Johnson, M. (2026). Analysis of EFL student-teacher discourse during collaborative board game play
Metadata
- Authors: Mark Johnson
- Reviewed by: Ken Tran and Bailing He
- Volume and page numbers: 8 (p. 1 – 20)
- Date of publication: 2026/05/28
-
Keywords: Classroom discourse, EFL, Game-based language learning, Power dynamics, Sinclair and Coulthard’s framework
- Cite:
Johnson, M. (2026). Analysis of EFL student-teacher discourse during collaborative board game play. Ludic Language Pedagogy, 8, 1-20. https://doi.org/10.55853/LLP_v8Ar1
Download
Compendium items
KEY POINTS
- Background: Analysis of classroom discourse between learners and teachers has revealed power asymmetry in many learning situations.
- Aim: Investigate the discourse and power dynamics of an EFL lesson where the instructor played a collaborative boardgame alongside two learners.
- Methods: Sinclair and Coulthard’s model of classroom discourse was used, primarily at the level of move, act, and exchange to analyse a transcript of a lesson.
- Results: Instructor dominance of the discourse was found. Sinclair and Coulthard’s model was useful for revealing this, however the nontraditional use of a board game introduced several areas where the model fit was less strong.
- Conclusion: The study highlights the tendency toward teacher dominance of discourse. The results suggest that this dominance might be shifted by letting students play and teach a game that the instructor doesn’t know. Sinclair and Coulthard’s model provides a framework for comparing even nontraditional pedagogical situations.
TWEET
Analyzing the discourse of a game-based EFL lesson revealed teacher dominance, even during a collaborative board-game. Awareness of the Initiation-Response-Follow-up (IRF) sequence and how game turn structure interacts with talk may help make the most of these types of lessons.