Professionalization of Prospective German teachers – A Conversation-Analytical Reconstruction of Explanations with Regard to Systematic Writing Knowledge

Abstract

The contribution deals with the reconstruction of interactive expla-nations in authentic situations of individual reading and spelling promotion from a conversation-analytical perspective. In the videographed classes, the basics of the syllabic analytical method according to Röber (2009, 2015) are worked on. This concept emphasizes the importance of the syllable for the process of written language acquisition. Two explanatory sequences are contrastively analyzed in which student teachers explain the differences between open and closed main syl-lables. It has proved to be important to describe how the students situatively and interactively structure the explanations, and how the subject matter is shaped. It is examined how the student teachers respond to the pupils’ contributions and how they succeed or fail managing the explanation process and producing knowledge interactively. The analysis shows that both students have the relevant knowledge of the German writing system and appropriate didactic knowledge for teaching the learning object. However, they succeed very differently in embedding this knowledge in the situational context. Finally, the extent to which these findings can be used for concepts and implementations of research-based learning in high-er education will be discussed.