boosted through the enormously helpful comments we received on this manuscript from two anonymous reviewers. Like (we predict) many readers, the reviewers identified research (even areas of research) that we might possibly have overlooked. We checked our records, finding that in every case the work in question had been identified and was therefore incorporated within the initial set of 1532 publications. In many cases, the work was then excluded for failure to comply with one or more of the assessment criteria. In some cases though, it survived assessment, and is actually included in the final sample. Most likely we referenced the research against a different source from the one that the reviewers were using and/or did not cite the research explicitly in the text. (About 20% of the asterisked items listed in the References are not cited, usually because their topic was not developed in depth, e.g. as with some of the infrequently explored ‘predictors of variability’ listed in Table 6).