Abstract:

The interaction behavior and personal skills of teachers at universities play a decisive role in the perceived quality of teaching and can be seen as the basis of a sustainable student-teacher relationship. Based on these considerations, the question therefore arises as to which skills a teacher needs in order to interact successfully with students. Universities in particular face the challenge of finding successful teachers on the one hand and training existing teachers to meet the diverse requirements and tasks on the other. These personal skills and abilities required at the individual level of teachers are also referred to as interaction skills.

Even though there are many studies available today that focus on the analysis of selected personal characteristics, individual abilities and skills as well as the behavior of teachers (cf. e.g. Günther/Schneider 2018; Kelly et al. 2011; Kasper 2004), there are hardly any studies that deal with the dimensions that make up the construct of a teacher's interaction competence. The aim of the research project is to determine the dimensions of the construct of interaction competence of teachers, whereby a consideration is made at the individual level.

The first step of the study consists of specifying the individual constructs of the conceptualised explanatory model. In addition, research is conducted into which indicators appear suitable for measuring the hypothesised constructs. To this end, a comprehensive literature analysis was first conducted and the suitability of existing conceptualisations and operationalisations of existing measurement models was examined. In a second step, a qualitative study was conducted to develop a measurement inventory for the subsequent main survey. To this end, a series of semi-structured interviews were conducted from November to December 2023 with a random sample (n = 32) of students from a German university. In the interviews, the students were asked to describe what makes a competent teacher in teaching-learning situations. Mayring's content analysis was used for the analysis (Mayring, 2014). As part of the evaluation of the open questions in the interviews, the answers were summarised in categories. The most common dimensions of interaction skills in the qualitative study were Creative ability (88%), Didactic skills (71%), Communication skills (66%), Adaptability (59%), Student-orientation (47%), Results-orientated action (34%) and Subject and methodological knowledge (32%).

The aim of this research paper is, on the one hand, to present the results of the comprehensive literature analysis and the qualitative study. On the other hand, the conceptualised measurement model of teachers' interaction competence and the further procedure for construct development are discussed.

References:
[1] Günther, S.; Schneider, A. (2018). Learning What Matters Most: Effective Educational Practices for Undergraduate Students, Proceedings of EDULEARN18 Conference, 2nd-4th July 2018, Palma, Mallorca, Spain, p. 5761.
[2] Kasper, G. (2004). Participant orientations in German conversations-for-learning. The Modern Language Journal, Vol. 88: 551–567.
[3] Kelly Hall, J., Hellermann, J., and Pekarek Doehler, S. (Eds.) (2011). The Development of Interactional Competence. Bristol, UK: Multilingual Matters.
Mayring, P. (2014). Qualitative content analysis: theoretical foundation, basic procedures and software solution, Klagenfurt.

Keywords:

Interactional competence, construct development, teaching skills.