In this study, an essential part of the analysis of multicultural classroom interaction is object orientation, which is the main feature of activity. Object orientation of interaction needs to be understood in order to understand interaction. The object is the issue or question that the participants (teacher and students) work on. In interaction people are connected to the object and to each other. It is important to note that in my analysis objects are individual goals not collective objects in the same meaning as on the collective level (see more about this in Figure 6). The elements of interaction can be illustrated with the following figures (8–10) of Engeström (2004), based on earlier work by Raeithel (1983). The figures describe the quality of interaction and are called coordination, cooperation and communication (Engeström, 2004, p.106).
Figure 8. Structure of coordination (Engeström, 2004, p. 107)
In Figure 8 above, all the participants of interaction have their own objects. They do not share an object. All participants care only about their own interests. Script in this figure means the division of roles that regulate interaction (Engeström, 2004, p. 107).
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Figure 9. Structure of cooperation (Engeström, 2004, p. 108)
In Figure 9 all the participants have a shared object, and they try to structure and develop it instead of only playing their own role and being concerned with their own interests. The participants follow a planned script. Cooperation often produces new, concrete solutions for problems (Engeström, 2004, p. 108)
Figure 10. Structure of communication (Engeström, 2004, p. 109)
In Figure 10 all the participants direct their attention to a shared object, interaction and script of interaction. They reflectively evaluate and develop the object, the script and style of interaction together (Engeström, 2004, p. 109).
In Figure 8–Figure 10 tools should be placed between the participants and object. In shared interactive situations, tools of object-oriented activity as well as communicational tools, are needed (Engeström, 2004, p. 114).
It is possible to divide discussions analytically into episodes and, further, into themes according to topics of conversation. By classifying these episodes and themes it is possible to clarify the object orientation of the discussion (Engeström, 2004, pp. 106, 109–110).
In this study, the above-mentioned Figure 8–Figure 10 are used to clarify multicultural
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interaction in the home economics classroom. Also, Goffman’s (1963) idea of focused and unfocused interaction is applied together with Leontjev’s (1977) definition of action (presented in Chapter 4.1.6). Videodata is analyzed through participants’ (teacher and students) focusedness of actions. As Goffman (1963, p. 24) writes, focused interaction means interaction that occurs when persons gather close to each other and act together in order to maintain shared attention. Goffman (1963) also uses the concept unfocused interaction, which occurs when someone notices the presence of another person when she/he momentarily enters his/her horizon. Unfocused interaction can also be defined as "communication by gestures and signals that arises simply through actors being co-present, as in the case, for example, of body language."
Furthermore, Korvela’s (2003) study helped to perceive interaction in the multicultural classroom. She studied the lives of three families by videotaping their everyday life situations in their homes. The study examined interaction in the homes and was based on the cultural-historical activity theory. Korvela divided the videotaped data into sequences and episodes.
The episodes were determined according to how family members’ acts focused on shared or separate objects. Korvela’s concept object presented in her study originates from Goffman’s context of focused interaction.
Because the simultaneous action of many people were analyzed in classroom situations, I applied Korvela’s (2003) idea of analysis of interaction. Korvela divided the interaction of videotaped data into sequences and further into smaller parts, functional episodes. Korvela found sequences (similar functional units) by going through everyday life situations of the families she had videotaped. Korvela defined functional episodes by analyzing the focusedness of actions of family members. She determined an epsiode according to the focusedness of the object.
My focus is on interaction in the multicultural classroom, including the teacher’s and students’ actions. School activity is carried out through actions in the classroom. Hence actions and focusedness of actions are analyzed. Interaction in this study was divided into parts and the actualized script was defined from the videotaped sessions (three-lesson block).
The script in the study is the known or unknown plan that shows how interaction proceeds. In a new situation script can be undefined or vulnerable to disturbances. It is a gradual description of the events from a starting point to an ending point. At the same time it includes
“the division of roles” and it determines what kind of interests or perspectives the participants are expected to have (Engeström, 2004, p. 114). The traditional script of home economics lessons was described in Olsoni’s text in Chapter 2.1.
In the following, Figure 11 outlines the phases of the analysis.
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Figure 11. Phases of the analysis in this study
The data was divided into seven units, one unit of analysis being one videotaped session (three-lesson block). All sessions included similar parts that were named sequences. The whole data was transcribed and the sequences were divided into themes according to the issues the participants discussed and worked on. After that, the data was divided into episodes according to the participants’ focusedness of actions (of objects). Through this division it was possible to analyze the quality of interaction, the teacher’s actions as a mediator of meaning, her tool-use and connections between the students’ everyday lives and home economics. As explained later, deviations from the script, aka disturbances appeared and the questions posed, were also analyzed in order to understand the interaction more precisely.
In the following, a more detailed analysis of the data will be presented, starting with observation of the videotapes and ending with sequences, themes and episodes.
6.2 “Rough analysis” of the videotaped data
The data (21 hours of authentic learning situations) was transferred from a digital video camera to a computer and then transferred to a digital versatile disc (DVD). The data was analyzed by examining interactive educational situations. I watched collected data from the DVD and divided the classroom activities into sequences, themes and episodes. The classroom activities were then “divided into units” and analyzed.
In this analysis the students were given imaginary names. Nine of the students were immigrants and two were from the dominant culture. During this data analysis the word researcher was used to refer to me and the word teacher refer to the other home economics teacher who taught the class. The word participants referred to both the students and teacher.
The term session means a block of three lessons (3 x 45 min.) of home economics, which the multicultural class had once a week. DVD-taped data of the study includes seven sessions. In this study, a lesson is one hour (45 min.) inside the sessions.
Action in the classroom included rich interactive situations that were not easy to grasp. I started to analyze the collected data by watching it (seven 3-hour sessions) over and over again. First, a “rough version” of what happened during the lessons was outlined. Situations in which teacher and students had problems in understanding each other and the lively conversations where teacher and students seemed to understand each other were marked.
Sequences
↓ Themes
↓ Episodes
Interaction in the classroom Phases of the analysis
-Quality of interaction (focusedness of actions) -Deviations from the script (questions and disturbances) -Connections to students' everyday lives
-Teacher's actions as mediator of meaning
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Then different sessions were compared with each other. At this point I needed to transcribe the collected data and systematically divide it into smaller units.
Overall, similar parts of the scripts of the seven sessions were found and marked. These parts were named as sequences. Then, an overall analysis of the sequences was outlined. After this, different topical themes inside the sequences were marked. Using this division, I began to outline the scripts of the different sessions. During a rough analysis of the data I realized that it was necessary to specify the start and the end of different sequences, themes and episodes.