Navigating controversial discussions: the role of talk moves in dialogic teaching

Despite its importance for students’ learning, engaging students in dialogic discussions, especially about controversial, justice-oriented topics, can be difficult for U.S. teachers to enact due to current political constraints. In this study, we explore how three middle school teachers engaged their students in curriculum-embedded discussions on a controversial topic and highlight their deployment of talk moves to invoke or extend discussions, assert authority, and interrogate. Using the Low-Inference Discourse Observation tool, we also identify how teachers used specific talk moves for each of these purposes during discussions. Our work underscores how teacher talk moves, coded along a spectrum of dialogicity in form, can function differently in the context of dialogic discussions about controversial topics.