Outcomes and Impact

Teaching, Learning and Assessment

ESOL tutors quickly realised that the Socratic dialogues they were leading were conversations that replicated the ‘Production’ element of the Presentation, Practice and Production Method of language acquisition. Research indicates that expecting people to use ‘presented’ and ‘practised’ language effectively in the ‘production’ phase is unrealistic. As Willis points out, ‘It is difficult to see how activities can be regarded as truly communicative if the learners’ main objective is not to achieve some outcome through the use of language, but to demonstrate to the teacher their control of the target form.’ (1990:4-5). Instead, learners need to be given the opportunity through task-based activities to simply throw all their language together and mutually strive for meaning ‘Since risk-taking is an important ingredient of natural learning and the search for perfection and fully defined linguistic goals does not allow for variety’ (Willis, 1993). As one tutor commented ‘Students were so keen to express themselves that they used any words they knew to get their point across to the group.’ This striving for meaning without feeling anxious about grammatical errors, built confidence and esteem in our learners. One tutor noted, “Everyone in the group spoke, even the least confident student. She is a new student who worries about making mistakes when she speaks. I could see her becoming more confident as the discussion went on and she realised that everyone was listening to what she was saying and not how she was saying it. She has been more confident in class since the Socratic dialogue too.”

Tutors also commented on how the conversations generated mutually supportive relationships and shifted the learning dynamic from being tutor-directed to one of collaborative learning, ‘If someone didn’t understand a word, the other students automatically explained the meaning of the word to help each other to understand.’ Likewise, a tutor commented that ‘I found that the students were naturally turn taking because they were genuinely interested in hearing the opinions of others in the group.’ We also noticed that the ensuing development of mutual understanding and respect helped with the creation of ‘a positive classroom environment where everyone can relate better to each other as individuals.’ Simply put by a learner, ‘it’s good to speak to different people and learn about different countries.’ Perhaps the most telling feedback, considering the impact of Covid 19 on all our lives, came from a tutor who believed that the conversations impacted on their mental health and wellbeing as, “it helps me to feel more connected to others again.”

Organisational Development

The promotion and celebration of different perspectives and insights was integral to our research activity. What was most striking was the significant impact on how tutors viewed ‘talk’ as a learning activity. Rather than ‘talk’ as means to an end those tutors who participated began to understand its value as an end in itself. Despite initial scepticism from some colleagues and subject specialisms, the ease of ‘giving it a try’ dispelled initial beliefs that the activity might only be suitable for certain subjects or with linguistically competent English speakers. The idea of ‘giving it a try’ fed directly into an organisational priority to develop more pedagogical risk taking and was taken up in other curriculum areas such as digital skills and LLDD programmes. Through the sharing of experiences, it became apparent that tutors, regardless of their specialism, could acknowledge that the dialogues led to positive and collaborative relationships that promoted mutual understanding and inclusion. As one tutor commented, ‘I’ve never learned so much by feeling that I’ve done so little’. Another theme from these cross-specialist conversations was the shared experience by many of continuing to think about questions after dialogues had concluded. A number of tutors reflected that the conversations ‘got inside their head’, whilst one learner put it as ‘I keep on thinking afterwards’.

What then of the implications for educational praxis? The following are three tentative suggestions based on this project.

Life is full of ‘big questions’, and this project taught us to be bold enough to know that they transcend lists of knowledge and skills criteria and appreciate their importance. One of the residual traditions of adult learning is that it should be grounded in, and respectful of, the lived experience of learners, and this project reminded us why.

Brian Simon (1915-2002,) the English Educationalist and Historian, believed that education has the power to help people think, question and be sceptical (1998). Using philosophical questioning through Socratic dialogues made us realise that we are all philosophers, and that such conversations have the power to develop, not only critical thinking, but also mutual understanding and inclusion. This was evidenced by our learners’ comments and our observations of learners expressing their thoughts and feelings, making connections and making friends.

“When minds meet, they don’t just exchange facts: they transform them, reshape them, draw different implications from them, engage in new trains of thought’’ (Zeldin, 1998, p98). This simple quote encapsulates why talk, discussion, dialogue, conversation, whichever word is chosen, is so important in learning. The participants in this research activity called it ‘real’ or ‘authentic’ talk. Through what we have learned during this project we have now made ‘Talk’ training and participatory ESOL activities integral to what we do. Sometimes new initiatives change practice and occasionally they truly change thinking. For us it was the latter, and as one tutor commented

“These conversations stay in your head afterwards and I really wasn’t expecting that.”