WP53 Urban Classroom Culture and Interaction: End-of-Project Report

What?s going on in contemporary urban classrooms?? Education policy advocates whole-class teaching fronted by the teacher, but just how workable are traditional forms of pedagogy?? What?s the influence in school of popular culture and the new media, and how much does ethnic diversity matter?? This end-of-project report seeks a balanced and realistic answer to these questions.? It draws on close observation and radio-mic recordings of the everyday lives of adolescents at school, studies the details of their talk, and sets these in the multi-layered context of policy imperatives, cultural change, friendship relations, classroom dynamics and the trajectories of individuals.