Problem-Based Learning as a Pedagogical Tool for Developing Interpersonal Communication Skills

Aim. Problem-Based Learning (PBL) is a popular theory in EFL teacher education, that identify and discuss its influence on the acquisition of interpersonal communication skills through fine-grained classroom interactional practices. Specifically, little attention has been given to how pre-service EFL teachers use verbal and non-verbal interactional resources to reach mutual understanding in collaborative problem-solving. Methods. The present study explored the efficiency of PBL as a pedagogical tool for building interpersonal communication skills, in particular repair strategies, clarification requests, silence, and pausing in classroom conversation. The study used a pre-experimental, one-group pre-test-post-test design with a sample of pre-service EFL teachers engaged in a systematic implementation of PBL over a 15-week instructional session. The interaction data were gathered from audio recordings of group discussions held before and after the intervention. Results. Interactional discourse analysis was employed as a qualitative analysis to study the sequential organisation and interactional role of the targeted features, and descriptive statistics and the Wilcoxon signed-rank test were used as quantitative analyses to examine changes in the frequency and distribution of these targeted features pre- and post-intervention. Conclusions. The data showed statistically significant growth in repair and clarification strategies, as well as a more strategic use of silence and pausing in the post-test interactions. By presenting mixed evidence on how PBL can be used to develop interpersonal communication skills at the interactional level in pre-service teacher education, the study contributes to EFL pedagogy

Audio equipment · Conversation analysis · Discourse analysis · Interpersonal communication · Interpersonal interaction · Nonverbal communication · Qualitative research · Silence · Test (biology) · EFL/ESL Teaching and Learning · Innovative Teaching and Learning Methods · Problem and Project Based Learning