Using Knowledge Construction Circle To Promote Students' Participation In Classroom Discussion

Facing the requirement of cultivating innovation ability in this new era, knowledge building theory shows good adaptability, and has been applied and also got developed in many countries and areas. Knowledge building discourse is one of the12knowledge building principles. Its role is to improve the level of understanding by participating in the conversation, sharing ideas and building new knowledge. However, the outcome of students’ participation in an experiment of knowledge building teaching which was applied in a primary school of Nanjing is not optimistic. In this study, the knowledge building circle strategy was applied to improve the students’participation in whole-class discussion and to explore the impact of this strategy.This study used a quasi-experimental method. The whole teaching process is divided into unused strategy and strategy of using phase based on knowledge building circle, and the study lasted for one semester. The knowledge building circle strategy is not used in the previous stage and students discuss in the traditional discussion way. In the second stage, the "knowledge construction circle" strategy is used in knowledge building discourse, then teacher and students make preparations for discussing as required. At the same time, this research uses the participatory classroom observation and collects data by shooting video and photos. In addition, the researcher gets feedback from students through the questionnaire survey.The researcher analyzed the data and got some conclusions. Firstly, the quantity of students’ participation in class discussion is much better in the second stage than in the first stage. The transformation of teacher’s role and clear rules to guide the talk is the main factors causing such change. Secondly, the performance of students’ participation shows positive trends in general after using the knowledge building circle strategy. And each dimension shows different results affected by the strategy. The last but not the least, the knowledge building circle strategy can promote the quality of whole class discussing. The level of students’ questions depth and explanations depth are improved significantly when the strategy is used in their classes. This is mainly due to that the knowledge building circle creates an environment that students are willing to speak and it improves the effectiveness of their discussion.This article also shares some experience of using knowledge building circle. The experience may be helpful for these teachers who carrying out knowledge building teaching.