Emotions and classroom management

Abstract

This article explores the emotional consequences of (im)politeness and evaluative language in teacher-student interaction at higher education level together with their influence in learning. In recent years, we have been experiencing an increase in students' challenging attitudes. There seems to be a direct relationship between a good atmosphere in the classroom and an increase in students' and teacher' performances. Therefore, it will be in teachers and students" interest to foster a positive classroom environment, which will hopefully result in a cooperative atmosphere of beneficial effects. I will focus on the expression of attitude (affect and feelings), judgement and appreciation following appraisal theory (Bednarek 2008, Martin and White 2000, 2005, Hunston and Thompson 2000, Thompson and Alba-Juez 2014), and combining it with politeness theory (Brown and Levinson 1987), considering revisions of the model (Eelen 2001, Lakoff and Ide 2005, Locher and Watts 2005, Spencer-Oatey 2002, Watts 2003, Watts, Ide and Ehlich 2005), and further exploration in (im)politeness (Bousfield 2011, Culpeper 2011). My data have been extracted from real class sessions. The methodology for processing the data borrows techniques from Corpus Linguistics (CL), and combines its typically quantitative approach with the more qualitative one by Conversation Analysis (CA) and Discourse Analysis (DA), as done in previous research (Santamaría García 2011, 2013, 2014). Results stress the importance that teachers and students develop sensitivity towards the language they use when interacting (in the classroom or virtual settings), as the interaction generated has effects not only on the relations created among them but on the teaching- learning process.