ABSTRACT

This part introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters. The part focuses on dialogic education and digital technology. It provides an overview of a recent review of the interactions between classroom dialogue and digital technology, unpacking the significance of the notion of ‘affordances’ for our understanding of digital technology. The part discusses the kinds of affordances identified in the literature on classroom dialogue and digital technology, before introducing an extended exemplification in their discussion of the microblogging tool Talkwall. It highlights the way that new technologies bring both new possibilities and constraints to interaction. The part highlights, there is clear potential, and a need for further research, regarding the role of different kinds of technologies and the potential to analyse new kinds of data to gain insight into learning and use that analysis to develop new technologies and supports.