MASARYK UNIVERSITY IN BRNO

Faculty of Education
Department of English Language and Literature

Teacher’s Role in Pair Work

Thesis

Supervisor: Written by:

PhDr. Alena Kašpárková Pavlína Berčíková

Brno 2007
Declaration:

I proclaim that I worked on this thesis on my own and that I used only the sources cited
in the bibliography list.

I agree with this thesis being deposited in the Library of the Faculty of Education at the
Masaryk University and with its being made available for academic purposes.

In Brno 18 May 2007

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Acknowledgment:

I would like to express special thanks to my supervisor PhDr. Alena Kašpárková for
revising my thesis, for her valuable advice, kind and helpful attitude and considerable
assistance that she provided me throughout the thesis.

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 Contents

CONTENTS……………………………………..….…………...................4
INTRODUCTION………………………………..……………..................6
I. THEORETICAL PART……………………………................................8
1. Whole class teaching..................................... ..........…….....................8
2. Teacher talking time.........................……………………...................10
3. Pair work..................……………………………………...................12
3. 1 Why pair work is necessary.........................………..................12
3. 2 Advantages of using pair work .......………………..................15
3. 3 Problems with pair work and some possible solutions..............18
3. 4 Organising pair work in the classroom......................................22
3. 4. 1 Feedback session and follow up work.................….......23
3. 4. 2 How to pair students off ………………..............…...................25
3. 4. 3 Seating arrangement during pair work.........................................26
4. The role of a teacher............................................................................29
5. 4.1 The role of a teacher during pair work..........................................30
4.2 Teacher positioning in the classroom...................................................31
6. Correcting mistakes in pair work activities ........................................32
5. 1 Delayed correction…………..……………………...................34
5. 2 Peer correction.....................................................................................35
5. 3 Observers...................................................................................35
II. PRACTICAL PART………………………………………….............37
7. The description of participants and methods..........................................37
8. The description of activities……………………………….……… .38
8. 1 Activity 1: Shamed! I have the messiest bedroom....................38
8. 2 Activity 2: Interview your classmates.......................................39
8. 3 Activity 3: Getting to know you................................................40
8. 4 Activity 4: Spot the differences.................................................41
8. 5 Activity 5: This is my favourite! Do you agree?.......................42
8. 6 Activity 6: A family tree......................................................................43
9. Observations....................................................................................44
9. 1 Observation 1: Shamed! I have the messiest bedroom..............45
9. 2 Observation 2: Interview your classmates.................................47
9. 3 Observation 3: Getting to know you..........................................49
9. 4 Observation 4: Spot the differences...........................................52
9. 5 Observation 5: This is my favourite! Do you agree?.................54
9. 6 Observation 6: A family tree.....................................................57
9. 7 Findings.....................................................................................59
10. The analyses of the questionnaire for students.................................61
CONCLUSION..........................................................................................66
SUMMARY...............................................................................................67

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BIBLIOGRAPHY...................................................................................... 68
APPENDICES............................................................................................70

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Introduction

In recent years there have been a number of exciting developments in language

teaching.. These developments are sometimes reffered to as communicative language
teaching or CLT. (Nolasco, Arthur 1988) According to Nolasco and Arthur a greater
emphasis on activities in which students have chance to determine what they want to
say independently on the teacher is among the most important features of CLT. The
problem of getting students to express themselves freely in the foreign language has
come to prominence.(Ur 1981:2) I do not want to disclaim whole class teaching since
there are many occasions when a teacher working with class as a whole is the best type
of classroom organisation.(Harmer 1998) However, “when we want all students to
speak, and for as much time as possible, the simplest arithmetic will make it clear that a
forty-minute period, even if every member of the class speaks, he will do so only a
minute or two.” (Ur 1989) Ur also points out that in reality even this is not achieved.

I have chosen the topic of pair work for my thesis since it is one of the possible
solutions of the problem how to get all students to speak in language lessons. I often
use this way of interaction in my teaching, but I sometimes have a tendency to interrupt
students when they are speaking together during pair work activity. I have noticed that
they do not feel comfortable with my interventions. That is why I decided to observe
students’ behaviour to find out how this is changing with various teacher’s roles. My
main aim was to find out what teachers actually do in various stages of pair work and
what are students’ reactions to teacher’s roles. I observed my own classroom to
examine how many roles the teacher has during one stage of an activity.

This thesis is divided into theoretical and practical sections. In the theoretical section I
firstly deal with whole class teaching to point out to advantages and disadvantages of
locksteps. In this part I wanted to underline the necessity of increasing students’ talking
time in the lesson. In the next chapter I analyse pair work as one of the possible ways
how to get all students to participate in classes. I point out to advantages and
disadvantages of using pair work and organising pair work activities in the classroom
including seating arrangement and pairing students. Chapter four deals with the role of
teacher during pair work which is also the main subject of the practical part. The last
theoretical chapter describes several strategies of correcting mistakes in pair work.

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I have divided the practical part of my thesis into three parts. In the first part I introduce
the activities which I used for the action research. The second part deals with the action
research. Its main aim is to focus on different teacher’s roles in pair work and to
observe students’ attitudes towards the teacher’s intervention during the course of pair
work activity. The analyses of questionnaire for students is the topic of the third part. In
conclusion I summarise my findings from the observations and students’
questionnaires.

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I. THEORETICAL PART

1. Whole-class teaching

The purpose of this chapter is to define what is meant by whole-class teaching, and to
distinguish it from pair work, dealt with in the next chapter. I will point out to
advantages and disadvantages of whole-class teaching to relate with necessity of
increasing students’ talking time and involving all students in the lesson. One of the
possibilities for doing this are pair work activities.

As Lewis and Hill proclaim (1992:23) most modern textbooks are based on “the
communicative approach”. The emphasis is on the fact that language is not used in a
vacuum but by one person to another in order to communicate a message. This view
seems obvious but the activities of the traditional language classroom ignored this
aspect of language. I personally experienced this way of learning when I was studying
at the secondary school. As Lewis and Hill describe we were taught in a similar way
frequently reading texts in order to answer questions about the text. The only purpose
of such texts was to examine the language of the text – the language of the textbook
was not used to communicate anything else; the “comprehension” questions which
followed such texts involved the students telling the teacher what the teacher already
knew. I can support Lewis’s and Hill’s opinion that if such activities were
communicative in any way, they communicated not the content of the text, but the fact
that the student had, or had not, mastered the language as a system. It is possible for
students to study material of real interest to them, and to communicate real ideas of
their own through the medium of language they are learning. (Lewis, Hill 1992:23)

Harmer (1995:205) uses the term “lockstep” for the whole-class teaching. Lockstep is
the class grouping where all the students are working with the teacher, where all the
students are ‘locked into‘ the same rhythm and pace, the same activity (the terms is
borrowed from the language laboratory). Lockstep is the traditional teaching situation,
in other words, where a teacher-controlled session is taking place. The accurate
reproduction stage usually takes place in lockstep (although this is not necessarily the

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only way it can be done) with all the students working as one group and the teacher
acting as controller and assessor. (Harmer 1995:205)

According to Harmer (1995:205) lockstep has several advantages. It usually means that
all the class is concentrating. The teacher can usually be sure that everyone can hear
what is being said. The students are usually getting a good language model from the
teacher. Lockstep can often be very dynamic. Many students find the lockstep stage
(where choral repetition, etc. takes place) very comforting.

Harmer (1995:205) also describes some disadvantages of lockstep. According to him

students working in lockstep get little chance to practice or to talk at all. Lockstep
always goes at the wrong speed. Either the teacher is too slow for the good students
(and therefore there is a danger that they will get bored) or he is too fast for the weak
students (in which case they may panic and not learn what is being taught). Shy and
nervous students also find lockstep work extremely bad for the nerves since they are
likely to be exposed in front of the whole class. Lockstep, where the teacher acts as
controller cannot be the ideal grouping for communicative work.

I completely agree with Harmer who claims that if students are going to use language
they are learning they will not be able to do so locked into a teacher-controlled drill.
And if they are to gain student autonomy they must be able to do so by using the
language on their own. Lockstep, in other words, involves too much teaching and too
little learning! (Harmer 1995:205)

However, Harmer does not abandon the whole-class grouping completely. He says that
it has its uses. Where feedback is taking place after a reading or listening task clearly it
will be advantageous to have the whole class involved at the same time both so they
can check their answers and so that the teacher can assess their performance as a group.
Where pair and group work are to be set up clearly the whole class has to listen to
instruction, etc. (Harmer 1995:205-206)

Byrne (1989:14-17) summarizes the main points teachers have to keep in mind during
whole-class work. When standing at the front of the class, they should look at students

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and look interested in what they are saying. They should watch the students while they
are talking and control the class clearly and economically. Finally, they should make
sure the students get enough practice. Hadfield (1992:45) emphasizes the importance of
developing strategies for maximising the amount of student talking time. Well-
organised pair work is one of the most important ways of achieving this. Lewis and Hill
(1992:23) also point out that teachers who recognise language as communication will
see the necessity for genuinely interesting texts, individualised teaching, pair work, free
practices, listening practices and many other classroom activities.

2. Teacher talking time

Lewis and Hill (1992:13-14) also say that most language teachers talk too much. It is
not, however, sufficient for the teacher to avoid unnecessary talk. If the main classroom
activity consists of the teacher asking questions which are then answered by individual
students, it still means that half of all classroom language is coming from the teacher.
They counted that teachers working in state school systems, for example, need to
remind themselves frequently of a calculation such as following – if the students have
four 45 minute lesson a week, in a class of 30, there are only 180 minutes available
each week to be divided among students. Even if the class consists of no reading,
pauses for thought, or other activities, but entirely of the teacher asking individual
student questions which were answered immediately, the teacher would do 90 minutes
talking and each individual student only three minutes. As soon as the practical
difficulties are taken into account, this time is greatly reduced and a more realistic
estimate of the time spent talking by each individual pupil would be perhaps a minute a
week. In those circumstances it is hardly surprising if students’ spoken English
improves slowly! However, much the teacher may be anxious about it, it is essential
that techniques are introduced into the classroom to increase the amount of student
talking time. Oral work, pair work, and group work are not optional extras – for the
students’ spoken language to improve, they are essential. (Lewis, Hill 1992:13-14)

Scrivener (1994:16) also underlines that the more a teacher talks – the less opportunity
there is for learners. They need time to think, to prepare what they are going to say and

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how they are going to say it. He suggests the teachers to allow the time, and the quiet
students need. Teachers must not feel the need to fill every gap in a lesson. Explore the
possibilities of silence.

According Lewis and Hill (1992:12) there are many opportunities in a typical lesson for
eliciting knowledge and information from the students rather than simply telling them.
However, teachers should beware of all of the following:
• Explaining when they do not need to.
• Repeating themselves unnecessarily (for example, when asking a question).
• Answering for students, without waiting long enough.
• Correcting too much and too quickly.
• Talking about something which interests them, but not necessarily their
students.
• Talking unnecessarily about the process of the lesson. (Lewis, Hill 1992:20)

Lewis and Hill (1992:20) emphasise that students should be involved in the lesson. But
that is very different from saying that all students should be encouraged to speak, or
that the student who is not talking is not participating.
It is the teacher’s job to involve everybody, but not necessarily to involve everybody in
the same way. Some students can participate fully while saying very little. This can be
frustrating for the teacher, but it is important to realise that you are there to adapt to and
help the students and not to impose your demands on them creating stress and reducing
learning and certainly not in an effort to change their personalities.

Scrivener (1994:68) stresses that it could be useful to aim to say nothing while the
activity is underway, and save any contributions for before and after. Similarly, getting
out of the way might be a help. He says that if he stays at the front of the class, visible
and clearly keeping an eye over everything, that might put students off talking. He
might do well to slink away into a quiet corner of the room and watch with interest, but
unobtrusively. I associate myself with his view. It is one of the most important aspects
of the main stage of pair work which I will deal with in the next chapters.

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3. Pair work

3. 1 Why pair work is necessary

Byrne (1989:31) says that unless you have a very small class, you will never be able to
give your students enough oral practice through whole class work. If you divide your
students into pairs for just five minutes, each student will get more talking time during
those five minutes than during the rest of the lesson. From the learners’ point of view,
then, some pair work in the course of the lesson is absolutely essential.

I support Lewis and Hill who claim (in 1992:17) that if language learning is to be a
natural and relatively relaxed process the general sequence will almost inevitably be
when the students work with each other asking and replying to each other in more or
less controlled pair work. In general the lesson develops from strictly controlled pair
work, where each individual question and answer is predictable, to less controlled pair
work where individual students have a wide range. This is the student-to-student phase.
There is a development from teacher-dominated to student-dominated activity.

What is pair work and other types of interaction?

Pair work is a type of classroom interaction when students are working with another
student. This may be to discuss something, to check answers, to do a communicative
activity, etc. (Scrivener 1994:214) According to Scrivener there are five types of
student grouping common in the classroom:
- the class working together with the teacher;
- the whole class mixing together as individuals;
- small groups (three to eight people);
- pairs;
- individual work.
In any lesson a teacher may include work that involves a number of these different
arrangements. Varying grouping is one way of enabling a variety of experiences for the
learners. (Scrivener 1994:13)

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Penny Ur (2000) describes several interaction patterns. She considers pair work to be a
kind of collaboration. She has listed types of interaction patterns in order from the most
teacher-dominated (1) to the most student-active (9):
1. Teacher talk
2. Choral response
3. Closed-ended teacher questioning
4. Open-end teacher questioning
5. Student initiates, teacher answers
6. Full-class interaction
7. Individual work
8. Collaboration
9. Group work
10. Self-access

Apart from ‘open pairs’, where students talk to one another across the class under your
control, there are according to Byrne (1989:31-32) two main kinds of pair work. These
are fixed pairs and flexible pairs. Fixed pairs are originated when the students work
with the same partner (usually the student on the left or the right) in order to complete a
task of some kind. In flexible pairs the students keep changing partners. Teacher must
decide whether he can let the students stand up and move around the classroom freely.
This will make the activity more interesting for them because they can choose the
person they want to talk to. If the classroom is too small, the students will be able to
interact with those around them without getting up.

When to use pair work in the lesson

Pair work does not need to be limited to any one stage of the lesson and doesn’t
necessarily need to be seen as purely a speaking activity. For example, you could start
your class with a vocabulary pair work activity where students take turns explaining
words from the previous lesson to each other. Another opportunity to use pair work is
before a reading or listening task where students need to predict what they will read or
listen to based on the title of the text. There are also plenty of opportunities for students
to work together after they’ve done the reading or listening to check and discuss

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answers together. Pair work doesn’t need to be limited to the final stages of a lesson but
can be interspersed throughout.1

Students can be put in pairs for a great variety of work including writing and reading.
(Harmer 1995:206) Pair work can be for brainstorming, pre-reading/listening prediction
activities and for checking and comparing answers, so quite clearly there are lots of
different types of pair work.

Peter Watcyn-Jones in his book Pair Work 2 (2002:7) suggests several types of
activities for working in pairs, e.g. ice-breaker/warm-up activities. He uses warm-up
activities for fun and to “break the ice” and for students to get know more about one
another. In role-plays and simulations students play simple roles or act out situations
they could find themselves in, such as ordering meal at a restaurant. Often the shyest
students come to life when hiding behind a role. Information-gap activities are activities
where students have to perform a task together. In some cases, one student has access to
part of the information only, but by working together, they have to solve the whole. In
discussion/speaking activities the emphasis is on students speaking together. They often
exchange views or opinions and express agreement and disagreement. These are often
referred to as ‘opinion gap’ activities. Cards and board games involve the use of cards
or a board in some form or other. They are often game oriented. In problem-solving
activities the students have to solve problems of various kinds such as jigsaw-reading
problems and so on. Vocabulary activities concentrate on vocabulary learning or
revision.

Scrivener (1994:63-65) also suggests several communicative activities in pairs such as

pair interview, pairs compare, picture difference, stamp collecting, planning a holiday
and survival.

It’s also useful to remember that students should have a genuine need or a reason to
speak together. Simply telling them to work in pairs does not make it a valid or useful
technique. Creating a need to talk together either because they are sharing ideas and

1
http://www.onestopenglish.com/section.asp?docid=153708

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information or because they have different pieces of information or different opinions
will make pair work far more meaningful.2

If one student describes a picture in the textbook while the other students look at it, the
communication is meaningless: why (other than in the classroom) would listen to
someone describing something we can see for ourselves? It is a display activity,
showing off language learned, but there is no communication here. We can, however,
transform it very easily. If a learner describes a picture that the others cannot see and
the listeners have a task, drawing a basic sketch of that drawing, then there is real
communication and the ‘describers’ and ‘artists’ will interact with a specific purpose.
This classroom activity effectively mirrors activities that learners might be involved in
when using the language in the outside world – listening to a description of something
over the phone, for instance.

In real communication the language that the students use is largely unpredictable. There
may be many ways to achieve a particular communicative goal. The main aim for
students is achieving successful communication rather than accurate use of particular
items of language. (Scrivener 1994:62).

3. 2 Advantages of using pair work

If pair work is new to the students, it is worth spending the time and trouble to explain
its advantages and to encourage them to take full advantages by participating as much
as they can and sticking strictly to English. ( PW Watcyn-Jones 2002:9)

I agree with Harmer’s view (1995:206) that pair work seems to be a good idea because
it immediately increases the amount of student practice. Harmer uses an example of
imaginary class of forty students. Similar example was also mentioned by Lewis and
Hill (see the chapter Talking time). If we have forty students in class we can
immediately see that at any one time (in an oral pair work exercise) twenty students are
talking instead of one. Pair work allows the students to use language (depending of
course on the task set by the teacher) and also encourages student co-operation which is

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http://www.onestopenglish.com/section.asp?docid=153708

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 itself important for the atmosphere of the class and for the motivation it gives to
learning with others. (Harmer 1995:206)

There are some clear advantages to using pair work. First, in large classes it gives more
students the opportunity to speak. Another reason is that students will learn from each
other. Learning is not just a top-down activity where the teacher opens up the top of the
student’s heads and pours in the information. By using pair work you give students the
opportunity to learn from each other and learn from doing. Finally, pair work gives
students a degree of privacy and allows them to try things out that they might not
attempt in the more public forum of a class discussion or a teacher-fronted activity.
When students speak with a partner only one other person can hear their mistakes (and,
of course, the teacher can hear them if he or she is monitoring). This help gives shy and
reserved students more confidence in their ability to use the language.3

I will summarize the advantages of pair work according to Watcyn-Jones (2002:9) in

the points below:

• Pair work gives everyone a chance to speak in non-threatening environment, i.e.

with a fellow-student rather than in front of the teacher and the whole class. Students
will learn from one another in a natural way that approximates more to the world
outside and gets away from someone of the constraints of the classroom.
• Pair-work activities are students-centred rather than teacher centred. Once an
activity has been explained (and perhaps demonstrated), the students work
independently of the teacher and at their own pace. This means the students really have
an opportunity to see how well they can communicate in English. Byrne adds that it
teaches them how to lead and be led by someone other than the teacher. (Byrne
1989:31)
• The language produced during pair work is generally more natural and authentic
than in teacher-led sessions. It is also more personalized and, subsequently, more
memorable for the students. Byrne says that students can face and talk directly to one
another, so it is much closer to the way we use language outside the classroom. (Byrne
1989:31)

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• Pair work activities encourage co-operation between students since, in order to
complete a task successfully, they have to work together and help create a very positive
learning atmosphere in class – one where they genuinely want to work with others. It
also normally leads to students being less afraid of making mistakes. In addition, most
students grow in confidence as they discover that they can complete a task successfully
without constant help from the teacher.
• Many pair work activities (especially of the ice-breaker type) lead to greater
personalization and students begin to express their own personalities in a more natural
and less inhibited way. This again contributes to creating a better learning atmosphere
in class plus a positive group feeling. Byrne adds that pair work allows students to mix
with everyone in group. (Byrne 1989:31)
• Many pair work activities are a lot more fun to do than more traditional exercises.
Students who enjoy what they are doing are more likely to learn than those who find
the work boring.
• Pair work is dynamic and active. Learning cannot really take place unless the
students are actively involved in the process. Pair work keeps them active which
increases their ability and desire to learn. It corresponds to Byrne’s idea that pair work
provides some variety during the lesson.(Byrne 1989:31)
• Finally, pair work gives teachers a break from being the centre of attention, from
having to ‘perform‘, be dynamic, interesting, and so on. Instead, the teacher can stand
back, listen more actively and think up strategies for helping the students increase their
knowledge and confidence. (PW Watcyn-Jones 2002:9)
• It allows you to monitor, move around the class and really listen to the language
they are producing. It takes the spotlight off you and puts it onto the students.
• Gives them a sense of achievement when reaching a team goal (Byrne 1989:31)
• It allows you to monitor, move around the class and really listen to the language
they are producing.4

Some teachers argue that collaborative work reduce individual thought. Vygotsky says
it does just the opposite: "interaction is essential to the development of individual
thought" Vygotsky (1962; 1978). Collaborative effort allows students to change roles:

4
www.britishcouncil.org/languageteassistant-pair-group-work.htm

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They act both as students and teachers by "exhibiting a degree of self reliance that
simply is not possible" (Harmer) in teacher centred environments.5

3. 3 Problems with pair work and some possible solutions

The idea of group and pair work in language teaching is hardly a new one, but
translating an idea into classroom practice often presents the teacher with practical,
logistical, and organizational difficulties which can be difficult to overcome. Many
teachers feel daunted by this, and often revert back to their tried and trusted methods.
These may be fine in themselves, but if the teacher is bored with them (otherwise why
consider new activities), then that attitude may well be transferred to students. On the
other hand, a great new (for a particular teacher) activity which is badly prepared and
implemented will likely have demotivative effects of a different kind. However, at least
with the latter the teacher has the opportunity of trying again and improving things.6

Harmer declares that certain problems occur with pair work, however. Teachers are
often worried about the use of the students‘ native language in monolingual groups.
Usually, however, students will use English if they are motivated to do so and the
teacher explains what the reason for the activity is.
Incorrectness is another worry, but as we have repeatedly said accuracy is not the only
standard to judge learning by: communicative efficiency is also vitally important and
pair work encourages such efficiency. (Harmer 1995:206)

Sometimes teachers do not want to use pair work. Using pair work means that many
learners are speaking at the same time. It’s complicated for the teacher to control all
students and to notice what they are saying. There is, of course, a loss of control in
terms of how much the teacher can check and hear. This does mean that some students
may continue to make mistakes simply because the teacher does not hear them.
(http://www.onestopenglish.com/section.asp?docid=153708)

5
http://esl.about.com/cs/teachingtechnique/a/bl_baker4.htm
6
http://www.eltnews.com/features/teachingideas/003_1ah.shtml

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Listed below are a few of the difficulties which attempting group/pair work with large
classes presents. There are also some interpretations of the problems:

• the students will make too much noise

Byrne claims that noise is OK, as long as they are not shouting. He suggests to move
students into different places in the room so that they can hear themselves speak.
Unless the noise is likely to disturb the class next door, you could just ignore it. The
noise won’t bother the students themselves. They will be too busy practising and in any
case they can hear one another quite easily. But it is necessary to control the noise
level.

• the students will make mistakes

According to Byrne (1989:31) if your aim is accuracy, you must try to prevent mistakes
as much as possible. He advices to give the students a clear model and give them
enough practice before they start on their own. You should also write relevant material
on the board. But being able to give the students a lot of extra practice in this way is far
more important than a few mistakes.

• the students will not work properly

There are always some students who will not do activity properly. They may simply
chatter in their mother tongue – or do nothing at all! But teachers generally know which
students in the class are most likely to do this, so they can take steps to deal with it. But
it must be said that, just because some students may misbehave, this is not a good
reason for not doing pair work. When you are teaching the whole class, you can’t be
sure that the students are co-operating just because they are keeping quiet.
• my students expect me to teach them
Byrne stresses that teachers should be prepared to justify procedures like pair work and
group work and also certain activities such as games and songs. Sometimes this is just
as important as explaining how to do something. If the students understand why they
are doing something, they will probably do it better. (Byrne 1989:33-34)

• you could lose control of the class

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It is advisable to set up a signal before pair work start, like a visual time out with hands,
so that students know when to stop. Do not shout for them to stop as they will just shout
louder!

• you are not able to listen to everyone at once and hear what they are saying

Set up groups of three where A and B talk while C monitors. Then swap roles. They are
producing language; you just want to make sure the language they are producing is
English. Have a fun system of every mother tongue word you hear the monitor must
stand up and then stay standing. The activity stops if all monitors are standing. This will
make them aware of using English as much a possible and using their first language as
little as possible. (www.britishcouncil.org/languageteassistant-pair-group-work.htm)

Pair work can help to overcome a frequent problem in groups that not all members
participate equally in discussions. Sometimes a dominant member or members will take
over a discussions. Sometimes a dominant members will take over a discussion
completely, while shyer students are unable to get a word in edgeways; sometimes the
problem is one of the ‘student passengers‘, as one teacher put it, who make no
contribution to class activities. (Hadfield 1992:122)

There are also issues to do with how you pair the students up. Some students may tend
to dominate the speaking exchange: shy students may say little or nothing. A weak
student may benefit from being paired with a strong student, but will the strong student
also benefit? It is no good simply putting students into pairs without also taking into
consideration who they should work with. A key point is that variety is good.
(http://www.onestopenglish.com/section.asp?docid=153708)

It is difficult to deal with both types of student. The dominant members may be forceful
or somewhat aggressive people, but often they are simply lively, enthusiastic, talkative
students who contribute a great deal to the class, and it is hard to encourage the others
to talk more, and them to talk a bit less, without dampening their enthusiasm.
Sometimes they are not aware of the problem and thus activities designed to heighten
their awareness of the imbalance in group participation may help to alleviate it.
Students who make little contribution to discussions may be shy or quiet people in their
own language. It is hard suddenly to be required to change your habits, and feelings of

20
inadequacy about language ability may make this doubly hard (although for some shy
students, the act of speaking another language is a kind of liberation). Activities that
give such students something to say, rather than those which require invention, and
activities which make turn-taking in a discussion into a kind of game rather than a real-
life decision, may help with this problem. (Hadfield 1992:122) Doing these activities in
pairs is a good solution of how to make shy pupils to speak and how to reduce talking
time of dominant members of the group.

There are many problems with pair work, but there are also many ways to solve them
successfully. Some more tips are suggested by Byrne. (1989:34-35) To prevent
problems with pair work Byrne suggests several points to keep in mind:
- divide the students into pairs in the most convenient way possible
- make sure the students know exactly what they have to do
- keep activities simple
- don’t let activities go on too long
- carry out selective checking
- control the noise level as necessary
- provide feedback

Teachers sometimes worry about noise and discipline when pair work is used
particularly with children and adolescents. A lot depends here on the task the teacher
has set and on his attitude during activity. If a teacher goes and concentrates on one pair
in the corner of the room to the exclusion of the others, then indeed the rest of the class
may forget their task and start playing about! If there is a danger of this happening the
teacher should probably remain at the front of the class (where without interfering in
any way he can get a general idea of what is going on) and then organise feedback
when the pair work task is over to see how successful it was. He should try and make
sure that pair work task is not carried out for too long. Students who are left in pairs for
a long time often become bored and are then not only not learning, but also become
restless and perhaps badly behaved. If the noise rises to excessive levels then the
teacher can simply stop the activity, explain the problem and ask the students to
continue more quietly. If this does not work the activity may have to be discontinued.
(Harmer 1995:206)

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I completely agree with Hadfield who says (in 1992:46) that teachers shouldn’t drop
pair work only because they are not satisfied that everyone is doing correct thing or that
students are using their native language. It is important to remember that if half the
class is not doing the right thing, that still means the half class are! As a result, instead
of one or two students doing something useful while the others sit back, 10 or 20
students are working constructively. Teachers must not drop pair work just because it is
not successful for all students all the time. A moment’s reflection will serve to remind
teachers that when traditional question and answer lessons are taking place there is no
guarantee that these are working successfully for most of the students – they may be
sitting there quietly, but that doesn’t mean everyone is working! (Hadfield 1992:46)

According to Jo Bertrand’s article7 there is a tendency with primary learners to treat the
class as a whole group and underestimate their ability to work in pairs or in small
groups. I can identify myself with Bertrand who claims that even very young learners
can become independent in their learning and guided early on they will be more likely
to grow into autonomous and successful language learners.

3. 4 Organizing pair work in the classroom

“Use pair work to increase student talking time – even if it seems chaos”
(Hadfield)
The teachers notes always start with suggestions on how to introduce the game or
activity. This is important as it helps stimulate interest in the topic and will prepare
them for the activity to follow. (Watcyn-Jones 2002:10)

To be “well-organised“ the teacher must give clear and explicit instructions and, while
the pair work is taking place, the teacher should be moving around the room monitoring
and if necessary guiding and correcting what individual pairs are doing. It may be
necessary to write on the blackboard an outline or model of what the pairs should be
doing or some key words and phrases. (Hadfield 1992:47)

It is also very important to always explain very clearly what to do and, where possible,
demonstrate the activity first with the whole class – either forming a pair with yourself

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and one student or preferably, getting two students to demonstrate. This stage should
not be rushed as when the students understand fully what they feel more confident and
are able to do their best and really benefit from the activity. With monolingual classes,
and especially those new to pair work, you can very occasionally explain things in their
first language – just to be 100% certain that they understand exactly what they have to
do. (Watcyn-Jones 2002:10)

After some time with the pairs working together, one or two pairs should be invited to
‘demonstrate‘ and, if necessary, after pairs have demonstrated the teacher should add
comments (both corrections of mistakes and suggestions for alternative, more natural,
ways of saying things), then students should work in pairs again, possibly reversing
roles. (Hadfield 1992:47)

It is a good idea to set a time limit for each activity and write this up so that everyone
can see it. Give a warning a few minutes before it expires so that students can start to
finish off. It may be that some students have not finished but it is inevitable that people
will finish at different times. And it is always best psychologically to stop them while
they are still enjoying themselves rather than letting the activity drag on until everyone
has finished. (PW Watcyn-Jones 2002:10)

3. 4. 1 Feedback session and follow-up work

Each activity should end with checking/feedback session for the whole class. This
checking and evaluation is an integral part of the activity and it is important to leave
enough time for it.
After any pair-work exchange students can recall and re-tell their partner what they
remember about the exchange (e.g. if they’ve just been eliciting personal information or
opinions). Or they can swap partners and tell their new partner about the ideas of their
previous partner. This doubles the amount of speaking generated by any activity and is
a good way to keep fast finishers busy while the rest catch up.

23
You can occasionally discuss the activity with the students. The discussion could
include talking about what the students found difficult as well as finding out if anyone
wanted to say something but didn’t have necessary language skills to express himself or
herself.

This is also the time when any mistakes can be pointed out and, if necessary, revision
practice given. One way of doing this is to write on the board sentences which contain
the main language mistakes you noted while circulating round the class during the
activity. You can get the students to work in pairs and to identify and correct mistakes.

This is also the time to give praise where necessary. I thought you all worked really
well today. /I heard a lot of interesting opinions today. /You solved the problem a lot
quicker than I expected. /I like your definition for ‘main course’ Mario!, etc. (PW
Watcyn-Jones 2002:10)

Your pair work will be most effective if you:

• are sure to fully explain the procedure before splitting the class up.
• always demonstrate either yourself or with the help of a volunteer exactly what
they have to do.
• ask them to tell you what they have to do before they do it (in their mother tongue
if need be) to check their understanding.
• have fill in activities ready for the quick finishers – but be sure that they have
completed the task correctly first and haven’t just finished early because they
misunderstood what they had to do.
• do not forget to have feedback time after pair work so that the children don’t feel
that they have been wasting time. It’s important to share their work as a whole group
although this doesn’t have to be systematic.
• set a clear time limit.
• Control who works with whom so children aren’t always being dominated or
dominating other.8 Since the students will be working in pairs, there is the inevitable

8
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problem of what happens when there is an odd number of students in the class. Here are
one or two possible solutions (although they are by no means the only ones):

a. The teacher forms the ‘extra‘ partner, in which case he or she should choose a
different student to work with each time.
b. The ‘odd‘ student monitors another pair. The student chosen to monitor another pair
should be changed each time an activity is done.
c. Three students work together instead of two. Two of the students form a team to
partner the third one, taking in turns to talk to him or her. Again, the group of three
should be changed frequently. (Watcyn-Jones:2002:5)

3. 4. 2 How to pair students off

Sometimes you might want to choose the pairs and at other times you may wish it to be
random. For example, ask students to stand in a line with the oldest at one end all the
way down to the youngest at the other end. Then pair the oldest with the youngest, the
second oldest with the second youngest, and so on down the line.9

Underwood (1987:77) points out that pair work can be done very successfully simply
by some students turning round or moving along a bit to sit with a partner. Young
learners tend to want to make pairs with their special friend and this is often perfectly
satisfactory. However it is a good idea to change partners they are working with.
According to her teachers should be more selective about pairing especially if they are
planning an activity which is long, and perhaps difficult for some students. They may
wish to try to pair a ‘good’ student with a less able one, if this can be done without it
being too obvious.

9
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3. 4. 3 Seating arrangements during pair work

I completely agree with Lewis and Hill (1992:40) who say that the spoken language is
about people talking to each other. If students are sitting in straight lines facing the
back of each other’s necks this is not easy to do.

For teachers who are used to a more formal arrangement – with the teacher facing rows
of students – it is advisable to try out less formal pattern with one or two specific tasks,
and reflect on its advantages and disadvantages before making it a regular used layout.
(Underwood 1987:52)

In traditional classroom, the students sit in rows. If it is at all possible, the room should
be arranged in such a way that pairs face one another across a desk or a table. This is to
give them ‘eye-contact’ which makes communication a lot easier. However, there may
be practical reasons why such a classroom arrangement may not be possible. In the case
of large classes organized in rows try to get students to work with the person sitting
directly in front of or behind them. If this isn’t possible and the students have to work
with the person sitting next to them, they can move their chairs so that they are at an
angle. Finally, when organizing a class into pairs, the students should sit so that it is
difficult for them to see their partner’s handout (unless it is an activity where they share
handouts).

If necessary, you can tell them to stand a book upright on their desks (or a bag) to act as
a shield. Students can also sit back to back for certain activities, especially when it is
important that they do not see each other’s handouts. It also forces them to listen more
carefully to each other. Partners should be changed frequently to ensure that everyone
really gets an opportunity to work with and get to know as many different members of
the class as possible. (Watcyn-Jones 2002:10)

There are lots of different techniques. A lot depends on your seating arrangements.
Where seating is flexible you may well have your students sitting in a semi-circle.
Asking students to work with the person next to them and moving them around is then
quite easy. However, to change pairs it is not always necessary to move all the students.

26
Simply move one student from one end to the other and you automatically create new
pairs all the way around the circle.10

According to Byrne (1989:32-33), teachers should as far as they can use the existing
classroom arrangement. He suggests to get the students to work with a neighbour and
only move a student if it is absolutely necessary. The important thing is for students to
be able to form pairs quickly and without any fuss. However, Scrivener says (1994:93)
that it’s difficult to sit still for a long time; it’s worth including activities that involve
some movement, even if only to give people the chance to stretch their legs. He
suggests several original ideas for investigating and exploring the possibilities of
seating:
• If the students normally sit in rows try forming a circle.
• Turn the classroom around so that the focus is on a different wall from normal.
• Make a train carriage with seats (or an aeroplane, or a town centre, or
whatever).
• Divide the class into separate groups at far corners of the room.
• Ask how can we reorganize this classroom to make it a nicer place to be? Let
the class discuss it and agree, then do it.
• Push the seats or desks up against the wall. Sit on the floor.
• Get rid of the seats completely. Ask everyone to bring in a bean-bag or cushion.
(Scrivener 1994:95)
In a circle or horseshoe, learners can make eye contact with everyone else in the group
and thus interact much more naturally. There is also a much greater sense of equality.
Weaker students tend to hide away less and stronger students to dominate less. Having
the teacher in the circle helps to clarify his role as an equal rather than as someone
separate and different. (Scrivener 1994:95)

10
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In this figure Scrivener describes seating possibilities in a standard classroom. Some of
them are very useful for pair work. (Scrivener 1994:95)

Fig.1:Seating possibilities in a
standard classroom

I have experienced in my classes Lewis’s and Hill’s opinion (1992:40) that if pair and
group work is a novelty, students will take a long time to move and find the moving
itself more interesting, than the group work which follows. If, on the other hand, pair
and group work is a normal part of your teaching, students will move naturally, quickly
and quietly to new positions providing they know what they have to do and understand
that this is not an opportunity to waste time but a useful and enjoyable activity. The
seating should suggest that students are encouraged to talk to each other; at the same
time, it should allow for the removal of the teacher from a central, dominant role during
certain activities.

There is only one thing to do if you have a huge, heavy, immovable teacher’s desk and
that is not to spend your time behind it. It is much harder to communicate with your
students from behind a big desk and it certainly discourages them from looking on you
as their friend and helper. So you will need to come out from behind your barrier to
become a part of the group. You might simply stand beside/in front of your desk, perch
on the front edge of the desk if you want to rest a bit, bring your chair out from behind
the desk (or use another chair), or move around to various parts of the class. By

28
holding your book or papers in your hand, you make your face more visible than when
you look down at a book on your desk, and this is a help to your students too (as well as
making it easier for you to see what they are doing!). (Underwood 1987:53)

In conclusion, as Scrivener says: “Changing seating arrangements can help students

interact with different people, change the focus from the teacher when appropriate,
allow a range of different situations to be recreated within the classroom, as well as
simply adding some variety to the predictability of sitting in the same place every
time.” (Scrivener 1994:93)

4. The role of teacher

“How we structure the classroom is an important, perhaps the most important, form of
communication we make to students. If we structure so that the teacher is full control of
what and how students study, we communicate that students are empty or that their
intelligence and curiosity are not valued. If we choose an autocratic authority structure,
we communicate a lack of faith in the potential of students to choose positive directions
for development. By taking full responsibility for students‘ learning, we leave them
none.“11

Littlewood (1981:19) supports what has been said in the previous paragraph saying that
especially in the more creative types of activity, unnecessary intervention on the
teacher’s part may prevent the learners from becoming genuinely involved in the
activity and thus hinder the development of their communicative skills. However, this
does not mean that once an activity is in progress, the teacher should become a passive
observer. His function becomes according to Littlewood less dominant than before, but
no less important. (Littlewood 1981:19)

11
http://www.sbg.ac.at/rom/people/leht/co/echanger

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4. 1 The role of teacher during pair work

The role of teacher will depend to a large extent on the function he performs in
different activities. Harmer examines the roles of controller, organiser, assessor,
prompter, participant, recourse, tutor and investigator. (Harmer 1995:200-205) It will
be obvious that the teacher’s behaviour for various types of activity will be different.
For communicative output according to him, the role of the teacher should change. Pair
work is often used for communicative activities that is why role of teacher very often
changes in pair work. Since the teacher as controller is no longer oppressively present
students can help each other to use and learn language. The teacher will still, of course
be able to act as an assessor, prompter or resource. With pair work, then, students can
practise language use and joint learning.

Watcyn-Jones (2002:10) stresses that once the pair work activity has actually started,
the students should work independently of the teacher and their own pace. The role of
the teacher while this is going on is monitor the students‘ progress by walking round
the classroom, pausing briefly beside each pair, listening to them and noting any
language errors or communication problems which can be taken up later on with the
whole class. It is best not to interrupt them or correct them while they are working as
this will impede fluency, spoil the atmosphere, distract them from what they are doing
and, at worst, destroy their confidence! But if things are obviously going really badly,
the teacher should be prepared to offer advice and encouragement – just sufficient to
get them working again.

He also advices to the teachers that while walking round, it is useful to have a small
notebook or a piece of paper on which you note down any persistent mistakes you hear
or common problems. As mentioned above, these can then be dealt with in a feedback
session after they have completed the activity. All teacher‘s roles, except the role of
controller who correct everything during the activity, are used in pair work.

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4. 2 Teacher positioning in the classroom

Teacher’s roles are closely connected to the teacher’s positioning in the classroom.
Griffiths in his article12 says that where we decide to position ourselves at various
stages of the lesson is important if we take into account the effect it has on our learners.
I agree with his view that whether we are standing, seated or crouching in front of, to
the side of or behind learners sends out a message with regard to what we want them to
do. Wherever we stand in the class, students will see us, therefore standing is important
when we want the attention of the whole class, for clarifying language or giving
instructions, for example.

Griffiths also points out to some common problems during pair work he has
encountered with positioning. He describes his ideas how to solve them. The first
problem he describes is impeding student-to-student communication due to too much
teacher control. Its cause can be teacher sitting in with the group or pair, or remaining
too long with one group or pair; teacher towering over students as they work.
To solve this problem Griffiths suggests to remain accessible but outside student-to-
student interaction, seated in the middle of the class or at the front, or move around the
class and crouch to attend to students.

The second problem are students over-reliant on teacher and not completing task
because teacher is continually available. According to Griffiths there are times when
the aim of the activity is for students to be working together and yet one of the pair or
group constantly asks for the teacher's help simply because they are there. In this case,
it is wise to position yourself near another group or pair to encourage the "needy"
student to work with their partner(s).

The third described problem is not providing students with enough support (student
neglect) so students just stop working. The cause of this difficulty is teacher remaining
sitting or standing at a distance from the students. Teachers can prevent this problem by
circulating or getting closer. They should either move constantly around the class,
attending to student questions and making sure they stay on task, or sit in a position that
makes you accessible to all students (see the following point).

12
http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/methodology/position.shtml

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The next problem which can occur during pair work can be one or several students
dominating the teacher's attention (neglecting of majority of students). This difficulty
can happen if teacher sits next to one or two students and stays there. To overcome this
problem Griffiths advices to remain mobile. Being seated is fine, but either leave your
chair in the middle of the room and go and crouch by the student(s) to answer
questions, or take your chair with you and draw it back to the middle of the room when
you've answered the question.

In conclusion Griffiths declares that it is important to remember that where and how we
choose to position ourselves sends a message to our students about what they should be
doing and about our availability. Although it is tempting to always be available for
students, and certainly preferable to neglecting them, there is a need for a balance in
terms of the attention they receive, and this can be achieved by positioning ourselves
according to the requirements of the activity.13

I completely identify myself with Scrivener who says: “The more ‘present’ I allow
myself to be, the more likely students will be to ask me for help. And the more I help,
the more I make the task less challenging for the students, the more they will lean on
me. The more involved I get, the more I end up doing the communication rather than
them. Active ‘not helping’ may sound rather cruel, but I think there are times when the
teacher can be most helpful by forcing students to face problems themselves.”
(Scrivener 1994:68)

5. Correcting mistakes in pair work activities

Some teachers claim that if they allow students to make mistakes, they will reinforce
the errors students are making. Many teachers feel that if they do not correct mistakes
immediately, they will be helping reinforce incorrect language production. This point of
view is also reinforced by students who often expect teachers to continually correct
them during classes. If the teachers do not correct they will often create suspicion on
the part of the students. On the other hand, there is a group of teachers who think that if
they don't allow students to make mistakes, they will take away from the natural
learning process required to achieve competence and, eventually, fluency.

13
http://www.teachenglish.org.uk/think/methodology/position.shtml

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Learning a language is a long process during which a learner will inevitably make
many, many mistakes. In other words we take a myriad of tiny steps going from not
speaking a language to being fluent in the language. In the opinion of many teachers,
students who are continually corrected become inhibited and cease to participate. This
results in the exact opposite of what the teacher is trying to produce - the use of English
to communicate.14

Error correction in pair work follows many rules of error correction generally
According to Ur (1981:246,247) there are some situations where we might prefer not to
correct a learner’s mistake: in fluency work, for example, when the learner is in mid-
speech, and to correct would disturb and discourage more than help. But there are other
situations when correction is likely to be helpful. Ur recommends not to correct a
learner during fluent speech. There can be places where to refrain from providing an
acceptable form where speaker is obviously uneasy or ‘floundering‘ can actually be
demoralizing, and gentle, supportive intervention can help. Conversely, even where the
emphasis is on getting the language right, we may not always correct: in grammar
exercise, for example, if the learner has contributed an interesting or personal piece of
information that does not happen to use the target form; also, when have got most of an
item right we may prefer not to draw attention to a relatively trivial mistake. (Ur
1987:246-247)

Julian Edge in his book Mistakes and Correction (1989:38) underlines three main
principles for correction and fluency in spoken English. Firstly, students need the
experience of uninterrupted, meaningful communication if they are to use the language.
Secondly, if students are to say anything meaningful, they need to feel that people are
listening to what they are saying, not to how they are saying it. Finally, making
mistakes in language use is not only normal, but necessary to language learning. For
some of the time, then, it is important that students are not corrected but simply
encouraged.

In pair work activities teachers are not able to hear most of the students. If they stop to
correct someone, they will miss lots more mistakes. There is a question what happens if
someone makes a mistake during a pair work activity. Edge knows (1989:38) that this

14
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is a difficult stage for many teachers, but we have to leave the students alone so that
they can get on with some learning. This is a good place to start giving the students a
little freedom. However Kenneth Beare claims that correction needs to take place, and
is expected and desired by students. However, the manner in which teachers correct
students plays a vital role in whether students become confident in their usage or
become intimidated. Correcting students as a group, in correction sessions, at the end of
activities, and letting them correct their own mistakes all help in encouraging students
to use English rather than to worry about making too many mistakes.15 Edge suggests
several possibilities for error correction in pair work. One of them is delayed correction.

5. 1 Delayed correction

In this kind of error correction the teacher walks round the class quickly to make sure
that all the students are working properly. She only stops if she finds that some students
don’t know what to do, or are doing the wrong things. If this is true of lots of pairs, the
best idea is to stop the whole class and ask one pair to show everyone again what they
are to do. When the teacher hears mistakes, she makes a note of them. This is important
information for the teacher. If she hears a mistake repeatedly, she can wait until the
pairs have finished the exercise and then ask someone to do the question in which she
heard the mistake. (Edge 1989:39)
If the teacher hears lots of mistakes in important points she has been trying to teach, she
need not think too much about correction. She must realize that the class has not
understood what she has presented and she needs to think of different ways of
presenting the same point again. Teachers can get this important information only if
they give learners the chance to make mistakes

It seems that when the teacher walks round the class and makes notes she does not
teach. However Edge says that this is a difficult and important part of teacher’s work.
The teacher has to decide if the class has learned well enough what was taught, notice
what mistakes are made, decide if it is worth doing more work on these mistakes,
decide how to do any necessary correction. (Edge 1989:40) So although it may not look

15
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as though teachers are ‘teaching‘ at this stage of a lesson, they are working very hard in
order to help learners do their learning!

If there are common mistakes, the teacher can write them on the board after the activity
and ask for correction from the class. These mistaken forms can now be corrected by
the whole class. While doing this type of correction, the teacher has a chance not only
to correct mistakes, but also to explain what was wrong, or to have students give their
explanations.

5. 2 Peer correction

Peer correction is another possibility how to correct mistakes in pair work If students
can get used to correcting each other in a positive way, this can be very helpful during
pair and group work If the students aren’t sure what is correct, they can make a note of
their difficulty, carry on with the exercise, and ask the teacher later. (Edge 1989:42)

There is a question what happens if the partner doesn’t notice a mistake and the
students continue with their work. I agree with Edge who claims that at this stage of
learning, it is much more important that the students get lots of practice in the language
than that everything is absolutely correct. (Edge 1989:42)

In fluency activities, we don’t want the learners to be interrupting each other. They
should concentrate on what their partner is saying. Occasionally, however, it is useful
to have someone concentrating on how things are said. In addition to the teacher
walking round the class and making notes, it is possible to turn some of the students
into observers. (Edge 1989:43)

5. 3 Observers

Edge suggests observers for work in groups but I think that this is a good idea also for
pair work, especially for odd students. The students work in groups of three. Two of
them carry out the pair work activity while the third one listens and tries to note down
some mistakes that the others make. This student is an observer. The teacher makes

35
sure that different students take turns at being the observer. When the activity is
finished, the observer shows the others what he or she has written down and the group
discusses what is correct and what is wrong. Disagreements can be referred to the
teacher. This use of an observer can be very profitable for learners, but the observer’s
job is very difficult and it is important for the teacher to make clear what this job is and
what it is not. (see Edge 1989:45-46)

I will conclude this chapter with the words of Penny Ur who answers the question about
correcting mistakes of language in this way: ‘Some teachers think this should never be
done in fluency exercises, on the ground that it is discouraging, interferes with the flow
of discourse, and stops students having to make with what they know.’ In her opinion
nothing should ‘never’ or ‘always’ be done in language teaching. There are reasons
why one would want to compromise. She explains reasons for making compromise in
correcting and follows: ‘In short, although we do not do formal language teaching in
these activities, and though we want students to develop independence and fluency,
there is a case for unobtrusive helping-out with specific errors or gaps as they come
up.’ (Ur 1981:21)

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II. PRACTICAL PART

“An aware and sensitive teacher, who respects and listens to her students, and who
concentrates on finding ways of enabling learning rather than performing as a teacher,
goes a long way to creating conditions in which a great deal of learning is likely to take
place.”
(Scrivener)

The practical part of this thesis is divided into three sections. In the first section I will
describe the pair work activities which I used for the action research. The second part is
focused on the action research and my comments and in the third part I will analyse
questionnaires for students in which I wanted to find out the students’ attitudes towards
pair work.

It is obvious that the teacher’s behaviour is different for various types of activities.
However, the role of the teacher changes also during the course of one particular
activity. In the action research I focused on different teacher’s roles in various stages of
pair work. My aim was to find out what teachers actually do in pair work when they
give instructions, monitor students, help students, correct students’ errors and provide
assessment. I analyzed how many roles the teacher has during one stage of an activity.

I used observation to monitor how students react to the changes of the teacher’s
behaviour. I observed students‘ attitudes to the teacher’s intervention when the students
were completing the task with their partners.

The next used method to find out what students’ opinions are for teacher’s roles in pair
work are the questionnaires. I analysed each task in the questionnaires separately and I
added my interpretation.

7. The description of the participants and methods

This study investigated peer interaction during pair work activities in the primary
school classroom, eight-year A class. I have been teaching those students for three

37
years so I know the participants very well. They are at the age of 13 to 14 years. All of
them are Czech native speakers and they started to learn English in the fourth class of
the primary school. They do not have any experience in studying other languages. The
students have three lessons of English a week. I observed the participants' engagement
in pair work activities and made notes. The observation lasted for about one month.

I used pair work activities for the research with fourteen to sixteen students. I did not
tell them that I would observe them during the task since I did not want the students to
change their typical behaviour. The students were accustomed to pair work in English
lessons so they were not surprised to work in this way. In my classes I usually work
with the Project course books, but for the action research I chose the activities that are
not included here. The main reason is that I try to introduce the variety into lessons and
to make students speak more through the different types of tasks.

During the first three activities I observed the students going round the class and
making notes. They did not ask me for help with the task, but I stopped them during the
activity. I also corrected their mistakes and asked them to perform the task when they
remained silent. I tried to notice students’ reactions to the teacher’s interventions.

In the course of the next three activities I changed my role. I stayed in front or at the
back of the students. During my observation I was making notes and answering their
questions only if they asked me for help. I wanted to find out if the students were
completing the task without the teacher’s control.

8. The description of activities

8. 1 Activity 1: Shamed! I have the messiest bedroom
This activity is inspired by the Crown magazine August/September 2006

Aims:
- speaking about tidy and messy students’ bedrooms
- speaking about teens’ problems

38
- reading an English magazine
- practising adverbs of frequency and verbs must, mustn’t, have to
Level: elementary
Time: 10 minutes
Materials: copies of the photo from the magazine, copies with the questions
for discussion

Procedure:
I divided students into pairs and I distributed copies of the text from the Crown
magazine page 13. I asked them to look at the photo and to discuss in pairs following
questions: Is this bedroom: Disguisting? A bit messy? Tidy? Does it look as your
bedroom? What can you see in the photo? Then I asked them to answer their partners
the following questions: How often do you tidy your room? How often do your parents
ask you to tidy your room? What do your parents do to get you to tidy your room? Is
your room usually tidy or a mess? Finally, I asked the pairs if their answers had been
similar or different.

Commentary:
First the students were shy to speak about their messy bedrooms, but when one of the
students had admitted she has got a messy room they started to feel free for
participating in pair discussion. The topic was interesting for them and also everyday
expressions from the magazine were useful. The students were interested in reading the
English magazine. I can recommend using them in lessons as much as possible.

8. 2 Activity 2: Interview your classmates

This activity is taken from Singing Grammar by Mark Hancock

Aims:
- practising making questions in past simple tense
- pointing out the useful language for interviewing such as Excuse me,
well, let’s see, Ok, next question

39
 - using polite phrases
Language level: elementary
Time: 15 minutes
Material: copies with handout

Procedure:
I distributed copies with questions and asked students to choose five of them
and to underline their options. Students pretended that they are researchers in the street
interviewing members of the public, so they had to be polite. Students interviewed
classmates using the questions from handouts.

Commentary:
The activity forced the students to make a lot of past tense questions and answers in an
active way. This kind of work is always very noisy, but it is useful noise during which
the students learn more than in a silent lesson. It is a good idea when the teacher
participates in the class research as one of the researches. It supports friendly
atmosphere and breaks an ice between the teachers and the students. However, he must
not act as controller who corrects everything.

8. 3 Activity 3: Getting to know you

This activity is inspired by Pair Work 1 by Peter Watcyn-Jones and Deirdre Howard-
Williams

Aims: - asking for and giving personal information

- asking about and expressing likes and dislikes
- filling in the form
Level: elementary
Time: 20 minutes
Materials: copies of handouts

Procedure:
The students worked in pairs. They asked their partners for personal information
according to the handouts. They filled in the forms. In the next part of the activity they

40
asked about their partner’s likes and dislikes. In the feedback session the students
introduced their partners.

Commentary:
Children like pretending that they are somebody else. I praised those learners who did
not provide their own personal information, but rather pretended being someone else.
The main aim of this activity was to break the ice and to make all students to speak.

8. 4 Activity 4: Spot the Differences

This activity is taken from Play Games with English by Colin Granger

Aims: - making sentences in present continuous tense

- finding differences between two pictures
Language level: elementary
Time: 10 minutes
Material: copies with different pictures

Procedure:
I asked students to work in pairs and I distributed copies with picture A and with
picture B for each pair. Students asked questions about people in the pictures to find as
many differences as possible. They wrote full sentences to do this. I set ten minutes
time limit. The player with the most correct sentences was the winner.

Commentary:
This activity is based on the principle of the information gap. It works better when the
students do not look at each other’s pictures. However, this can be quite difficult for
weaker learners. I think that it is sometimes better to allow weaker students to look at
the partner’s pictures to be more confident.

41
8. 5 Activity 5: This is my favourite! Do you agree?
This activity is taken from Pair Work 1 by Peter Watcyn – Jones and Howard –
Williams

Aims: - asking about and expressing personal preferences

- asking questions with what and the verb to be: What’s your
favourite? answering with the verb to be.
- practising basic vocabulary on the following topic areas: food, weather,
colour, drink, ways to travel, places to go for leisure, places for a holiday.
Level: elementary
Time: 20 minutes
Materials: copies with handouts A, B

Procedure:
I divided the class into pairs and gave each student the appropriate handout. I explained
that at first they had to fill in the ‘me’ column with their own favourites. Then students
worked in pairs. Student B started by asking the questions: What’s your favourite ...?
Then read out the options and noted down the answers in the ‘Partner 1’ column. If
student A’s favourite was the same, he had scored 1 point in the column for partner 1.
For the second part of the task I pointed out that the scoring is different and 5 points
were given for the same answer. Then students changed round and student A asked
student B and wrote the score. When it was done I asked students to make new pairs.
They asked the same questions as before and noted down the answers in the ‘Partner 2’
column. In the end of the activity students worked out their totals.

Commentary:
This activity is very simple, but it encourages the students to cover a number of areas
and topics. It is also positive because it discovers what joins the partners in pair work
together.

42
8. 6 Activity 6: A family tree
This activity is taken form Pair Work 1 by Watcyn – Jones and Howard – Williams

Aims:
- asking for and giving personal information about people
- asking if something is true
- practising present simple + question word + to be/have got
- vocabulary for family relationship and occupations
Level: elementary
Time: 15 minutes
Materials: Copies of two family trees with several differences
Procedure:
I divided the class into pairs (A and B) and gave each person a copy of the appropriate
handout. There are twelve differences between handouts A and B. I went through the
types of questions students needed for finding those differences. I stressed that they
were not allowed to look at each other’s family trees.

Commentary:
This activity is a kind of oral drill. The students ask questions that are given to them
beforehand. At first, the teacher conducts the drill with the whole class. Then the
students practise in pairs. The students usually hate drills which are provided
mechanically by repeating words or structures after the teacher. However, the drill from
this activity provides a good opportunity for the revision of language and it is
entertaining. The students are conducting the drill themselves rather than being
controlled by the teacher.

43
9. Observations

The teacher has three main responsibilities in getting students involved in pair or group
work. The first responsibility is getting things started. It means making sure everyone
knows what to do and has the necessary vocabulary to do it and telling them
approximately how long the activity should take. The second is monitoring the pairs or
groups at work and deciding exactly when to stop the activity. The third teacher’s
responsibility is leading a short follow-up discussion after each activity, answering
questions, pointing out significant mistakes, and giving additional practice.
(http://www.cambridge.org/us/esl/letstalk/support/ideas.htm#tip1)

In this chapter I will describe my observations of the teacher’s roles and students’
behaviour in pair work activities which were disturbed by the teacher’s interventions. I
did not stay silent in front or in the back corner of the classroom, but I was going from
one pair to another interrupting the students and correcting their pronunciation and
grammar.

During the next three activities I monitored the teacher’s role and the learners’
behaviour in various stages of pair work activities. After giving instructions the
students worked in pairs without the teacher’s control and interruptions. I made notes
and answered their questions, but only when they asked me for help.

44
9. 1 Observation 1: Shamed! I have the messiest bedroom

There were fifteen students in the classroom, so I arranged six pairs and one group of
three. The students were divided into pairs by pre-activity. Half of them was given the
beginnings of the sentences and the second half of students their endings. They had to
find the second part of the sentence to complete it and make pairs. The odd student
could join the partner according to his choice.

I introduced the Crown magazine and distributed the copies with the photo and the text
from page 13. I asked the students to look at the photo and to discuss it answering the
questions which were described above in the procedure part of this activity. At this
stage I explained the words messy and tidy. I had a role of organiser, resource and
instructor.

When the students started pair discussion I interrupted each pair in the middle of their
communication correcting their mistakes and making notes. I had a role of assessor,
participant, prompter, monitor and resource. I was surprised that only two pairs
were working on the task during my interventions. I describe what others were doing in
the table 2 below.

After the discussion I asked the students to compare their answers. Several students
presented them for the whole class. I invited to participate those students who had not
spoken during the pair work discussion. I worked as an assessor and prompter.

Table 1 – Teacher’s roles in I have the messiest bedroom activity

Stage of the What does the teacher do? Role of teacher
activity
Giving Organises the students into pairs, Organiser,
instructions explains instructions and resource,
vocabulary, distributes material instructor
Monitoring Corrects pronunciation and Prompter,
grammar, helps to formulate resource,
some sentences, intervenes pair assessor,
work participant,
monitor
Feedback Assesses the students, asks them Assessor,
session to summarizes their findings, prompter
prompts

45
Table 2 – students’ behaviour in the activity called I have the messiest bedroom
Number of Verbal skills Questions, asking Students’
the pair, for help behaviour
students’
names

1 Roman, Both weak They asked for the They stopped

Přemysl translation of the speaking, turned
questions in the into Czech. They
beginning of the were making
task noise.
2 Monika, Strong, weak None They chose the
David easiest question
and answered it
pretending
conversation.
David was silent.
3 Alžběta, Saša Average, weak What was the They started to
homework for perform the task
today? from the
beginning in front
of the teacher.
Alžběta asked
about homework.
4 Jan, Kristýna Both strong Is Crown available They were in the
in the shops? middle of the
activity. They
followed it in front
of the teacher in
the same way as
without the
teacher.
5 Linda, Both strong What does the They continued
Simona word tidy mean in their discussion
Czech? under the teacher’s
control. They did
not mind it.
6 Lucie, Strong, average Can you explain It was Michal’s
Michal the meaning of the turn, but he said
word a mess? that Lucie should
speak. She spoke
instead of him.
7 Michaela, Average, strong, none They said that they
Ondřej,Tomáš weak had finished their
discussion. It was
not true. Ondřej
apologized for not
having his
homework.

46
9. 2 Observation 2: Interview your classmate
I asked my colleague to help me with the observation of this activity, because I wanted
to participate in it. I could not manage to observe so many pairs myself.
There were fourteen students in the classroom during that lesson. The students did the
classroom research to practice the phrases of politeness and making past tense
structures. I did not divide them into pairs, but I asked them to interview at least two
classmates. They could choose five from twenty questions according to the handouts.

In the beginning stage of this activity I distributed handouts with the topics for the
interviews. There was also example dialogue. We went through the vocabulary and
practiced making questions in past tense. I played the first dialogue with one of the
students and then I asked two volunteers to practise it once again to make sure that
everybody understands the task. I played the role of distributor, instructor, resource
and participant.

When the main part of the activity started I monitored the students making notes and
interviewing their pair communication. I participated as one of them interviewing
several students. I observed the students’ reactions to my participations with the support
of my colleague. I expected some of the students to interview me. I can say that the
students did a lot of communication working on this task. They did not mind my
interventions. Only two weaker students turned to Czech language because they did not
understand some words. At first, nobody came to interview me. I think they were to
shy. However, as soon as the first student made an interview with the teacher, four
people wanted to ask me too. I corrected their pronunciation, but I tried to do it in a
gentle way. At this stage I played the roles of monitor, participant, assessor and
resource.

In the feedback session I asked the students to present the results of their researches.
They made the sentences of this type: I have found that Lucie drank tea yesterday and
Tomáš did not drink tea. I corrected especially grammar because a few students did not
make the correct forms of the verbs in past tense. I had the roles of assessor and
observer and resource.

47
Table 3 – teacher’s roles during the activity Interview your classmate
Stage of the activity What does the teacher do? Role of teacher

Giving instructions Gives instructions, arranges Organiser, resource, instructor

the pairs, explains the rules
Monitoring Observes, makes notes, gives Observer, resource, prompter,
advises, translates some participant
words, prompts students,
participates
Feedback session Organises feedback session, Resource, assessor, prompter
encourages all participants to
join, asks questions if there is
a silence.

Table 4 - Students behaviour in the activity Interview your classmates

Name of the student Who did she/he made an Students’ behaviour
and the level of interview with during the main stage and
his/her verbal skills their reactions to the
teacher’s interventions
1 Lucie, strong Jan, Kristýna Saša She was completing the task
successfully. I made an
interview with her correcting
some grammatical mistakes.
She seemed not to mind it.
2 Tomáš, strong Linda, Roman, teacher He was working very hard
without any questions. He
chose one strong and one
weak student and also the
teacher to interview.
3 Roman, weak Simona, Saša He did not use polite
phrases. Those were too
difficult for him. However,
he participated in the
conversation. I interviewed
him correcting his mistakes.
4 Michal, average Michaela, teacher She began the first interview
with the teacher. She
enjoyed the activity.
5 Simona, strong teacher, Linda, Alžběta She was working without
any problems.
6 Linda, strong Ondřej, Saša Linda was confused that
Ondřej did not understand
her questions. She had to
explain them in Czech.
7 Ondřej, weak David, Michaela When I interviewed him he
felt nervous. He stopped
speaking and asked me for

48
 the meaning of some words.
8 Jan, strong Alžběta, Saša, Simona He enjoyed the activity and
he helped his partners.
9 David, average Teacher, Ondřej He performed the task
successfully with the
teacher, but had some
problems with Ondřej who
did not understand David’s
questions.
10 Monika, strong Linda, Roman She helped Roman to
formulate his sentences. She
was working with Linda
without problems.
11 Saša, average Přemysl, Tomáš, teacher She made an interview with
me. She made some
mistakes. After my gentle
correction she finished the
task successfully.
12 Kristýna, strong Jan, David She worked without
problems. She corrected
David’s mistakes.
13 Alžběta, average Teacher, Simona, Michaela She shortened the polite
phrases. I asked her to
practise the whole dialogue
with the next student.
14 Přemysl, weak Roman, Alžběta He was shy to make the
research with the teacher. He
seemed to be confused with
my corrections.

9. 3 Observation 3: Getting to know you

Sixteen students participated in this activity. I allowed them to work with partners
according to their choice. After giving instructions I was monitoring them and
intervening each pair in the middle of the task. I made notes about their reactions to my
interventions. I distributed the handouts and I introduced the activity by claiming that I
am a very famous person whom everybody knows very well. The students then asked
me questions about my nationality, occupation, address, etc. I did not tell them the
name. Then they asked me which things I liked and disliked. I worked as a organiser,
instructor, participant and resource.

49
Then the students worked on the task with their partners. In the first part of the activity
they asked questions about partner’s personal information. In the second part of the
activity they asked each other the questions about their likes and dislikes. I was
crouching from one pair to another helping with the task, monitoring and correcting
some mistakes. There were various students’ reactions to my interventions, but I can
say that they generally did not feel comfortable with the teacher’s presence. Some of
the students stopped the task asking for things which did not have anything to do with
the task. The aim of my observation was to find out if the teacher’s intervention can
spoil the atmosphere. At this stage I had the roles of monitor, assessor, participant,
resource and prompter.

When almost everyone finished I asked a few students to tell the class about their
partner. It was fun to mention the most curious facts about their partner. In the final
feedback I wrote on the board the most frequent mistakes I had noticed during the
activity. I asked the students to come to the board and correct them. For homework I
asked them to prepare the similar form and to question a friend or a family member. At
the final stage of the activity I had the roles of assessor and recourse.

Table 5 – Teacher’s roles in the activity Getting to know

Stage of the activity What does the teacher do? Roles of teacher

Giving instructions Gives instructions, performs Organiser, participant,

the task, distributes instructor, resource
handouts, organises pairs
Monitoring Monitors the students, makes Monitor, assessor, participant,
notes, prompts some students resource, prompter
to work, corrects mistakes,
answers the students’
questions
Feedback session Provides feedback, assesses, Assessor, resource
summarizes the most
frequent mistakes, sets
homework

50
Table 6 – the students’ behaviour in the activity Getting to know you
Number of Verbal skills Questions, asking Students’ behaviour
the pair, for help during the teacher’s
student’s intervention
name
1 Lucie, Both strong None They did not mind
Kristýna the teacher’s
intervention. They
finished earlier, so I
asked them to write
more questions for
their partners.
2 Michaela, Both average None When I came to them
Alžběta they started to
perform the task from
the beginning instead
of continuing it.
3 Linda, Strong, average Can we watch a They stopped the
Michal volleyball match in task, changed into
the hall? Czech. They told me
there was a volleyball
match at school and
they want to watch it.
4 Roman, Both weak None They did not
Ondřej formulate questions,
but read only the
words from the form
and answer them in a
very simple way.
5 Lucie, Strong average How can I say They performed the
David instalatér in English? task from the
beginning for the
teacher. When I did
not watch them they
spoke in Czech.
6 Simona, Both strong None They were
Tomáš completing the task
during my
intervention. They
changed their
identities. I praised
them for that.
7 Saša, Average, weak They asked for help They stopped
Přemysl the neighbouring pair speaking. They were
laughing, but they
did not tell me why. I
had to prompt them
to work on the task.

51
8 Jan, Strong, weak Tereza asked Jan for Tereza was not able
Tereza help . to ask the questions.
Jan helped her. They
spoke in Czech a lot.
Tereza seemed to be
bored with the task.

9. 4 Observation 4: Spot the differences

There were fifteen students in the class. I divided them into six pairs and one group of
three. In this activity I allowed the students to choose their partners on their own. Three
kinds of pairs were made. The first one was with two strong students, the second one
with two weak students and the third one with one strong and one weak student. The
triad was formed from mixed ability students.

In the beginning of the activity I distributed copies with two different pictures for each
pair. I explained that they should find twelve differences between the pictures using
present continuous tense and the verbs in the table below the pictures. Several students
asked me for the meaning of the words carry, pipe, come out of and get out. To be sure
that the task is clear I performed one sentence with the selected learner as an example.
At this stage of the activity I served as an organiser, instructor, resource and
participant.

When all students seemed to understand what to do I sat at the teacher’s desk and
started writing notes. I kept a distance from the students so some of them could think
that I had not been listening to them. They were accustomed to my presence from
previous activities. For this reason I think several students stopped working and started
to speak in Czech, but not about the differences between the pictures. I had to prompt
them so my role was the role of prompter. I was still available to answer their
questions. However, there were not any questions at this stage. The teacher’s roles
during the activity were the roles of prompter, resource and monitor.

After a ten minute time limit I stopped the activity and provide feedback session. I
checked how many differences they had found and praised the most successful pairs.

52
Then I asked learners one by one to read their sentences. I corrected pronunciation
immediately. For grammar correction I used body signals or I asked other learners to
say the wrong sentences properly. At this final stage of the activity I had a role of
assessor, resource and prompter.

Table 8 - Teacher’s roles during the Spot the Differences activity

The stage of the What does the teacher do? Role of teacher
activity

Giving instruction Organizes pairs, gives Organiser, resource,

instructions, asks if the task is instructor, participant
clear, explains some words,
performs an example
structure, offers help
Monitoring Observes the pairs, Prompter, resource, monitor
encourages the students who
do not work, makes notes
Feedback Corrects pronunciation and Assessor, prompter, resource
grammar, invites the students
discussion
to read their answers, praises
the students, evaluates

Table 7 - Students’ behaviour during the Spot the Differences activity

Number of Verbal skills Questions, asking Students’
the pair, for the teacher’s behaviour
students’ help
names
They cooperated,
without help of the
1 Michal, Both strong None
teacher
Lucie
The weaker student
was mostly silent
2 Kristýna, One strong, one weak None
but the stronger one
Roman helped him to speak
They seemed to be
For the meaning of bored with the task,
3 Linda, Both strong
the they were speaking
Simona word come out of in Czech when the
teacher was not
looking at them

53
 They started to
For the meaning of speak in Czech, not
4 Ondřej,
get out completing the task.
Přemysl Both weak They had to be
encouraged by the
teacher.
They started the
For the meaning of activity, but when
5 Alžběta, Both average
carry the teacher was not
Michaela looking they
stopped it.
They tried to find
None all differences
6 Monika, Both strong
between the pictures
Jan
They divided their
For the meaning of roles: the weaker
7 triad: Two strong, one weak
a pipe student was writing
David, and his stronger
partners were
Tomáš,
dictating.
Saša

9. 5 Observation 5: This is my favourite! Do you agree?

For this activity I divided students into pairs using a pre–activity. The students were
given the cards with the adjectives. I asked them to find a person with the opposite
adjective and to make pair with him or her. There were fourteen students in the
classroom so I had an ideal number for pairing. Some of the students were dissapointed
that they were not in pairs with their close friends, but they all worked with their new
partners without any serious comments. To start this activity I distributed handouts and
asked the students to complete the column under ‘me’ for their likes and dislikes. Then
they were instructed to question their partners and to write the score for the same
answer. There were two columns for questioning two partners. I modified the task
asking the students to work only with one partner. I used the second column for fast
finishers. There were several questions at this stage because some students did not
understand the scoring. I explained the instructions again in Czech. Vocabulary was
quite easy so nobody asked me for the meaning of the words in the beginning stage. I
had a role of organiser and instructor.

54
Once the students started to work on the task I began to play the role of observer. I was
still available to answer possible questions. However, I did not sit in front of the
students. I stayed in the back of the classroom because I wanted to monitor the students
behaviour in the situation when they could not see me. There were some pairs which
did not work without teacher’s control, but the most of the students felt comfortable to
complete the task without teacher’s interventions. I answered several questions for the
meaning of some words. The students wanted me to translate the names of countries
and the words for television programmes into English. Instead of translating the words I
offered them Czech – English dictionaries and I invited them to find the words
themselves. Firstly, they seemed to be confused, but later they enjoyed working on their
own. My role at this stage was the role of observer, resource and prompter.

After a given time limit the activity was stopped even if the students did not go through
all questions. I decided to provide feedback session in the form of ‘hot seat’ activity. I
chose two students to sit in front of the class and to answer the same questions as they
had in their handouts. The questions were asked by the rest of the students. There were
four students who wanted to make the questions all the time so I invited silent students
to contribute as well. I corrected pronunciation and I helped the weaker students to
make the questions. I praised them if their sentences were correct. I supported those
students who tried to make their own original questions for the hot seat candidates. I
can say that all students enjoyed the final stage of this activity. I played the role of
assessor, prompter, resource, observer and participant.
Table 9 – Teacher’s role during the What’s your favourite ...? activity
The stage of the What does the teacher do? Role of teacher
activity

Giving instructions Gives instructions, arranges Organiser, resource,

the pairs, explains the rules of instructor
the task.
Monitoring Observes, makes notes, gives Observer, participant,
advices, translates some resource, prompter
words, prompts the students
who do not work.
Feedback session Organises feedback session, Participant, resource,
encourages all students to join assessor, prompter
it, asks questions if there is a
silence.

55
Table 10 – Students’ behaviour during the activity What’s your favourite...?
Number of Verbal skills Questions, asking Students’ behaviour
the pair, for the teacher’s
students’ help
names
1 Monika, Both strong None They were working
Kristýna on the task very hard.
They had finished
earlier than the others
so I asked them to fill
in the column two
with new partners
from the pair
number5. They also
finished earlier.
2 Roman, Weak, strong Can you translate the The stronger student
Tomáš word dobrodružný? supported the weaker
one, so they both
completed the task
successfully.
3 Saša, Average, strong How can I say They checked if the
Linda Rakousko in English? teacher is watching
them. I had to prompt
them to work on the
task. They spoke
about their problems
without my control.
4 Přemysl, Weak, strong I can’ say seriál in They were working
Simona English. hard looking for the
unknown words in
the dictionary
5 Michaela, Both average How can I translate They finished earlier
Michal Chorvatsko? than the rest of the
students. They
changed their
partners with number
two to fill in the
second column.

6 Lucie, Strong, average None They were working

David without the teacher’s
help.
7 Jan, Strong, average They did not They tried to leave
Alžběta understand the word the task when I had
scoring not been watching
them. After the
prompting they
finished it a little bit
bored.

56
9. 6 Observation 6: A family tree

Before the activity started I had revised the key vocabulary for family relationships and
occupations. I did that in the form of brainstorming asking the students to write as
many words as possible in pairs with their neighbours. I added some more words they
did not mention. Then I drew a simple family tree on the board to check if students
understand how it works.

There were fifteen students in the classroom so I had to make one triad. I gave the
same handouts B to two students in the group of three. In this activity I divided the
students into pairs myself putting one strong and one weak student together. However, I
did not tell them the reason for my decision. I think that some weak students could be
confused. Several students were dissapointed because they wanted to work with their
close friends. I gave each pair a copy of the appropriate handout drawing their attention
to the fact that there are twelve differences between the handouts A and B. I allowed
them ten minutes to work together. I stressed that they were not allowed to look at each
others family trees. At this stage I had a role of organiser, instructor, resource,
participant.

The students were working on the task without my interventions. I observed them as in
the previous activity from the back of the classroom. I was available to answer their
questions. I put the dictionaries on the front desk. I was surprised that the students
noticed the dictionaries and were using them without asking me for help. The students
seemed to become more accustomed to this form of work. Some of them were speaking
in Czech when they did not understand anything. It did not prevent completing the task.
I did not have to prompt them because all students enjoyed looking for the differences.
In the most of the pairs stronger students were asking questions and the weaker students
were answering them. Only in one pair weaker student started to ask questions, but they
changed the roles after a while. It is generally more difficult to make questions than
answers. I had a role of observer at this stage.

When I saw that most of the students had finished their work I stopped the activity. We
went through the answers as a class. I corrected pronunciation and grammar. I

57
congratulated those who were both fast and accurate. In final feedback session we did a
follow up activity to reinforce making questions in present tense and asking for
information about people. We changed pair work to the whole class activity. We made
a class family tree on the board. I drew the first face and gave it name, age and
occupation. Then I asked several members of the class to come up one by one and add
someone to this family tree. A person in front of the blackboard had to ask questions
about its name, occupation, children, etc. All students enjoyed the final activity. At this
stage I had a role of assessor, resource, monitor and participant.

Table 11 – Teacher’s roles in the Family tree activity

Stage of the activity What does the teacher do Role of teacher

Giving instructions Explains the activity, Organiser, resource,

distributes handouts, divides participant, monitor,
the students into pairs, instructor
explains some words and
grammar.
Monitoring Observes the students, makes Monitor, resource
notes, offers help.
Feedback session Checks the results, provides Assessor, participant,
feedback, arranges follow up resource, monitor
activity, congratulates the
most successful pair

Table 12 – Students’ behaviour in the activity – A family tree

Number of the Verbal skills Questions, Students’bahaviour
pair, students’ asking for the
names help
1 Lucie, Roman strong, weak Roman did not Lucie was helping to
ask the teacher, Roman to make the
but his partner. questions. She explained
the difficulties in Czech.
They cooperated
2 Kristýna Saša strong, average None They were taking turns
to ask and answer
questions.
3 Simona, strong, average They were The strongest pair. They
Michaela looking for the managed to find all
unknown words differences in time.
in the dictionary.

58
 4 Jan, Přemysl strong, weak They asked for They were working hard
the meaning of without any serious
the word retired problems helping each
the pair number other.
one because they
heard that pair
one was
discussing it.
5Monika,Alžběta strong, average They asked They finished the task
something the successfully finding
other pair, but I eight differences. They
did not catch looked for meaning of
what it was the word husband in the
dictionary.
6 Michal, Linda average, strong None Michal began to make
questions, but he had
some difficulties to
formulate them. They
changed the roles.
7 David, Tomáš, average, strong, None Tomáš was asking and
Ondřej weak David was answering.
David found the word
retired in the dictionary.

9. 7 Findings

I have observed six various pair work activities and examined the teacher’s roles in
various stages of those activities. I have monitored pair work from the two different
points of view. In the first part of my observations I interrupted pair work correcting the
mistakes, participating and listening to the students. In the second one I did not
intervene students performing the task. I monitored them from a distance. I support
Harmer’s opinion who says that the teacher as controller is not oppressively present
because students can help each other to use and learn language. (Harmer p. 244)

According to my observations the teacher was not in the role of controller at all. It is
not possible to control all participants during pair work. The teacher can control only
one pair at one time. The teacher plays the most of his roles in all stages of pair work.
The least roles he has in the middle part of pair work when he does not intervene the
students’ work. However, he plays at least two roles at this stage.

59
It is obvious that student behaviour is closely connected to the teacher’s role during the
activity. I have observed that when the teacher participates too much in pair work he
discourages students. I share the same view as Watcyn-Jones and Howard-Williams
who claim that “once the activity has actually started it is best not to interrupt or correct
the students while they are working as this will impede fluency, spoil the atmosphere,
distract them from what they are doing and, at worst, destroy their confidence!” (Pair
Work 1, p. 11) When I interrupted the students working on the pair work activity they
stopped working on the task in 6 cases. In the situation when I monitored them from a
distance without intervening they stopped speaking only in 2 cases.

The table bellow summarises how many times I played individual roles during the
stages of observed pair work activities 1-6.

Table 13 – Teacher’s roles during the stages of pair work activities 1-6
The stage of organiser resource instructor prompter Observer participant assessor
activity (monitor)
Giving 5 5 5 - 1 2 -
instructions
Monitoring - 5 - 4 5 3 1
Feedback - 4 - 4 1 2 5
session

60
10. The analysis of the questionnaire for the students

I prepared a short questionnaire to find out what attitudes the students have towards the
teacher’s interventions during pair work. I wanted to see how the students feel when the
teacher interrupts them during a pair work activity, what type of partners they like to
work with and if they like an opportunity to speak English not only with the teacher in
English lessons.

I distributed 40 questionnaire forms to the students of the eight classes. Those were the
students who participated in my observation, but also other learners of our school (ZS
TGM Bojkovice). I received 36 forms back, but only 33 of them were suitable for
analysis. The questionnaire contained 10 questions (see appendix ....). The students
could choose one from two to four options. The questions were written in Czech
language and the students answered also in Czech. I expected most of the answers, but
some of them surprised me.
Here is analysis and interpretation of the individual questions from the questionnaire:

1. What type of work do you like in English lessons?

9 (27%) of students answered they like whole class activities. 12 (36%) like working in
groups and 10 (30%) of students like pair work activities. Only 2 (6%) students
answered they liked working individually.

The number of students who prefer whole class activities is quite high. I did not expect
it. I think that the reason for this fact is that still many teachers teach in a traditional
way standing in front of the class and teaching all students together. Students are
accustomed to this kind of work. In whole class interaction (as I described in the
theoretical part of this thesis) some students are active, but some of them sometimes do
not say a word during the whole lesson. It is obvious that the situation is changing since
36% of students prefer group work and 10% of them pair work activities. However,
pair work is not more popular than group work. In my opinion, these two forms of work
are very similar and both are suitable for learning languages in a communicative way.

61
Individual work is not very popular among students. It is good because if people learn
languages they have to communicate with someone else.

2. Do you prefer changing various partners for each pair work activity or do you
like working with the same partner all the time?

23 (70%) students out of 33 answered they prefer working with the same partners. 10
(30%) students like changing partners for pair work activities.

From my point of view, so many students prefer the same partners because they are
close friends and they do not want to disappoint them working with someone else.
Changing partners is necessary in pair work since students can learn from different
partners. However, these answers confirmed my expectations. I could monitor this
situation in the observations described above. (see part Observations)

3. How do you like to be organised with your partner in pair work?

20 (61%) students answered they prefered to choose their partners on their own. 13
(39%) students want to be organised into pairs on the basis of a pre-activity. None of
them likes selecting partners for pair work by the teacher.

Those answers completely correspond with my findings from the observations. I

noticed that most of the students did not mind random pairing after a pre-activity.
However, I could see that in spite of the fact that they loved pre-activities, they had not
felt comfortable with their partners. Students worked when I had chosen their partners,
but many of them were confused. In my opinion, it is better to allow students to work
with their partners according to their choice. The main aim of pair work is cooperation
and it is sometimes impossible with someone who students do not like.

62
4. Do you like to work with a partner on the same, higher, lower or on all levels of
language skills?

15 (45%) of students prefer to work with the partners on the same level. 12 (36%) of
students like working with the partners on the higher level. 4 (12%) of students do not
mind on which level their partner is. Only 2 (6%) students prefer partners of lower level
of language skills.

The answers from this question are very similar to my expectations. During my
observations I noticed that the students were completing the tasks more successfully
with the partners on the same or higher level. It did not often work than two weaker
students were put together. I think that it is very useful to organise one weak and one
strong student into pair. The stronger student can help the weaker one and the weaker
student does not need teacher’s support. The teacher should often change pairs so that
the stronger students would not be de-motivated working only with the weaker partners.

5. How do you feel when the teacher intervenes into the middle of pair work
activity?

Most of the students, 25 (76%) wants the teacher’s help only if they ask for it. 8 (24%)
students do not want to be interrupted at all.

It is obvious from the observed pair work activities that the teachers have to be
sensitive when they interrupt pair work communication. The answers for this question
confirm the fact that non-sensitive teacher’s intervention can spoil the whole activity.

6. How do you feel when the teacher corrects all your mistakes?

24 (73%) of students answered they felt stupid when the teacher corrects all their
mistakes. 6 (18%) students do not mind it and only 3 (9%) students like correction of
all mistakes.

This answer again corresponds with my expectations. During the observation I noticed
that the students often looked discouraged when I was correcting most of what they had

63
said. Mistakes are part of learning and it is more helpful to teach students how to
correct mistakes themselves.

7. Who do you ask for help with a problem during pair work?

23 (70%) of students answered that at first they asked for help their partners. 8 (24%)
students prefer to ask for help the teacher and only 3 (9%) students remain silent and
wait that someone else will solve it instead of them.

It is natural process when students ask their partners for help, because they sit next to
them. Pair work is based on cooperation that is why they are forced to solve everything
together. The teacher’s role is to observe and answer the questions. It is not possible to
be available for all students all the time.

8. Do you like the opportunity to speak English in class without the teacher’s
control?

28 (85%) of students like it. 4 (12%) students sometimes like it and 1 (3%) student does
not like it.

This answer confirms the answer to the question number 5. Students should get the
opportunity to speak English with other students. It is a good possibility to try their
communicative skills with someone else than the teacher. Speaking with the classmates
can simulate real life situation. The students need to try their ability to understand
language. The teacher is not always a good partner because he usually understands or
guesses what the students want to say.

9. Do you like when your teacher participates in pair work activities such as e.g.
class research?

18 (55%) students like it. 12 (36%) students are not sure about it and 3 (9%) students
do not like it at all.

64
I was surprised that 12 students are not sure if they like the teacher’s participation in
pair work activities. There can be two reasons. The first is that they are too shy to take
the teacher as a partner. The second reason could be the fact that the teachers do not act
as partners, but rather as teachers and controllers.

10. Do you think that you learn language speaking English with your classmates
who make mistakes?

13 (39%) students answered yes. 15 (45%) students are not sure about it and 5 (15%)
students do not think they learn by speaking in class with someone else than the
teacher.

These answers surprised me most of all. Possibly the students consider activities done
with their classmates as entertainment and not learning. Some of them think that if they
do not perform in front of the teacher they do not learn. I can compare my proclamation
with the observation of some pairs during pair work activities. There were several
students who did not work or stopped working and started performing the task in front
of the teacher. Those students did not understand how much benefit they get from pair
work.

65
Conclusion

The main aim of this thesis was to focus on different teacher’s roles in various stages of
pair work. From my observations I have found out that the teacher plays the most of his
roles in all stages of pair work with the exception of the role of controller since he is
not able to control all participants.

From the questionnaires and the observations I have also discovered that students prefer
to work in pairs with their friends. In my opinion, changing partners is necessary since
students can learn from different people. This kind of work is very similar to the
language outside the classroom. However, it is sometimes better to allow students to
work with partners according to their choice. It is sometimes not possible to work with
someone whom you do not accept. In spite of the fact that it is very helpful to organise
one weak and one strong student into pairs, teachers should often change students in
pairs so that the stronger students would not be stopped in their development.

Analyses of students’ answers in the questionnaire show that pair work becomes
popular among students, but it is not the most popular kind of work. Most students like
the opportunity to speak English in class without the teacher’s control. They also like
the teacher’s participation in pair work activities , but only on condition that the teacher
does not act as a controller. However, my observations and also questionnaire show that
there are still many students who are afraid of making mistakes and who demand the
presence of teacher when they perform the task.

I would recommend to the teachers to be sensitive when they interrupt pair work
communication. Non sensitive teacher’s intervention can spoil the whole activity.
Teachers should be present during pair work, but they should intervene only in the case
when students ask them for help. Of course, there are sometimes situations in which
teacher’s intervention is necessary. However, the more you disrupt students during pair
work, the more they become dependant on your help. As it was said in the beginning of
this thesis with development of communicative language teaching students should be
given a chance to express what they want to say independently on the teacher. This can
be achieved in well prepared pair work.

66
Summary

This thesis is entitled Teacher’s Role in Pair Work since its main aim is to find out
what teacher’s roles are in various stages of pair work. It also describes students’
reactions to those teacher’s roles.

The thesis consists of theoretical and practical parts. The first theoretical chapter deals
with whole class teaching to underline the necessity of increasing students’ talking time
in the lesson. Pair work as one of the possible ways how to get all students to
participate in classes is analysed in the next chapters. Chapter 4 deals with the roles of
teacher during pair work and the last theoretical chapter describes strategies of
correcting mistakes in pair work.

The practical part is divided into three sections. The first section introduces activities
which were used for the action research. It focuses on different teacher’s roles in pair
work and observations of students’ attitudes towards teacher’s interventions during the
course of pair work activity. The questionnaire analyses are the main subject of the
third section .

Resumé
Tato práce byla nazvána Role učitele při párové práci, neboť jejím hlavním cílem je
zjistit, jaké role má učitel v různých fázích párové práce.

Práce se skládá z teoretické a praktické části. První kapitola teoretické části zabývající
se frontální výukou zdůrazňuje nezbytnost zvýšení doby, po kterou student v hodinách
cizích jazyků hovoří. Párové práci jako jedné z možností, jak přimět všechny studenty
aktivně se zapojit do výuky, jsou věnovány další kapitoly. Kapitola čtvrtá popisuje role
učitele a metody opravování chyb při párové práci.

Praktická část je rozdělena do tří oddílů. V prvním jsou představeny aktivity, které byly
použity pro výzkum. Druhý oddíl se zabývá popisem výzkumu, jehož hlavní cílem bylo
pozorování rolí učitele. Zkoumá také reakce studentů na zasahování učitele do průběhu
vlastní párové práce. Obsahem třetího oddílu praktické části jsou rozbory dotazníku pro
studenty.

67
Bibliography

Brown, J. Understanding Research in Second Language Learning. Cambridge

University Press, 1988
Byrne, D. Techniques of Classroom Interaction. Longman Group UK Limited, 1989
Edge, J. Mistakes and Correction. Longman Group UK Limited, 1989
Granger, C. Play Games with English. Mackmillan Publishing, 1994
Hadfield, J. Classroom Dynamics. Oxford University Press, 1992
Hancock, M. Singing Grammar. Cambridge University Press, 1998
Harmer, J. The Practice of English Language Teaching. Longman, 1991
Harmer, J. Teach English. Addison Wesley Longman Limited, 1998
Lewis, M.; Hill, J. Practical Techniques for Language Teaching. London: Commercial
Colour Press Plc, 1992
Littlewood, W. Communicative Language Leaching. Cambridge University Press, 1981
Malamah-Thomas, A. Classroom Interaction. Oxford University Press, 1987
Nolasco, R.; Lois, A. Large Classes. Mackmillan Publishers, 1988
Nunan, D. Understanding Language Classrooms. Prentice Hall International (UK) Ltd,
1989
Peck, A. Language Teachers at Work. Prentice Hall International (Uk) Ltd, 1988
Scrivener, J. Learning Teaching. Mackmillan Publishers Limited, 1998
Underwood, M. Effective Class Management. Lomgman Group UK Limited, 1987
Ur, P. Discussions that work. Oxford University Press, 1981
Ur, P. A Course in Language Teaching. Cambridge University Press, 2000
Wajnryb, R. Classroom Observation Tasks. Cambridge University Press, 1992
Watcyn-Jones, P. Pair Work 2. Penguin Books, 2002
Watcyn-Jones, P.; Howard-Williams, D. Pair Work 1. Penguin Books, 2002
Wright, T. Roles of Teachers and Learners. Oxford University Press, 1987

Baker, J. Student Collaboration in the ESL/EFL Classroom. 2007. About. 4 Dec. 2006
<http://esl.about.com/cs/teachingtechnique/a/bl_baker4.htm>

Beare, K. StudentCorrection During Class-How and When? About. 17 Nov. 2006

<http://www.onestopenglish.com/section.asp?docid=153708>

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Bertrand, J. Working in Pairs and Groups. British Council. 10 Oct. 2006
<www.britishcouncil.org/languageteassistant-pair-group-work.htm>

Crown. Mary Glasgow Magazines. London. August/September 2006, p. 3

Griffiths, B. Teacher Positioning in the Classroom. 2005. Teaching English. British

Council. 5 Dec. 2006
<http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/methodology/position.shtml>

Hoodith, A. Promoting Oral Fluency via Group&Pair Work.Eltnews. 15 Oct. 2006

<http://www.eltnews.com/features/teachingideas/003_1ah.shtml>

Pentcheva, M.; Skopov T. Whole Language Whole Person. 1999. Echanger pour
Changer. Exchange to Change. 9 Nov. 2006
<http://www.sbg.ac.at/rom/people/leht/co/echanger>

Teaching Ideas. Lt’s Talk. 3 Nov 2006

<http://www.cambridge.org/us/esl/letstalk/support/ideas.htm#tip1>

Tennant, A. An Introduction to Using Pair Work for Teaching Speaking Skills.

Onestopenglish. Mackmillan. 22 Nov. 2006
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Appendix 1
Questionnaire for the students in English

1. I like to work in English lessons:

individually in pairs in groups as a whole
class

2. I prefer to: - work with a new partner for each pair work activity
- work with the same partner all the time

3. How do you like to be organised with your partner in pair work?

a) I prefer when the teacher chooses the partner for me.
b) I want to choose the partner myself.
c) I want to be organised into pairs by some pre-activity

4. I like to work with a partner who is:

a) on the same level as me
b) on the higher level than me
c) on the lower level than me
d) I like to work with the students of various levels

5. When I am speaking with my partner in English during the task I prefer the
teacher:
a) to control me all the time
b) help me only if I ask him/her

6. How do you feel when the teacher corrects all your mistakes:
a) I like it and feel comfortable with it.
b) I do not mind it.
c) I hate it. I feel stupid.

7. If I have a problem during pair work I prefer to:

a) ask the teacher for help

70
 b) ask my friend for help
c) I am silent. I do not solve the problem and I hope that someone will answer
instead of
me.
8. Do you like the opportunity to speak English in class without teacher’s control?
Yes no sometimes

9. Do you like you when the teacher participates in the activities such as e.g. class
survey?
yes no I do not mind it

10. Do you think that you learn by speaking English with your friend making a lot
of mistakes?
yes I am not sure definitely not

71
Appendix 2
Dotazník pro studenty v češtině

V každé otázce vyber a podtrhni jednu z možností.

1. V hodinách angličtiny rád(a) pracuji:
samostatně ve dvojicích ve skupinách

hromadně se všemi žáky ve třídě

2. Když pracuji ve dvojici dávám přednost:

- práci s jiným partnerem pro každou aktivitu
- práci pokaždé se stejným partnerem

3. Jaký způsob organizování do dvojic ti vyhovuje:

a) mám raději, když mi partnera určí učitel
b) raději si vybírám partnera sám(sama)
c) chci, aby mi byl partner přidělen na základě nějaké činnosti nebo hry

4. Rád(a) pracuji ve dvojici s partnerem, který je:

a) na stejné úrovni vědomostí a dovedností jako já
b) na vyšší úrovni než já
c) na nižší úrovni než já
d) je mi jedno na jaké vědomostní úrovni je můj partner

5. Když mluvím s partnerem anglicky při práci ve dvojicích jsem raději, když:
a) mě učitel neustále kontroluje a opravuje
b) mi učitel pomůže s problémem jen, když ho o to požádám

6. Jak se cítíš, když učitel opravuje tvé chyby:

a) jsem rád(a), líbí se mi to
b) nevadí mi to
c) nesnáším to, cítím se hloupě

72
7. Když mám nějaký problém při práci ve dvojici:
a) požádám o pomoc učitele
b) požádám o pomoc svého partnera
c) neudělám nic a počkám až problém vyřeší někdo jiný místo mě

8. Líbí se ti možnost mluvit v hodinách anglicky bez kontroly učitele?

ano ne někdy

9. Jsi rád, když se učitel zapojuje do aktivit jako je např. třídní dotazník(class
survey)?
ano ne nevadí mi to

10. Myslíš, žes se učíš jazyk tím, když mluvíš anglicky i s chybami se svým
kamarádem?
ano nejsem si jistý(á) rozhodně ne

73
Appendix 3
Material - Activity 1

74
Appendix 4
Material – Activity 2

75
Appendix 5
Material – Activity 3

76
Appendix 6
Material – Activity 4

77
Appendix 7
Material – Activity 5

78
Appendix 8
Material – Activity 6

79
80