ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that among the hidden benefits of group work, in which children are expected to work and think together on academic tasks, is that by adopting a listening rather than a speaking role, a teacher can learn more about children’s understanding of their tasks than through more typical question-and-answer formats. Some teachers discover this for themselves and find that they need to revise their assessments of children’s thinking and reasoning. Examples of supporting evidence are drawn from observational and interview data in socioculturally grounded research that combines group work, dialogic learning and epistemic climate in primary mathematics in England and Spain. This chapter addresses the long-enduring case for rebalancing the ingrained teacher/adult domination of classroom interaction on grounds not only of the power of peer influence on cognitive development but also of the increasingly exclusive epistemic climate of present-day classrooms.
