Anomalies and conflicts in classroom discourse

In this study, a teaching episode is analyzed to determine how a conflict is perceived as such and overcome by students as a result of the verbal interaction between the teacher and the students. The episode is part of a teaching sequence aimed at discussing the particulate nature of matter with students aged 15–16 years. In the task that generated the episode, the students observed a glass of water with a piece of rock and a ice cube and represented, by particles, the constitution of these three materials. The students represented the particles of ice closer than the particles of water, ignoring the observation that the ice cube floated on the water. The episode consisted of a discussion between the teacher and a group of students and shows the laborious construction of the conflict in the verbal interaction. The episode is analyzed by drawing from two different theoretical perspectives. The Piagetian theory of equilibration is used to describe the phases of compensatory construction in the students' attempts to deal with the problem. Analysis of the verbal interaction that resulted in the conflict's compensation is based on the work of investigators such as Vygotsky, Bakhtin, and Wertsch, and allows us to redefine the Piagetian constructs. The main theoretical issue raised by the present analysis is the shift from a personal perspective to a social one, which is a consequence of changing from personal construction to verbal interaction as the unity of analysis.