1. The study focuses on how teachers in a Chinese university successfully encourage and elicit student dialogic talk through questioning, despite the cultural norm of reserve among students.
2. Two effective teacher questioning patterns were identified: using a series of display or convergent questions to create dialogic momentum, and persistently using explorative questions with multiple questioning strategies.
3. The findings show that dialogic interactions were rare in the observed classes, but when they did occur, teachers played a crucial role in eliciting productive classroom talk through their questioning discourse.
The article "Engaging students in dialogic interactions through questioning" presents a study on how teachers can encourage and elicit student dialogic talk in EFL classrooms. The study is based on observation data from a university in central China and focuses on the challenges of engaging students in dialogic interactions in a culture where reserve is the norm.
One potential bias in the article is the focus solely on the Chinese context. While it is important to consider cultural factors that may impact classroom discourse, it would be beneficial to also explore how these findings may apply to other cultural contexts. This narrow focus limits the generalizability of the study's findings.
Additionally, the article lacks discussion on potential limitations of the study methodology. While non-participant observation was used as the data collection method, there is no mention of potential biases or limitations associated with this approach. It would have been helpful for the authors to acknowledge any limitations or biases that may have influenced their findings.
Furthermore, the article does not provide a balanced discussion of different questioning techniques and their effectiveness in eliciting student dialogic talk. The focus is primarily on two questioning patterns identified in the study, without considering other possible strategies that teachers could use to promote dialogue in the classroom. This one-sided reporting limits the scope of the discussion and overlooks potentially valuable insights.
Moreover, there are unsupported claims throughout the article, such as stating that dialogue-oriented approaches are beneficial for L2 learners without providing concrete evidence or examples to support this assertion. Providing more empirical evidence or case studies would strengthen the credibility of these claims.
Overall, while the article provides valuable insights into how teachers can engage students in dialogic interactions through questioning, there are several areas where improvements could be made to enhance the depth and balance of the analysis. By addressing potential biases, acknowledging limitations, providing more evidence for claims, and exploring alternative perspectives, future research in this area could offer a more comprehensive understanding of effective teaching practices for promoting dialogue in EFL classrooms.