National andInternational Conference onCurriculum andInstruction2017
February 4, 2017, Facultyof Education,KhonKaenUniversity,Thailand
Interaction Patterns in English Language Classroom:A Case ofPre-service
English Teachers at Roi-et Rajabhat University
Angcharin Thongpan (Angcharin@reru.ac.th)
Lecturer, English Programme, Faculty of Education, Roi-et Rajabhat University,Thailand
Phornnuanphajong Luangwangpho (Phornnuanphajong@gmail.com)
Lecturer, English Programme, Faculty of Education, Roi-et Rajabhat University,Thailand
Kanyawadee Saeng-ngam (Kanya991@hotmail.com)
Lecturer, Curriculum and Instruction Programme, Faculty of Education, Roi-et Rajabhat
University,Thailand
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to investigate pre-service English teachers’ use of the
communicative language teaching in English language classroom and to describe the features
of the interaction patterns. The participants consisted of 30 students who enrolled School
Internship 1 (EDU5330) required by RERU, academic year 2016. The class was observed by
video record in order to determine the communicative features in the classroom interactions.
The data were video transcribed via COLT (Communicative Orientation of Language
Teaching) observation schemes (Allen, Fröhlich & Spada, 1983) and interview questions.
The data from observation schemes were analyzed by proportion calculations whereas
a content analysis was carried out with the data from interviews.
The results have revealed that pre-service English teachers’ language class reflects
important characteristics of Interaction Patterns in Language Classroom. However, the
learners mostly produce pre-prepared and rehearsed interaction, and so they need to be
guided and trained to use English language in a more meaningful way.
Keywords: COLT, pre-service English teachers

National andInternational Conference onCurriculum andInstruction2017
February 4, 2017, Facultyof Education,KhonKaenUniversity,Thailand
Introduction
In recent years, the development of communicative competence has become the
explicit focus of numerous second language teaching programs. Although models of
communicative competence ( Canale and Swain 1980). Teaching is mainly an outcome of a
teacher’s perception. Whatever teachers do in their classrooms is an outcome of their
educational beliefs, whether they are aware of their teaching philosophy or not. Teacher’s
belief about how better a foreign language can be learned plays a significant role in deciding
how they will conduct their classes. English teachers have their beliefs and perceptions about
various classroom activities and accordingly they execute these beliefs and knowledge in their
classroom practices. But, does it always happen? Thus, it is not possible to claim that a
change in theory will guarantee a change in practice and whether the application of the
communicative approach in actual teaching contexts is as successful as it is in the theoretical
base still remains as a question. Consequently, there is a need for an effective feedback about
the successful and inefficient facets of the mentioned approach in terms of its application and
this study aims to meet this need in practice and whether the application of the communicative
approach in actual teaching contexts is as successful as it is in the theoretical base still
remains as a question. Consequently, there is a need for an effective feedback about the
successful and inefficient facets of the mentioned approach in terms of its application and this
study aims to meet this need.
ResearchQuestions
1) What are the participant organization patterns in English language class?
2) What do the Pre-service English Teachers and the students think about the
communicative features of their lessons?
Methodology
Participants
The participants of this study included the students and 3 pre-service English teacher
of secondary class from 3 schools in 2016 academic year. 3 schools were chosen because it
was as a place where the 5th years student teaching training.
Data Collection Instruments
1. Communicative Orientation of Language Teaching (COLT) Observation
Scheme
The COLT observation scheme is divided into two parts. Part A describes classroom
events at the level of activity, and Part B analyzes the communicative features of verbal
exchanges between teachers and students as they occur within each activity. The decision to
establish classroom activity as the main unit of analysis was based on the fact that this
concept is familiar to teachers and constitutes the focus around which most teaching is
conceived and organized. The rationale for Part B derives from the fact that the development
of communicative competence is a major concern in the current language teaching literature,

National andInternational Conference onCurriculum andInstruction2017
February 4, 2017, Facultyof Education,KhonKaenUniversity,Thailand
and constitutes one of the basic issues in the Development of Bilingual Proficiency Project of
which the classroom observation studies form a part. In this section I will present a brief
discussion of the main parameters of the observation scheme. The description of classroom
activities will be dealt with first, followed by a presentation and discussion of the
communicative features of classroom interaction proposed in this scheme.
COLT Part B Communicative Feature
The COLT observation scheme Part B consists of an analysis of the communicative
features occurring within each activity, there are seven communicative features have been
isolated:
1) Use of target language, this communicative feature is designed to measure the extent
to which the target language is used in the classroom. This feature is covered by two
categories in the coding scheme LI refers to use of the first language, and L2 refers to
use of the second or foreign language.
2) Information gap, this communicative feature refers to the information requested
and/or exchanged is unpredictable, that is, not known in advance. It consisted of two
subcategories:
2.1. Requesting information
(a) Pseudo-requests (The speaker already possesses the information
requested).
(b) Genuine requests (The information requested is not known in
advance).
2.2 Giving information
(a) Predictable (The message is easily anticipated in that there is a very
limited range of information that can be given in the case of responses, only one
answer is possible semantically, although there may be different correct grammatical
realization).
(b) Unpredictable (The message is not easily anticipated in that there is
a wide range of information that can be given. If a number of responses are possible,
they provide different information).
3) Sustained speech, this feature is intended to measure the extent to which speakers
engage in extended discourse, or restrict their utterances to a minimal length of one
sentence, clause or word. The categories designed to measure this feature are:
a. Ultra-minimal (utterances which consist of one word coded for student
speech only).
b. Minimal (utterances which consist of one clause or sentence for the
teacher, one-word utterances art coded as minimal).
c. Sustained speech (utterances which are longer than one sentence, or
which consist of at least two main clauses).
4) Reaction to form or message, the point at issue being whether the purpose of an
exchange is to focus on the language code (that is, grammatical correctness) or on the
message, or meaning, being conveyed. Research has shown that in first language

National andInternational Conference onCurriculum andInstruction2017
February 4, 2017, Facultyof Education,KhonKaenUniversity,Thailand
acquisition attention is focused on the meaning rather than on the well- utterances
(Snow and Ferguson 1977, Wells 1981).
5) Student/teacher utterances, there are many ways in which participants may react to
each other's contributions, this feature as follows:
a. No incorporation: No feedback or reaction is given.
b. Repetition: Full or partial repetition of previous utterance(s).
c. Paraphrase: Completion and/or reformulation of previous utterance(s).
d. Comment: Positive or negative comment (not correction) on previous utterance
(s).
e. Expansion: Extension of the content of preceding utterance(s) through the
addition of related information.
f. Elaboration: Requests for further information related to the subject matter of
the preceding utterance(s).
6) Discourse initiation, in first communication among teacher and students, interactions
generally has equality in discourse roles and also spontaneously initiates talk.
7) Restriction of linguistic form, in mother tongue communication, speakers use a wide
variety of linguistic forms to express the meanings they wish to convey.
The analysis started with the calculation of time for each activity and episode and then the
percentage of the time spent on each of the categories was calculated under the major parameters.
Coding was done by putting check marks into the appropriate boxes under each category. To
achieve reliability, the coding was done many times at different times with the help of the tape-
recordings and controlled by three different supervisors until a full agreement was reached. The
inter-rater reliability for the coding was calculated as .98.
2. Interview Questions
The participant 3 pre-service English teacher and seven voluntary students were
interviewed. The interview questions were prepared based on the categories on the observation
scheme so as to determine both the pre-service English teacher’s and students’ perceptions of the
way in which the language was taught. To achieve validity and reliability in the interviews, all the
questions were asked to the participants exactly in the same wording and they were assured that
they would not be penalized because of what they would tell since their identity would not be
revealed. Some random parts of the interviews were transcribed twice at different times to
check consistency.
Findings
Findings for the Classroom Observations (Part B)
The results for the analysis of the classroom observation data collected with the COLT
Part B have been presented in this section under the three main categories provided in the
observation scheme.
The distributions of the participant organization of pre-service English teachers of
secondary class have been given in Table 1.

National andInternational Conference onCurriculum andInstruction2017
February 4, 2017, Facultyof Education,KhonKaenUniversity,Thailand
Teacher interaction Total
1. Target
language
L1 9.63
L2 90.37
2.Information
gap
Requesting
information
Pseudo-
requests
52.0
Genuine
requests
48.0
Giving
information
Predictable 56.22
Unpredictab
le
43.87
3. Sustained
speech
Ultra-minimal 30.0
Minimal 23.23
Sustained speech 46.77
4. Reaction to
form or message
13.03
5. Student/
Teacher
utterances
No incorporation -
Repetition 14.12
Paraphrase 43.7
Comment 39.21
Expansion 2.12
Elaboration -
6. Discourse
initiation
74.0
7.Restriction of
linguistic form
5
As can be seen in Table 1, the 93.37% of pre-service English teacher’s interaction was
in L2 whereas 67.33% of students use. The Information gap scheme, teacher use pseudo-
requests information was 52.0% while student’s 98.0%. Teachers giving information by
predictable 56%. For sustained speech, the teachers frequency use of 46.77% and students’
77.0%. In reaction to form or message, Teacher interaction was 13.03 while students’87.0%.
Teacher mainly initiative discourse 74.0% whereas students’26.0%. Students use restriction of
linguistic form of 95.0 but the teachers use only5%.
The findings concerning the teacher interaction mainly L2 in the classroom, in
contrast, the students used L1. The mean of the teacher/student interaction also indicates that
the teachers used the target language more often than students. The Information gap scheme,
teacher use pseudo-requests information at the most. Sustained speech were mostly used by
students, they also Reaction to form or message. Teachers work as a major in discourse
initiation finally; students always used the restriction of linguistic form.
Student interaction Total
1. Target
language
L1 67.33
L2 32.67
2.Information
gap
Requesting
information
Pseudo-
requests
98.0
Genuine
requests
2.0
Giving information Predictable 75.87
Unpredictabl
e
24.13
3. Sustained
speech
Ultra-minimal 77.0
Minimal 23.27
Sustained speech -
4. Reaction to
form or message
87.0
5. Student/
Teacher
utterances
No incorporation 45.12
Repetition 34.0
Paraphrase -
Comment -
Expansion 20.0
Elaboration -
6. Discourse
initiation
26.0
7.Restriction of
linguistic form
95

National andInternational Conference onCurriculum andInstruction2017
February 4, 2017, Facultyof Education,KhonKaenUniversity,Thailand
Example
Teacher/Student interaction Communicative features Part
B
T : Did anyone watch a football match last night? L2/Gen.Req/Min
S1 : NO L2/Unpred/Info/Unrestr/Ultram
T : Chanpen? You watched it in English? L2/Gen/Req/Min
S2 : The (inaudible) L2 (uncodable)
T : I want, I don’t want to know if you watched
Thai TV programs, I want to know if you watched
English Nuttawut?
L2/Mess – Comment/Min.
S3 : Yes L2/Unpred/Unrestr.Ultram.
4. Results and Discussion
The purpose of this study is to investigate pre-service English teachers’ use of the
communicative language teaching in English language classroom and to describe the features
of the interaction patterns.
First, the dominant participant organization in the observed lessons is between the pre-
service teacher and the students, it is possible to conclude that there is a tendency for a teacher-
centered instruction, but there is also encouragement for the interaction among the learners. This
is consistent with the participants’ opinions concerning the activities since both the teacher and
the students seem to be highly aware of the advantages of such activities and favor the inclusion
of them in their lessons. The findings of this paper have also revealed that not only the teacher
but also the students reacted to message more than to form in their interaction. Moreover,
reaction to language form was observed a lot more often within the teacher utterances which
could be explained with the fact that it was mainly the teacher who provided the feedback on
the usage of the language. The communicative approach highlights the significance of
information gap in interaction since there is a high degree of unpredictability in natural
discourse. That is, speakers normally do not ask the questions the answers of which they
know, or they do not provide the information which they think is known or anticipated in
advance. However, such things happen quite often in language classrooms for the sake of
practice (Spada & Fröchlich, 1995). While results of the Part B analysis confirm some of the
findings of other studies on classroom interaction (e.g., Sinclair and Coulthard 1975, Naiman,
Fröhlich, Stern, and Todesco 1978, Wells 1981) for example, that students usually have the
exclusive role of responding to questions which are generally pseudo-requests and that
students rarely interact with each other in teacher-centered classrooms, there were some
interesting differences among the programs observed in this study. In particular, students in
immersion classes, where subject-matter instruction in the L2 was part of the curriculum,

National andInternational Conference onCurriculum andInstruction2017
February 4, 2017, Facultyof Education,KhonKaenUniversity,Thailand
were given more opportunity for unrestricted language use, for sustained speech, and for
giving unpredictable information. The results provide preliminary evidence that the scheme is
capable of doing so the programs did indeed differ in their communicative orientation. The
development of an observation
scheme capable of capturing the characteristics of different types of classrooms is an
important step toward identifying what makes one set of instructional techniques more
effective than another. In
particular, it is hoped that the COLT scheme will assist in clarifying a number of issues
relating to the current debate on the respective advantages of more communicative approaches
versus more controlled,
structure-based approaches to second language education.
References
Naiman, Neil, Maria Fröhlich, Hans H. Stern, and Angie Todesco. (1978).The good language
learner. Toronto: Ontario Institute for Studies inEducation.
Sinclair, John M., and R. Malcolm Coulthard. (1975). Towards an analysis of discourse.
London: Oxford University Press.
Spada, N., & Fröhlich, M. (1995). Communicative orientation of language teaching
observation scheme coding conventions and applications. Sydney: NCELTR.
Wells, Gordon. (1981). Learning through interaction: the study of language development.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.