Looking forward: reflections of two future-teachers on conversation practice at Communication Café

Abstract

In this article, we will present and discuss some aspects linked to interactions in English observed during Communication Café meetings, which is an extension project at the Universidade Estadual do Sudoeste da Bahia – UESB. We will list and analyze aspects observed during the chats – type of interactions; level of participation-interaction; practices that helped the discussions – and we will establish a parallel between these and reflections that point to future perspectives (Looking forward) on how to democratize the learning of oral expression skills in English (Freire, 2004). According to research by the British Council (2014) and also according to Ahmadi and Leong (2017), the practice of oral expression skills in English receives little attention in many teaching contexts and, consequently, few people develop socio-communicative skills. As teachers in training and collaborators at Communication Café, we will reflect on this issue in order to problematize it and, possibly, interfere in discussions that seek ways to deal with the challenges linked to the practice of conversation. The Communication Café extension project aims to create an interactive space for practicing English conversation, from a collaborative learning perspective (Dewey, 1976). In this study, in order to analyze our experiences in the project, we will present excerpts from reflective diaries and notes. This study is in the area of studies on English teaching and learning, in particular, studies linked to the challenges of thinking about the place of
conversation practice in teaching contexts. This article should interest everyone who seeks to better understand the direction of a more holistic and humane education.