Developing adaptive teaching practices through participation in cogenerative dialogues

Teaching and Teacher Education 63 (2017) 326e337

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Research paper

Developing adaptive teaching practices through participation in cogenerative dialogues J. Luciano Beltramo* Regis University, Denver, CO, USA

h i g h l i g h t s  Cogenerative dialogues revealed students' explicit interests and learning needs.  Teachers used this information to engage in several forms of adaptive instruction.  Yet, more inferential student information often went underutilized by teachers.  Teachers and students collaborated to solve instructional issues in the classroom.

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

Article history: Received 15 June 2016 Received in revised form 29 December 2016 Accepted 9 January 2017

This study explores the potential of cogenerative dialogues to help teachers develop the adaptive instructional practices necessary for ambitious approaches to teaching diverse students. Specifically, the investigation examines asks: What information can urban U.S. high school teachers learn about students through such dialogues? and How do such teachers later leverage this knowledge in adopting adaptive teaching practices in the classroom? Findings reveal that, through their involvement in cogenerative dialogues, participating teachers gained insights into students' individual interests and social and learning needs. The teachers then utilized this new knowledge to enact classroom practices of responsive guidance and macro- and micro-adaptations. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Adaptive teaching Cogenerative dialogues Ambitious teaching

In many U.S. classrooms today, and for a number of complex sociopolitical reasons (Heilig & Darling-Hammond, 2008), students from historically marginalized communities are often faced with and underserved by overly didactic, teacher-centered instruction (Ladson-Billings, 2009). Such teaching delivers heavily structured and standardized curriculum with little differentiation and/or relevance to the learning needs, cultural repertoires, and individual interests of students (Obidah & Howard, 2005). Students are expected to adjust to the chosen instructional approach of the teacher, rather than the teacher adapting classroom practices to the learning needs and cultural-linguistic backgrounds of students. Traditional instruction has been associated with inequitable learning opportunities, particularly in the science content areas (Emdin, 2007a; 2011; Parker, 2014), as measured by decades of lower achievement scores for diverse students (McWhirter,

* Regis University, Regis College, Department of Education, 3333 Regis Blvd., H12, Denver, CO 80021, USA. E-mail address: [email protected]. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2017.01.007 0742-051X/© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Luginbuhl, & Brown, 2014). In response, scholars have proposed more student-centered pedagogical approaches. One approach gaining particular traction in recent research is ambitious teaching, which specifically seeks “to get students of all racial, ethnic, class, and gender categories to understand important ideas, participate in the discourses of the discipline, and solve authentic problems” (Windschitl, Thompson, & Braaten, 2011, p.1315). To enact ambitious teaching, teachers employ within each of their content areas a set of “core practices” dthose high-leverage teaching moves that stimulate deep student thought and engagement around central concepts of the discipline (Lampert et al., 2013). Examples of core practices within the science content areas include engaging students in investigations and facilitating classroom discourse (Kloser, 2014). In their efforts to reach every student, however, teachers guided by ambitious teaching are called to flexibly adapt core practices to the exigencies of their particular contexts “based on continually assessing and learning about students as they teach” (Lampert, Boerst, & Graziani, 2011, p. 1366). In this way, literature on ambitious teaching has highlighted

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the importance of developing teachers' adaptive expertisedtheir ability to respond to knowledge about students by adapting curriculum and teaching practices to promote deeper learning (Hammerness et al., 2005; Hatano & Oura, 2003; Lin, Schwartz, & Bransford, 2007). Scholars have argued for the necessity of adaptive teaching by highlighting the complex, dynamic social systems within which teaching is situated (Sawyer, 2004) and the often unpredictable nature of student meaning making (Hammerness et al., 2005). Moreover, adaptive teaching is especially needed in certain contexts, such as classrooms serving diverse students, whose modes of participation, ways of thinking, and cultural and linguistic backgrounds have been historically neglected by more traditional instruction (Mascarenhas, Parsons, & Burrowbridge, 2010). Contexts particularly deserving of adaptive teaching are science classrooms, where, scholars argue, students should be encouraged to pose their own questions, and thus teachers must flexibly respond ‘on the fly’ by adapting their lesson plans and goals to address those questions (Hammer, Goldberg, & Fargason, 2012). For teachers to develop this adaptiveness, literature suggests that they need a strong base of pedagogical content knowledge, a vision of ideal teaching, and, especially, a deep understanding of and familiarity with their students (Fairbanks et al., 2010). Most studies in adaptive teaching explore how teachers learn about their students through content-based assessments, in-class discussions, and observations of the learning environment (Parsons, 2012). While certainly necessary, such methods are still somewhat limited in that they typically do not involve direct dialogue with students and thus are challenged in uncovering less visible types of information about students (e.g., their authentic questions and interests) that are so crucial to both student learning and adaptive teaching (Graue, Whyte, & Delaney, 2014). Recent scholarship in science teacher education has explored an emergent tool for helping teachers gain greater understanding of their studentsdcogenerative dialogues (Tobin, 2014). Conceptualized as learning catalysts for educators (Siry & Lang, 2010), cogenerative dialogues represent spaces where teachers meet with representative groups of their students on a regular (usually weekly) basis outside of instructional time to generate, deliberate on, and evaluate ideas toward improved opportunities for student learning (Tobin & Roth, 2006). These conversations typically center on questions such as: How have activities and the classroom environment supported or impeded student learning? What improvements should be made to bolster student interest, engagement, and learning? Here are some ideas for future lessons; in what ways can they be made more meaningful and accessible to students? (Emdin, 2007b). The investigation here reports on a design study in which I collaborated with two high school science teachers to establish and facilitate cogenerative dialogues with their students. Through this study, I pursue the following questions: What types of student information are made available to teachers through their participation in cogenerative dialogues? In what ways and to what extent can teachers leverage what they learned about students to engage in adaptive teaching? By pursuing these questions, I frame the study around two purposes:  To expand what is presently known about cogenerative dialogues and their potential for mediating teacher learning about their students; and  To better understand how cogenerative dialogues can help teachers develop the type of adaptive practices that are so necessary for approaches like ambitious teaching, which seek more equitable learning opportunities for diverse students.

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1. Sociocultural learning and adaptive teaching Within this study, I conceptualize both teacher and student development from a sociocultural theoretical viewpoint, where learning is understood as a collaborative process of engagement with and meaning making around problems and questions that hold personal and cultural value (Rogoff, 2003). Scholars working from this perspective explain that learners engage with materials and activities that make sense with and involve their funds of knowledge (Gonzalez & Moll, 2002), cultural repertoires, and ways of knowing (Gutierrez & Rogoff, 2003)dor what Gee (2001) collectively conceptualizes as students' Discourses. At the same time, because they navigate multiple social groupingsdwhich each may have differing and/or competing Discoursesdlearners develop their own individual values and interests that also shape what they find meaningful and how they learn (Gutierrez & Rogoff, 2003). Thus, from a sociocultural lens, teachers seeking to optimize student engagement and meaning making acknowledge students as both members of communities and as unique individuals by creating learning opportunities that resonate with students' home Discourses, as well as their individual interests, social needs, and learning preferences. Adaptive teaching aims for similar ends. In carrying out adaptive practices, teachers attend to how students make meaning of academic content, the social context of the classroom, and the broader world outside of school; and then appropriately use such student information to reshape instruction toward improved classroom learning opportunities (Hammerness et al., 2005). Adaptive teaching is also characterized by continual assessment and response to the substance of student thinking (Hammer et al., 2012); differentiated support of students' learning in relation to their social, emotional, and intellectual needs (Howell, 2012); inclusion of students' prior experiences and funds of knowledge within the classroom (Graue et al., 2014); development of caring, thoughtful relationships with students (Dozier, Garnett, & Tabatabai, 2011); and establishment of learning goals that reflect students' interests and authentic questions about the world (Vaughn & Parsons, 2013). Early scholars of adaptive teaching posited that such practices typically manifest in one of two forms: macro- and microadaptations (Corno, 2008; Randi & Corno, 2005). Macro-adaptations represent a teacher's efforts outside the classroom to recraft instructional and curricular plans in light of new information about student learning. Micro-adaptations occur when teachers flexibly respond to students in the moment of teaching by improvising from previously established plans. More recently, others (e.g., Maskiewicz & Winters, 2012; Vaughn & Parsons, 2013) have proposed that adaptive teaching is also demonstrated through responsive guidance, where a teacher “works first to engage students in the pursuit of [their authentic questions], and then to support them in their pursuit in ways that afford progress toward canonical practices and ideas” (Hammer et al., 2012, p. 55). In this third form of adaptive teaching, a teacher seeks out the queries of her students, and then adaptively constructs learning activities that address these student interests and curiosities, eventually tying them back to broader academic concepts. Seen from these theoretical and pedagogical perspectives, teaching is as much about teacher learning as it is student learning; that is, to deeply engage students in meaning making by responsively adapting class content and activities, teachers need to constantly learn about who their students are moment-tomomentdwhat their students can and want to do with guidance from their teacher, and how and what their students think about the content. Thus, adaptive teachingdand broader pedagogical approaches like ambitious teaching that draw on itdrequires

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teachers to learn continually about students. I propose here that cogenerative dialogues offer special purchase in this regard.

2. Learning about students through the ‘reflective contract’ of cogenerative dialogues From a sociocultural perspective on teacher learning, I assume that teachers develop their practices by collaborating with others in the profession around meaningful challenges and problems (Little, 2003). At times, however, learning may stall in professional collaboratives marked by strong cohesion, where a lack of diverse perspectives could hinder the identification of problems within a shared practice (Wenger, 1999). On such occasions, groups may benefit from perspectives of those positioned at the peripheries of €n their profession. In his concept of the “reflective contract”, Scho (1983) argues that a potentially powerful outside perspective can be found in one's clients, or those whom a professional serves. € n's theory is the idea that, through consultation Implied in Scho with students, teachers might gain valuable knowledge that would otherwise be inaccessible to themdknowledge, for example, of how students are (or are not) making meaning of the content or what questions students would like to explore. Such knowledge is understood as essential not only for addressing the complex, nuanced problems that teachers encounter daily in their practices (Hammerness et al., 2005), but also for developing more equitable learning opportunities for students from historically marginalized €n explains that learning communities (Banks et al., 2005). Scho through the reflective contract occurs recursively, through a cycle of reflective inquiry consisting of information gathering, planning, experimentation, and evaluation via further reflection. Thus, this study conceptualizes cogenerative dialogues as one potential form of a reflective contract, where teachers might recursively access the perspectives of, reflect with, and learn about the Discourses, interests, and needs of their students, all with the aims of using this information to make efforts toward adaptive classroom practices. Research on cogenerative dialogues in K-12 classrooms supports this conceptualization, highlighting several affordances for teacher learning and adaptiveness in relation to students' cultural repertoires and, in particular, their expectations for classroom communication (Tobin, 2014). For example, previous studies have explored how teachers engaging in cogenerative dialogues have adopted aspects of their students' speaking styles (Beers, 2009; LaVan, 2005), reformatted classroom discussions to reflect more authentic forms of student discussions, and employed culturally relevant analogies to help explain science concepts (Emdin, 2011). Other investigations have found that teachers can use cogenerative dialogues to gain insight into students' “lifeworlds” (Stith & Roth, 2006), experiences of home life, and authentic curiosities about the world (Stith & Roth, 2008). A limited but emerging niche of research on cogenerative dialogues has explored how these spaces might help teachers gain access to other forms of student information, such as students' social and learning needs. For instance, studies have examined how teachers participating in cogenerative dialogues have learned about students' feelings of safety (Stith & Roth, 2010; Wassell, Martin, & Scantlebury, 2013) and concerns for giving and receiving respect in the classroom (Stith & Roth, 2006). The present investigation seeks to build on this nascent but important area of research by further exploring how cogenerative dialogues can help reveal individual students' learning preferences, social needs, and authentic interestsdeach of which is critical for teachers' efforts to create the engaging learning opportunities called for by ambitious teaching. Specifically, the study addresses these research questions:

 What types of student information are made available to teachers through their participation in cogenerative dialogues?  In what ways and to what extent can teachers leverage what they learned about students to engage in adaptive teaching?

3. Methodology In conducting this inquiry, I utilized data collected from a design-based investigation into two teachers' experiences with cogenerative dialogues1. In design-based studies, researchers collaborate with practitioners to explore how interventions (or catalysts) such as cogenerative dialogues can mediate the participants' learning in ‘real’ classroom environments (Design-based Research Collaborative (DBRC), 2003; Reinking & Bradley, 2008). In selecting participants for this research, I recruited two teachers, n and Lorena Silva (all names as pseudonyms), both of Ellen Galva whom worked in urban U.S. high schools serving the types of diverse student populations that often lack access to equitable learning opportunities (Obidah & Howard, 2005). These teachers also both taught science, a content area where adaptive teaching is especially necessary for facilitating inquiry-based learning (Maskiewicz & Winters, 2012). Ellen and Lorena were veteran anatomy/physiology teachers, with each having more than ten years of experience in the classroom (see Table 1). Over the six-month design investigation, I worked closely with Lorena, Ellen, and their participating students to enact, continually develop, and learn from the weekly cogenerative dialogues we established. At each site, the teacher selected one of her anatomy class periods about which she wanted to learn more. After presenting information about cogenerative dialogues to the selected class period at each site, I then invited any interested student to join our afterschool meetings. Four students volunteered to participate within Lorena's dialogues (see Table 2). At Ellen's site, ten students asked to participate, a number quite large for a single dialogue group. To ensure meaningful opportunities for each of these members to converse with their teacher, we asked the students to divide themselves into two clusters, who would each participate in eight dialogues. Similar to previous studies on cogenerative dialogues (e.g., Tobin, 2006), I initially led most of the discussions among our dialogue members during our early meetings at each site. As the teachers and students became increasingly more comfortable with facilitating the conversations themselves, however, I scaled back my participation until I was a rare contributor, preferring instead to listen as discussions more naturally unfolded among other dialogue members. 3.1. Data collection and analysis To understand how the cogenerative dialogues operated as catalysts for Ellen and Lorena to learn about their students and then enact more adaptive teaching practices, I collected robust ethnographic data, closely following procedures of previous design research into cogenerative dialogues (e.g., Siry & Lang, 2010). During the sixteen weekly cogenerative dialogues held at each site, I took field notes on, videotaped, and transcribed discussions among the teacher and student members, so as to capture moments when students shared information about themselves (see Table 3). To note how Ellen and Lorena later changed their instruction in response to this student information, I observed and videotaped weekly blocks of their anatomy classes, as well as an

1 IRB approval was sought and obtained by both the author's university, as well as the participants' charter school district.

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Table 1 Teacher participant demographics, experience, and school information. Teacher

Gender Race/ ethnicity

Ellen Galv an Female Latina Lorena Silva Female Latina

Experience in teaching (years) High school 13 11

Ambition East 97% Latino, 3% Black Ambition West 99% Latino, 1% Black

Table 2 List of student participants at each site. Ambition East (Ellen) Ambition West (Lorena)

Racial/ethnic makeup of school enrollment Percent qualifying for free/reduced lunch

, Lina, Patricia, & Vanessa Weeks 1e8: Alejandro, Jose Weeks 9e15: Angel, Dylan, Maria, Melvin, & Nelson Weeks 1e16: Antonio, Carlos, Emmy, & Mateo

97% 92%

needs,” “social needs,” and “authentic questions”), first those found across transcripts from the same site, and later those identified across transcripts from both sites (see Appendix A). These categories then represented patternsdor typesdof information that students made available about themselves within the cogenerative dialogues.

Table 3 Summary of data collection and analysis process. Stage of data collection & analysis (and timeframe of each stage)

Methods taken by author

Baseline Data Collection (Months 0e0.5)

Observed and videotaped entire week of instruction at both sites; formally interviewed each teacher and student participant. Observed and videotaped each dialogue; observed and videotaped 1e2 blocks of instruction every week at each site; conducted debriefs with teachers and students following each dialogue and instructional block; conducted formal interviews with each participant at Month 3. Observed and videotaped entire week of instruction at both sites; formally interviewed each teacher and student participant. Located and labeled pieces of information students revealed about themselves in dialogue transcripts; grouped pieces of information into categories, both within and across sites. Paired pieces and/or categories of student information with corresponding individual teaching ‘moves’ made by Ellen and Lorena. Labeled and categorized each pair. Reread raw data from each pair; created summarizing descriptions of each pair; cross referenced descriptions with patterns from first and second cycles of analysis; selected pairs that demonstrated these patterns and illustrated examples of ambitious teaching.

Data Collection on Cogenerative Dialogue Enactment (Months .5e5.5) Comparative Data Collection (Months 5.5e6) First Cycle of Data Analysis (Months 6e7) Second Cycle of Data Analysis (Months 7e8) Third Cycle of Data Analysis (Months 8e9)

entire week's instruction at each site at both the front and back end of the study to collect baseline and comparative data. Additionally, I conducted and audio-recorded informal ‘debrief’ interviews (DBRC, 2003) with Ellen and Lorena immediately following every dialogue and teaching episode. In these debriefs, I worked closely with the teachers in helping make sense of student information disclosed via the dialogues. I also probed the teachers on their rationales for instructional decisions they made in subsequent lessons. In keeping with traditions of design research (DBRC, 2003; Reinking & Bradley, rrez 2008), I undertook the role of an “observant participant,” (Gutie & Vossoughi, 2010, p. 101) meaning that I collaborated with the participating teachers and students to help enact the dialogues; discuss and informally analyze the data collected; and co-construct necessary adjustments to dialogue and classroom structures in response to the data. I explored this data through three cycles of analysis, with each cycle undertaking a slightly different process (see Table 3). The first cycle of analysis centered on the student information revealed within the cogenerative dialogues. Here I conducted several rounds of coding on each dialogue transcript (Miles & Huberman, 1994; ~ a, 2013). While rereading the transcripts, I located points Saldan within cogenerative dialogues where students offered information about themselves, which typically occurred when students shared their perspectives on, gave a suggestion around, or talked about their needs in relation to an aspect of teaching. I then labeled each of these points with a description of the information being given. Using concepts from sociocultural theory, I grouped these various points of student information into related categories (e.g., “learning

In the next cycle of analysis, I examined field notes and videotapes from the instructional periods that followed each cogenerative dialogue to explore if and how individual pieces and broader categories of student information were leveraged somehow in moments of adaptive teaching. This analysis also consisted of several rounds of coding. I began by matching the pieces and/or categories of information students revealed about themselves in a dialogue to one of Ellen and Lorena's later teaching ‘moves’ that seemed to respond to this student information. I labeled such instances as adaptive teaching practices, and gave them their own individual descriptors. I next used theory on adaptive teaching to classify these instances into several categories (e.g., “micro-adaptations,” “macro-adaptations,” “responsive guidance”), first those emerging within each teacher's classroom and then those found across both classrooms (see Appendix B). These categories then revealed the types of adaptive practices found across Ellen and Lorena's respective classrooms. I have chosen, however, not to structure my findings as separate presentations of the types of information students revealed about themselves on the one hand and the categories of adaptive practices that teachers seemed to enact on the other. Doing so, I contend, would merely identify general patterns on each side without showing their crucial intersectionsdthe temporally bound connections between what a teacher learned about students in a dialogue and what she chose to do in class periods immediately following the dialogue. I argue that although individual pieces of student information and moments of adaptive teaching collectively constitute important overall patterns, it is their one-to-one,

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sequential couplings that demonstrate cogenerative dialogues' potential to mediate teacher development toward adaptive teaching2. Thus, in the following findings section, I present two episodes (Roth & Tobin, 2001) to illustrate how the participating teachers learned about students in a cogenerative dialogue and then used this new knowledge of students to enact adaptive practices. In research on cogenerative dialogues, episodes are commonly employed to depict how teacher and/or student learning within a dialogue later spurs developments in teaching (e.g., Roth, Tobin, & Zimmerman, 2002). An episode generally consists of a raw datum from a cogenerative dialogue (typically a transcript excerpt from the recorded conversation among members), along with analysis and interpretation of the datum, a raw datum from or a vignette describing later classroom practice, and an analysis and interpretation of this teaching. I present in the findings section two episodes composed of data and analysis from this research. To select a transcript excerpt and corresponding classroom vignette for each episode, I conducted a third cycle of analysis. I reread each cogenerative dialogue and its following classroom observation field note as a pair, or episode, each time writing descriptions of the pieces of student information and corresponding moments of adaptive teaching that emerged across them. I cross referenced these descriptions with the patterns of student information and adaptive teaching practices that I had identified in the earlier analysis cycles. I then selected two episodes (i.e., dialogue transcripts and their corresponding classroom vignettes) that best demonstrated these patterns and that revolve around examples of pedagogical activitiesdscience labs and whole-class discussionsdthat reflect core science practices of ambitious teaching (Kloser, 2014). 4. Findings 4.1. Episode A: using cogenerative dialogues to inform teaching within a lab dissection In the tenth week of the study, Lorena and I facilitated with her student group a cogenerative dialogue (see Table 4 for a transcript excerpt), where we discussed an upcoming lab in which clusters of students would dissect and explore the anatomical structures of sheep hearts. For homework over the previous two evenings, the students had been assigned to read and answer questions found within a lab manual provided to them several days earlier. The manual explained each step of the lab and briefly referenced new vocabulary related to the heart anatomy. After we had discussed Lorena's lessons from the previous week, the topic of our conversation shifted from the lab manual to the upcoming heart dissection and students' concerns and authentic queries around this activity. 4.1.1. Student information revealed A host of individual pieces of student information were revealed

2 Importantly, although the pieces of student information and corresponding teacher moves are paired sequentially to note their possible connections, I do not assume causality in their relation but, rather, mediation. According to sociocultural learning theory, developments in one's actions (or practices) occur not through the singular, unidirectional causality of a given intervention, but rather through the intercessiondor mediationdof multiple factors (e.g., one's tools, community, norms and rules, etc.) that converge and impact one another dialectically €m, 2000; Vygotsky, 1980). From these theoretical assumptions, I suggest (Engestro that the teaching decisions of Ellen and Lorena mutually interacted with newly acquired information about their students (among other factors less studied here) to shape adaptive developments in their classroom actions.

within the sliver of transcript from this dialogue. The transcript revealed that some students in Lorena's class, like Carlos and Antonio, had concerns about class participation, particularly around students engaging in appropriate lab activities without distraction from tools such as food coloring. One might also notice from the excerpt that some students, like Emmy and Antonio, had a need for clearer directions, more organization, and more structural supports within labs, such as assigning particular “jobs” or roles to individuals within each group. Without such structures, time might have been a factor in finishing lab procedures for some students like Carlos. This dialogue also revealed that as student interests were piqued during labs, a multitude of questions tended to emerge at one time from, and could be shared by, individual students located in separate groups. Given their apparent desire to soak up information in during these dissections, students like Mateo wanted to hear their peers' questions and the answers to those queries; thus, finding ways to share and address questions for the whole class could benefit student learning and engagement. At the end of the excerpt, Antonio and Carlos shared some of their own related curiosities even before the lab was underway (such as Carlos' question about a heart's shape and Antonio's query about “open heart surgery”). Further, while not captured in Table 4 (for brevity), Mateo and Emmy posed additional authentic questions about the heart to Lorena later in the dialogue as well. Looking across these pieces of information also revealed broader, more inferential categories of information about students' needs in relation to lab activities. First, Lorena's comments in the dialogue pointed to her view of labs as a place for student-guided exploration; however, student requests for more conceptual clarity and academic supports before and during labs indicated a need for greater scaffolding from the teacher in order for students to build the prior knowledge necessary for carrying out lab explorations. Therefore, such an interpretation of the dialogue transcript implied that labs should perhaps be prefaced with several preparatory lessons, so that students have the interests, knowledge, and tools to discover even more once they begin their dissections. A second theme across these pieces of information was that within activities of hands-on learning such as dissection labs, students desired (and likely needed) structures that could help them work with peersdfor example, to help them know “who does what”dby providing clear expectations and guidance for individual participation. 4.1.2. Vignette from following instructional period The day following the cogenerative dialogue referenced above, Lorena began the instructional period by announcing to her class: “Take a look at the ‘Do-Now’: It asks you journal about any questions you have about the heart as an organ, or any questions that came up for you last night when you were reading the lab manual.” After circulating around the room to check on students as they completed this warm-up activity, Lorena goes to the whiteboard: “Now who can share with us what questions they wrote down?” Students start raising their hands and volunteering questions … Many of these questions repeat ones asked by the cogenerative dialogue from yesterday. Lorena copies them in shorthand on the board. The questions that are more original, however, she doesn't copy, but instead just answers them aloud for the class as they're asked. (Field notes, Week 10). Immediately following this whole-class discussion, Lorena then presented a series of Power Point slides (which she had prepared the night before) that addressed the questions her cogenerative dialogue students had raised earlier. As Lorena gave this direct instruction (clarifying confusing anatomical terminology, explaining

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Table 4 Cogenerative dialogue transcript excerpt about lab dissection (Lorena). Lorena: Emmy:

So what'd you think of the actual reading of the lab manual itself? I thought some words were kind of confusing. Even the pictures, ‘cause I was looking for the new vocabulary there and it wasn't there. So maybe you could go over it. Lorena: Okay, so I'll definitely give you better pictures next time. But should I also review vocabulary before the lab? My concern is I don't want to overwhelm you with paperwork before a lab, and then in the lab is when you'll get to see all of the new anatomical structures, so … Emmy: I think it'll help to do it before, that way we know what we're dissecting … Carlos: Miss, the manual says we're gonna put food coloring down the heart. Are we really doing that? ‘Cause you gotta go over that [set of directions]. Like, a lot of people might put more than they should and just start playing around with it. Mateo: Yeah, you could just give us a certain amount [of food coloring] … Emmy: Or just give a person in the table group a job, like one of them is the dropper … That way, it's more organized. Carlos: Yeah, because when it was just me and Mateo in the eye dissection [last month], we had to take our gloves off to write down, and then try to put them back on. It just took too long and we couldn't finish it. Lorena: That's good. So, give people specific jobs? I like that. We could have, like, lab assistants. So, if I put you in groups of four, we could have lab assistants who are doing the dissecting, they're the ones touching everything, so they have gloves to touch everything. Then, the lead person gets all the supplies, and they could be the one actually going through the directions, “OK, where are we at?” Then we could have a person be the recorder, who fills out the lab guide for the group. Antonio: Yeah, that's good, Miss, ‘cause sometimes people be arguing about doing stuff. Lorena: Okay, so we'll have lab jobs for everyone so they'll all know who's doing what … Mateo: Miss, people always have a lot of questions during labs, but when you answer them at their tables, we can't all hear them and then we ask the same questions … Lorena: Okay, so maybe I could just announce new questions to the class when I get them. Carlos: Oh, I got a question now, Miss. Why is the heart that shape and not like emoji?… Antonio: Yeah, and what causes the heart to clog? Why do they do open heart surgery?

the heart's actual shape in relation to its popular images, discussing plaque, fat deposits, and open-heart surgery, etc.), students seemed actively engaged: “Even while [Lorena's] presentation extends past 5 min, the students are still actively listening … Some are nodding and taking notes. Others whisper to partners and point to visuals presented on Lorena's slides” (Field notes, Week 10). Lorena then advanced to her final slide, which introduced the lab and explained the different ‘jobs’ that would soon be undertaken by certain students within each group. After answering a few questions about these directions, Lorena directed each group to assign its members a particular job and begin following the instructions listed on the manual. Like Mateo had predicted during the previous dialogue, as student groups began moving into the actual dissection stage of the lab, a dozen or so students raised their hands at different points to get Lorena's attention and ask a question about their specimens. When students asked about the anatomical structures being explored in the lab or their particular jobs during the lab (which collectively represented the majority of questions), Lorena called for her students' attention and shared the question and its answer aloud with the entire class. When questions concerned material not yet covered in class, however, Lorena handed students post-it notes, and asked them to write down their curiosities and then place the note on her desk, so that she could cover those questions in the lab debrief at a later date. 4.1.3. Analysis of adaptive teaching practices This vignette illustrated how Lorena incorporated the feedback from students in her cogenerative dialogue and in doing so, demonstrated macro- and micro-adaptive teaching practices (Corno, 2008), as well as instances of ‘responsive guidance’ (Hammer et al., 2012). Macro-adaptationsdthe responsive pedagogical decisions that Lorena made prior to teaching the labdincluded those moments when Lorena reviewed vocabulary terms that Emmy had identified as possibly confusing, presented information in relation to the authentic queries of students like Carlos and Antonio, and provided her class with the structure of lab ‘jobs’ recommended by the student group. Lorena also undertook a micro-adaptationda responsive teaching decision made on-theflydwhen she addressed student curiosities that arose during the labdthose that did not seem to directly relate to the material at handdby having students record them for later discussion, a move perhaps facilitated by Mateo's forewarning that this lab would raise

many student questions. In doing this, and in asking students for their own questions before the lab began, Lorena also demonstrated responsive guidance by adapting the content of the lesson to the interests and explorations of her students. While many of the pieces of student information were targeted by these adaptive practices, other information, particularly the broader themes emerging from the cogenerative dialogues, went unaddressed. For example, although Lorena did frontload some vocabulary explanations and addressed several related student queries about the heart, this segment of the lesson seemed somewhat hurried, consisting of less than 15 min of the total 100-min instructional block. In this way, the teaching here seemed less responsive to an underlying need (inferred from the cogenerative dialogue) for more time spent preparing students for the lab. The press to quickly arrive at the lab itself also extended to the limited discussion of lab jobs, which were the focus of many students' questions during the dissection. Given this amount of student confusion, such a rush to get through the explanations of lab structures actually likely reduced the amount and quality of time for student learning through hands-on discovery within the dissection. Thus, some of the broader themes of student information that could be interpreted from the dialogues were not reflected in Lorena's later teaching moves and likely did not contribute to instantiations of adaptive teaching in her classroom. 4.2. Episode B: using cogenerative dialogues to inform facilitation of class discussions The transcript excerpt featured in Table 5 was taken from the seventh cogenerative dialogue involving Ellen and her student group. Members of this dialogue perceived a lack of student participation within class discussions as a major area for classroom change. Thus, our talk centered on different techniquesdthose previously used and/or new possibilitiesdfor eliciting more student volunteers. 4.2.1. Student information revealed The transcript excerpt revealed several specific pieces of information about some students' learning needs and preferences. Vanessa and Patricia not only identified the efficacy of cold-calling as a strategy, but also helped explain its necessity, particularly for students who may self-identify as ‘shy’, lack confidence in their knowledge of the content, and/or feel uncomfortable (for personal,

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Table 5 Cogenerative dialogue transcript excerpt about class discussions (Ellen). Ellen: What did you all think about being cold-called in class, or even just the idea of participating in class discussions? Vanessa: I feel like it was a good idea, because that's a way that you checked for understanding of some people who were trying to avoid it. Some people don't want to be called on because they don't want to be put out. I also think it's beneficial because we're all shy people in this group. I mean, admit it. [Laughter] We need to be called on to get us to talk in class! Patricia: For me, it's good because I don't have confidence in my answer. Because when I read it, and then I hear other people, they sound so different. I just say, “Okay, I'll just change my answer.” I only volunteer if I'm 100% positive of my own answer. Lina: I know, huh? It's just scary! What if your answer's wrong? And then everyone just looks at you when you raise your hand. I don't know, it's sad [laughter] … John: Could you think of a different way, one that would work for you better, rather than just being cold-called? Patricia: Well, I like how today you made us do a digital warm up, and we got to respond online to their comments instead of saying them out loud. That worked for me. John: So, may be move more class discussions online then? Lina: Not always, ‘cause I think we should actually have to talk to people, and I think we all need to practice that, even if it's not something we always like to do. Ellen: I agree completely, Lina … We need to build that confidence to participate in class, and not just rely on technology. But the question is, how do we do that? Patricia: I remember one of my old teachers from middle school used to tap us on the shoulder before we answered questions [out loud] and she'd be like, “I'm gonna call on you next time, okay?” and that made it a little easier for me … Vanessa: And also I think maybe you could, like, have people discuss their answers more with each other before we have to share them with the whole class. Like, maybe you could give us time in our rows to talk about what we wrote down, and then each row could, like, vote one person to say what we just talked about.

developmental, or cultural reasons) with the mass attention that accompanied public speaking, as Lina indicated. Patricia highlighted the sharing of ideas through online discussion boardsdanother strategy Ellen had already employeddas a second effective method for helping reticent participants to still engage in dialogue around content with classmates. Lina, however, quickly pointed out the limitations of this method for students like her who still required ‘practice’ of oral language in the genre of anatomy, and she expressed her need for more face-to-face encounters with peers during class. Patricia and Vanessa then each proposed new possibilities for promoting greater participation, particularly among reluctant speakers: Patricia suggested a practice commonly referred to as designating volunteers (Caldwell, 2007), where a teacher seeks out assent from and previews questions with more reluctant students prior to the whole-class discussion, in order to encourage their later participation. Vanessa recommended that Ellen both provide students more opportunities to discuss questions in small groups before offering an answer to the class and allow students to serve as representative speakers for their peers. Within their suggestions for new possible strategies, Patricia and Vanessa revealed some potentially helpful insights into student thinking: Patricia's recommendation indicated that some students may benefit from advanced warning before, or individual encouragement for, speaking in front of the class. Vanessa's suggestion underscored the need for students to gain clarity and perhaps confidence from more familiar peers (i.e., those with whom they sit) before sharing this knowledge with the whole class. More inferential, thematic information was also available from this transcript. Given the varied methods of eliciting student participation that were discussed above (e.g., cold calling on individuals, using online discussion boards, designating volunteers, small group discussion prior to whole-group sharing, etc.), one might surmise that multiple options and/or opportunities for participation within the same activity (i.e., exchange of ideas) could benefit at least some students. Additionally, the reluctance to participate that was emphasized within the dialogue could also indicate student needs for greater processing of information prior to a discussion activity and/or for more explicit instruction and practice in oral language skills, especially in light of the fact that many of Ellen's students were designated English learners. 4.2.2. Vignette from following instructional period The day following her dialogue with the student group, Ellen delivered an anatomy lesson that centered on the digestive track. Ellen began the class period by asking her students to use their laptops to answer this warm-up question relating to the previous

nes con limo n every evening's homework: “Why is eating chicharro day for snack so bad for your digestive system?” Soon afterwards, Ellen called for her students to discuss their answers with the individuals sitting around them, and she then directed the students to use any new insights they may have gained to respond to classmates' answers on the online discussion board. As students carried out these next steps, Ellen circulated carefully around the room, stopping to chat with a few individuals, most of whom were typically reluctant to participate in class discussions. I overheard one conversation in which Ellen caringly cajoled a student, “Nadine, this answer sounds really strong. When I call for volunteers, would you mind presenting it?” Ellen then moved to the front of the classroom and introduced a whole-class discussion by exhorting the students to take courage and show confidence in their answers by volunteering: I know there are students in here with some well thought-out answers that would really benefit the class to hear … And remember, there are no wrong answers in science, only ones that are more or less accurate, and we only learn by building on less accurate understandings to begin with … C'mon, let's show some ganas and speak up! Ellen then restated the opening question and watched as eight volunteers (many of whom she had recently “designated”) raised their hands and shared their responses. After exhausting the volunteers, Ellen cold-called on a handful of students, who offered their answers with little hesitance. Once the conversation rounded to a conclusion, Ellen pointed out to the class that much of what she heard so far addresses some of the misconceptions students had originally posted in their online answers, so she ended this portion of the lesson by asking the class to review and revise any partially accurate ideas they may have posted to the discussion board. 4.2.3. Analysis of adaptive teaching practices This vignette of Ellen's teaching captured several instances of macro adaptive practices that related to the pieces of information shared in the third cogenerative dialogue excerpt. As dialogue members had suggested, Ellen asked students to participate in online discussion boards and continued to cold-call some in oral class discussions. Ellen also supplemented these techniques with the other strategies recommended by Patricia and Vanessa, namely, the use of small-group conversations paired with designating volunteers, to prime students to participate in the whole-class discussion. Such adaptive actions by Ellen likely provided those more reluctant students with advanced warning about volunteering, with confidence in their answers, and with further time for processing information. Reflecting Lina's stated fear of ‘wrong’ answers, which may have hindered her participation in previous class

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periods, Ellen also reiterated the epistemological belief that science ideas are not categorically wrong or right, but simply vary by degrees of accuracy, with more accurate understandings only emerging from earlier, less accurate ones. Collectively, these strategies for promoting participation allowed students multiple opportunities to voice their ideas within the same activity and around the same key question. An example of a micro adaptation can also be seen at the end of the vignette, where Ellendnoting students' misconceptions in their original discussion board postsdcalled for the class to revise their earlier online answers in light of what they may have learned from the multiple discussion activities. Less visible in this vignette, however, was any explicit instruction on oral language skills that may have been useful in such activities. Ellen's teaching seemed to address student needs for various forms of social participation in class; however, the more thematic need for development of the oral language skills necessary for class participation (implied, for example, when Lina and Vanessa asked in the dialogue for more “practice” in discussions with peers) was not explicitly targeted in the vignette above, nor was it seen in later observations of her teaching. 5. Discussion For decades, scholars have called for more equity-oriented teaching, especially in schools serving diverse students, who historically have been subject to teacher-centered classroom instruction (Ladson-Billings, 2009). In response, research has begun to explore the possibilities of more adaptive pedagogical practices (Lampert et al., 2013). The current investigation contributes to previous research on adaptive teaching (e.g., Corno, 2008; Hammer et al., 2012; Parsons, 2012) by exploring learning catalyst for teachersdcogenerative dialoguesdwhich could facilitate the development of adaptive practices by helping teachers both construct and leverage new knowledge about their students, something few studies (e.g., Soslau, 2012) have examined. Findings from this study have revealed that discussions within cogenerative dialogues can uncover a host of useful information about students, and that such information can be effectively utilized in several different categories of adaptive practices. The episodes presented above illustrate how discussions between a teacher and her students can elicit pieces of information about students that can be grouped into three categories: student learning needs, social needs, and personal interests and curiosities. In the following subsections, I discuss each of these categories and other areas of teacher learning facilitated by cogenerative dialogues. I then situate my findings in relation to theory on adaptive expertise to explore the extent to which the cogenerative dialogues of this research promoted Ellena and Lorena's growth in adaptive teaching. 5.1. Learning about student learning needs Students within the cogenerative dialogues expressed learning needs for further vocabulary clarification; supportive structures and clearer expectations for appropriate classroom participation; robust preparation for and ample scaffolding of student-led inquiry and/or hands-on activities like dissection labs; greater engagement through the integration of student interests into subject area content; access to resources and collaborative opportunities for research outside of school; and multiple and varied opportunities for processing science content prior to classroom discussions. These pieces of information might be understood as representing student learning needs, in that they can help teachers understand (a) what students are ready to process and participate in with teacher guidance and (b) what types of guidance might be most useful for student learning.

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Theory on sociocultural learning, particularly Vygotsky's (1980) concept of the zone of proximal development, underscores the essential nature of such knowledge for effective teaching. That is, to help students construct knowledge, teachers must first have a sense of the two dimensions of learning needs noted above (a and b). The findings here support and extend previous literature (e.g., Stith & Roth, 2008) in suggesting that cogenerative dialogues might represent spaces in which teachers can access these learning needs and thus locate more precisely individual students' zones of proximal development. For example, in the first episode present above, Emmy reveals that she needs further clarification of vocabulary terms introduced in the lab manual, and in the following class period, Lorena adapts her teaching by providing some targeted direct instruction around those terms prior to initiating the dissection lab. 5.2. Learning about student social needs Sociocultural learning theory also posits that within the zone of proximal development, learners must feel comfortable with both the guide/s with whom they work and the context of this guidance (Smagorinsky, 2013; Vygotsky, 1980). In other words, learners have particular social needs that require attention if development is to take place; the findings here indicate that within cogenerative dialogues, discussions between teachers and students can begin to uncover such social needs. For example, within the episodes presented above, students revealed preferred strategies for eliciting their participation within small-group and whole-class discussions. Student comments also implicated their needs to process information and to practice less comfortable social interactions (such as face-to-face discussions of content) first with familiar peers before branching out into whole-class conversations or presentations. Previous literature on cogenerative dialogues supports this finding, highlighting how teachers have used such dialogues to learn about and adapt to students' social needs by limiting cold-calling on some students (e.g., Martin, 2006) and by partnering students with familiar peers when group projects center around challenging concepts or new linguistic skills (e.g., Wassell et al., 2013). Teachers are then able to utilize this information to create more responsive, adaptive classroom environments, as when, for instance, Ellen used small-group discussions to prime her students for a whole-class conversations. 5.3. Learning about student interests and questions Also similar to previous literature (e.g., Beers, 2005a, 2005b), the findings here indicated that cogenerative dialogues can serve as spaces for teachers to learn about their students' individual interests and curiosities. Often, the participating teachers adaptively leveraged this information by adaptively fitting the knowledge and questions students brought to school with the academic content of anatomy. For instance, students in Lorena's dialogue group such as Carlos and Antonio felt comfortable sharing with Lorena their lingering questions about the heart and its anatomical structures. Again, sociocultural learning theory underscores the importance of teachers (and other guides) having access to this student knowledge, because with it, they can shape learning experiences that promote deep engagement and meaning making around topics of interest and/or authentic questions (Smagorinsky, 2013). 5.4. Learning how to collaborate with students Additionally, the findings here raise the possibility that within cogenerative dialogues, teachers not only learn about their studentsdtheir learning and social needs, interests and

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curiositiesdbut also learn how to collaborate more effectively with their students. Tobin and Roth (2005) write that through their participation in cogenerative dialogues, “teachers can learn to collaborate with students to establish and maintain effective learning environmentsdrather than endeavoring to establish control over them” (p.315). The episodes presented here seem to illustrate a similar but slightly divergent ideadthat by offering a teacher more insights into how her students learn, think, and feel, and through the recursive interactions of weekly meetings, cogenerative dialogues allow a teacher to begin building a familiarity and trust with students that helps her understand how to better interact with them on a person-to-person level. Learning to collaborate personally with students could go beyond ‘establishing effective learning environments’ to actually establishing learnercentered relationships (Kostogriz, 2012). Moreover, scholars (e.g., Tusting, 2009) argue that such relationships are central to teachers' abilities to adapt their instruction, as will be discussed in further detail below. 5.5. Leveraging new knowledge about students through micro- and macro-adaptiveness The episodes above also illustrate how Ellen and Lorena leveraged new knowledge of students to deliver more adaptive instructional practices. The most common category of such practices across both sites were macro-adaptations (Corno, 2008), where the teachers seemed to craft lessons and/or planned certain strategies that responded to the student information gleaned from earlier cogenerative dialogues. Examples of such macroadaptations could be seen when Lorena used Emmy's suggestion to institute student “jobs” during science labs, and when Ellen leveraged Vanessa's recommendations to designate student volunteers for class discussions. Less frequent but still apparent were moments when the teachers exhibited micro-adaptive practices, that is, when they leveraged their greater familiarity with students in pedagogical decisions seemingly made in-the-moment of teaching (Corno, 2008). For instance, confronted with numerous student questions during her dissection lab, which was predicted by Mateo in their earlier cogenerative dialogue, Lorena decided to forego answering each question and instead asked students to write down their personal queries on post-it notes that would be addressed in later class periods. Moments of responsive guidancedwhere a teacher opens up her curriculum to be shaped by student interests and questions (Hammer et al., 2012)dwere also found at several points during the episodes. This occurred most commonly in the case of Lorena, who, for example, responded to student disengagement perceived by members of her cogenerative dialogue by centering future inquiry on the authentic questions of student groups. 5.6. Supporting the dimensions of adaptive expertise Theory on adaptive teaching and adaptive expertise point to several possible explanations for how cogenerative dialogues could facilitate the types of responsive, adaptive practices illustrated by here by Lorena and Ellen. Scholars propose that adaptive expertisedthe understandings and competencies underlying adaptive teachingdrelies on an individual's development of two particular dimensions of practical knowledge: technical efficiency and innovation (Hammerness et al., 2005; Hatano & Oura, 2003). 5.6.1. Efficiency Efficiency represents the development of “automatized schemas and routines that provide enough background efficiency to keep teachers from becoming overwhelmed and losing sight of

important goals” (Hammerness et al., 2005, p. 363). This dimension of adaptive expertise is generally developed through substantial experience and the deep technical knowledge experience tends to foster (Hatano & Oura, 2003). Given their veteran status as teachers, it is likely that Ellen and Lorena have the ample experience in technical aspects of teaching that is necessary for the efficiency dimension of adaptive expertise. Evidence of this advanced knowledge of teaching ‘moves’ (and when/how to use them) can also be found in the episodes presented above as, for example, when Lorena utilizes the strategy of sticky note questions after student queries become too numerous for her to answer, and when both teachers employ engaging warm-up activities to engage students at the beginning of class. 5.6.2. Innovation The dimension of innovation represents an individual's capacity to creatively apply their technical knowledge in ways that uniquely respond to the particulars of a given context. Scholars suggest that such innovation is primed by (a) an awareness of broader social contexts, which for teachers includes a constant pursuit of knowledge about their students, and (b) consistent opportunities for structured analysis, or reflection with those who can offer new perspectives and feedback on teaching practices and their emergent problems (Hammerness et al., 2005; Hatano & Oura, 2003). As discussed earlier, the cogenerative dialogues studied here seemed to have provided Ellen and Lorena with spaces to access key pieces of student information, and in turn likely contributed to the teachers' awareness of their classrooms' social contexts. Moreover, previous literature (e.g., Tobin & Roth, 2005), along with the episodes above, suggest that cogenerative dialogues provide teachers like Lorena and Ellen with consistent opportunities to reflect on this new student knowledge in relation to their previous and current teaching practices. In this way, the findings here support the claim of extant literature that cogenerative dialogues represent for teachers opportunities of structured analysis and reflection on their practice. Thus, cogenerative dialogues may support the dimension of innovation required for adaptive teaching by offering teachers spaces for gleaning and reflecting on critical information around students' interests and social and learning needs. 5.6.3. Affect Other scholarship in adaptive teaching identifies additional factors that contribute to a teacher's ability to flexibly respond to students and their exigencies. Lin et al. (2007) contend that, in addition to efficiency and innovation, adaptive experts also need a certain dispositionsdin particular, a confidence and willingness to take calculated risks by experimenting with newly developed or modified practices. Tusting (2009) supports this conjecture and adds that adaptive teachers often need opportunities to develop trusting relationships with students and to leverage these relationships in negotiating an atmosphere of mutual respect. In these ways, adaptive expertise in teaching also seems to depend on an affective dimension that consists of confidence, risk-taking, and trust with students. The episodes presented above, in addition to those found in previous studies (Emdin, 2007a, 2007b), suggest that cogenerative dialogues provide spaces for teachers to not just learn about their students, but also learn how to collaborate with students, particularly in collective decision-making about classroom activities and curricula. Further, the findings here raise the possibility that teachers like Ellen or Lorena may experience the increased confidence to take risks around new pedagogical practices when their students themselves ask for such classroom changes. For example, in the first episode, Emmy hints that student ‘jobs’ might provide more clarity for student participation within labs; Lorena not only

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responds enthusiastically to this suggestion within the cogenerative dialogue, but changes her lesson plan for the following day to reflect Emmy's recommendation. Thus, it might be suggested that cogenerative dialogues could further facilitate teachers' adaptive teaching by supporting the affective dimensionsdthe teacher confidence and relationships with studentsdthat in turn afford innovation and responsiveness. 5.7. Missed opportunities Importantly, not all of the student information revealed through the cogenerative dialogues was leveraged in participating teachers' adaptive practices, and this finding points to a possible constraint around the teacher learning mediated by cogenerative dialogues with students. While the instructional decisions of Ellen and Lorena seemed especially responsive to the pieces of student information more explicitly identifiable within their conversations with the student groups, the more implicit, thematic types of information about students and their needs were less reflected in the teachers' classroom practices and thus may have been overlooked. In my debriefs with Ellen and Lorena following their dialogues, I often discussed with them the more explicit information that students shared with us about themselves, but rarelydif everddid I help them make connections between individual pieces of information to better identify and understand the larger, thematic student needs that were also being inferentially expressed. In my concern to collect robust data in the duration of the study, I had postponed a close analysis of dialogue transcripts until most if not all of our meetings had passed, and it was usually weeks or months following a dialogue that I began to notice the more interpretative themes about the students and their learning needs. By that time, the study was almost complete, and my opportunity to contribute to my participants' learning during that school year had effectively elapsed. I highlight this finding here to suggest that even when a teacher and researcher have opportunities to immediately reflect on discussions recorded in dialogues, some (and perhaps the most important) information about students may not be easily recognized without more concentrated scrutiny of data such as dialogue transcripts. Previous studies of cogenerative dialogues (Carambo & Stickney, 2009) and other forms of student consultation (Hoban & Hastings, 2006) recommend that, to fully mine the rich information that students provide about themselves in such spaces as cogenerative dialogues, teachers should analyze recordings of student voice (e.g., videotapes, transcripts, field notes) with peers in a series of collaborative professional development sessions over an extended period of time. Such opportunities might increase the possibility that implicit themes as well as explicit pieces of student information can be gleaned. These sessions might also facilitate the construction of even more ideas for adaptive teaching practices, particularly if the collaborating teachers are themselves familiar with (and perhaps even currently teach) the same students. 6. Conclusion In the face of inequitable learning opportunities for students from historically marginalized communities, recent literature highlights the need for teachers to take up ambitious teaching, which itself requires teachers to develop a strong adaptiveness to their students. This study suggests that cogenerative dialogues represent a powerful space for teachers to learn about students and for helping teachers generate adaptive practices that leverage student knowledge in service of more equitable learning opportunities. The findings here also raise several possible explanations for how cogenerative dialogues can facilitate experienced teachers'

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adaptive practices: Participation in these dialogues can help teachers identify student learning needs and thus locate more accurately students' zones of proximal development; become more familiar with student social needs and in turn develop more trusted classroom relationships; find and include student interests and authentic questions within learning activities; learn how to better collaborate with students; and develop the innovative, affective, and collaborative dimensions of adaptive expertise. Within this study, however, I also caution that cogenerative dialogues should not be viewed as a replacement of collaborative professional reflection with colleagues; rather, such dialogues might represent a complementary space for reflection that can inform what teachers discuss and analyze in their learning communities. For, as seen in the findings reported here, unpacking the information available about students through cogenerative dialoguesdparticularly the more implicit, thematic insightsdrequires the many opportunities for deep and iterative analysis that are likely most available and fruitful in collaborative professional spaces (Little, 2003). This study raises implications for research and practice further in teaching and teacher education. As tools for facilitating teacher learning and adaptive practices, cogenerative dialogues could serve as especially fruitful areas for research and practice in ambitious teaching. For example, future inquiry might explore how cogenerative dialogues could be used by a teacher to target a particular high-leverage practice of ambitious teaching (e.g., a classroom discussion), learn about students' needs and interests in relation to that practice, and then adapt this more universal activity for the specific contexts of a classroom. Similarly, a group of teachers within the same department or school district (perhaps in collaboration with researchers from a local university) might each conduct a series of cogenerative dialogues with their respective students around a shared practice (e.g., conducting student-led inquiry) and then collaboratively compare and analyze the transcripts of each dialogue to uncover and explore themes for common areas of instructional improvement within that practice. Through such collaborative efforts at professional development and research, perhaps new affordances of cogenerative dialogues might be revealed, especially in regards to how these spaces can bring about more adaptive teaching and in turn hopefully more equitable learning opportunities for diverse learners. Finally, like this study, much of the research on cogenerative dialogues has occurred within U.S. and Canadian settings and with less focus on the more international inquiry conducted in the area of student consultation (c.f., Rudduck & McIntyre, 2007). Thus, future investigations might study cogenerative dialogues outside North America and, perhaps more importantly, begin to explore the connections of this literature to findings from the broader field of student voice research (Fielding, 2001). Funding This work was supported by the University of Southern California's Dissertation Completion and Provost Fellowships. Acknowledgments Many thanks to Jamy Stillman and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable feedback. Appendix A. Examples of codes applied in cycle 1 of data analysis: analysis of student information gleaned from cogenerative dialogue transcripts.

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Example of student information from cogenerative Description of student information Site of cogenerative dialogue transcript dialogue

Within site pattern

Across site pattern

Lorena's

Student learning needs: Need for greater clarity of expectations for in-class student participation

Student learning needs: Need for greater clarity of expectations for student participation

Ellen's

Emmy: People in the gallery walks weren't taking it seriously … They would just write stupid stuff [on the posters] … We need, like, to know the rules and more strictness. Mateo: Miss, can you put the directions more on the [lab] manual? ‘Cause some people don't know what they're doing [during the lab]. Nelson: I wasn't here for that. What were we supposed to do for those personal research question thingies? Maria: Yeah, experimental designs are confusing. My group needs a lot of help! [laughter] Angel: We have no clue, either. Can you just show us one way to do it? Nelson: Yeah, because even when I asked you what to do, I was so confused.

Emmy expresses a desire for greater clarity about and enforcement of student participation expectations during gallery walk activities. Mateo expresses a desire for greater clarity about student participation during science labs. Nelson expresses a need for greater clarity about instructions for and student participation in student inquiry project. Maria, Angel, and Nelson express a need for greater clarity about both instructions for and student participation in design inquiry project.

Student learning needs: Need for greater clarity of expectations for student participation in student inquiry

Appendix B. Examples of codes applied in cycle 2 of data analysis: analysis of adaptive teaching moments found in field notes and videotapes of classroom instruction.

Example of student information from cogenerative dialogue transcript Site of cogenerative dialogue Lorena's

Ellen's

Lorena's

Ellen's

Lorena's

Ellen's

Description of corresponding adaptive practice

Carlos: Miss, when we're doing the food coloring [in the heart dissection During the heart dissection lab, Lorena circulates quickly about lab], people are gonna mess around with it. You gotta watch this group over the room, monitoring student progress. At the point when students pour food coloring down different ventricles of the there, especially [points to a table in the classroom] heart, Lorena is especially vigilant around a group located back of the classroom, and when a student from that group begins to misuse the food coloring, she quickly approaches the group and provides hands-on guidance in how to apply it correctly to the heart. Ellen: If people keep choosing the same partners for group work, how do we Ellen announces to the class that, to make more inclusive work make them work with others, without making them too uncomfortable at groups, she'd like each student to choose one partner with whom they work well. Then, that pair would partner with the same time? Kevin: Well, we could, like, have everyone choose one friend as a partner, another pay of students with whom they have yet to work. After and then that pair has to find another pair that they've never worked with some initial groans from the class, the students set off to this task, and it seems that within 2e3 min, most of the students before? Nelson: Yeah, but some people might probably just stand around and wait have formed their groups of four. Meanwhile, it seems that, perhaps with Nelson's comment in mind, Ellen notices several and not try to get partners. students scattered throughout the classroom who are reluctant to engage in this partner-finding exercise; in response, she quickly becomes a ‘match-maker’, helping those reluctant students find partners with whom they're comfortable working and who are willing to work with them in turn. Lorena: What about the respiratory system? What could we do to make Based on the suggestion from Mateo and Carlos, Lorena follows her direct instruction about the anatomy of the respiratory studying that more interesting? system by introducing to the class a hands-on simulation, where Mateo: I got it. Miss, what if we made a model of the lungs? each group creates a model “lung” from plastic bottles, modeling Carlos: Yeah, something that shows how air gets pumped in when we clay, rubber bands, and balloons. breathe, like maybe with balloons or something. As the following class period winds to a close, Ellen notes that Vanessa: I think returning the laptops to the laptop cart takes too long. Some of us just stand there for like 5 min before we can put it away and then the procedure for putting away laptops has been somewhat unorganized and inefficient. Thus, she's decided that students we end up leaving class late. John: So, what suggestions do we have about how to make this go more will wait at their seats and pack up until their entire row has finished their digital exit slips, at which time that row may smoothly? Lina: I think Miss should just call us up by our rows and have it go more return their laptops to the cart. After Ellen explains this new organized like that instead of everyone trying to put their laptop away at procedure, the students carry it out with little problems, taking less than 3 min for the entire class to return their laptops. once. Lorena: Are there any topics you think people would want to learn more Lorena asks student groups to select a topic touched on (but not covered deeply) in class and then research and present about, when it comes to just being aware of your health? information on it during an end-of-the-year health fair for the Mateo: Maybe like how to exercise at home. I want to do that one. Carlos: What about all that cholesterol stuff and, you know, diabetes and school. Many of the possible topics presented to the class were originally recommended by the student group. stuff … Emmy: How about pimples? You know, like skin acne … Antonio: Hey, Miss, I heard this one thing about soda and how much sugar it contains. I want to do something like that … Nelson: Miss, I liked it how we did our warm-ups before. You know, how In response to Nelson and Angel's requests for individual inquiry you would ask us a question that would make us review material from a and enrichment (i.e., extra credit), Ellen asks students to select long time ago and if our answer was accurate, you'd give us extra credit. and research answers to three ‘personal research questions’ Angel: Yeah, we should have opportunities for extra credit again, like for related to the endocrine system but not directly covered in class. researching something we like.

Category of adaptive teaching Microadaptation

Macroadaptation

Responsive guidance

J. Luciano Beltramo / Teaching and Teacher Education 63 (2017) 326e337

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