School classrooms are dynamic environments with interactions between students, teachers, their belongings, classroom infrastructure, and the overall school ecosystem. Interactions between each of these players affect the nature and quality of classroom activities. Studies have shown that a teacher's movements and positioning within the classroom affect student attention at various points of a lesson period, particularly during transitions such as from a lecture to workbook exercises.
The opening phase of a lesson is a crucial point where students come together and the teacher lays out the constraints and expectations for the class ahead. Teachers' orientation and movement at this point establishes social tension that is "tightness" or "looseness." As per the Goffman's theory, social tightness or tight occasions are social situations involving many onerous situational obligations, and looseness or loose occasions are relatively free from such constraints. Lesson periods naturally go through periods of greater tightness, such as when a teacher requires students to pay attention to the black board, and lesser tightness, such as during group discussion activities. However, in all cases, the teacher sets the tone of expected tension.
In this context, a study by Associate Professor Mika Ishino from the Faculty of Global and Regional Studies, Doshisha University, Japan, investigated how a teacher's response to temporal cues, such as the school bell, affect social tension in the opening phase. The study was made available online on March 7, 2026, and will be published in Volume 93 of the journal Linguistics and Education on June 01, 2026. It is a part of the special issue, edited by Dr. Pilvi Heinonen and Dr. Marjo Savijärvi from the University of Helsinki, Finland, and Dr. Teppo Jakonen from the University of Turku, Finland.
"Being a formal classroom teacher at secondary education levels, I was intrigued by how teachers create different tensions in the classroom," says Dr. Ishino.
The researcher conducted a multimodal conversation analysis to examine the delivery of two English language lessons by two different teachers at the same secondary school, named Ms. Kajihara and Mr. Furuhata for the purpose of this study. The typical flow of these lessons is that teachers and students perform some minor preparatory work. A school bell rings. The teacher and students exchange a greeting, such as "good morning," and then proceed with the lesson.
Notably, Ms. Kajihara sorted handouts at her podium while students were loosely organized at their desks. When the bell rang, she continued to sort handouts, only pausing a few seconds later to start the class and gave hands-up gesture to the students to stand up. When her students stood up for the greeting, many did not look at her until she prompted them to do so. Only then did Ms. Kajihara initiate a greeting, although a few students continued to look elsewhere.
In contrast, when the bell rang at the start of Mr. Furuhata's class, he stopped writing on the blackboard and stood at attention at his podium. He asked his students to stand up, used a verbal chant to tell them to look forward with hands at their sides. He called out individual students who did not stand up in the correct orientation. He repeated his instruction about looking forward. Only when he was satisfied that all the students were standing straight and were looking at him, he initiated a greeting.
The comparative analysis revealed that Mr. Furuhata's actions enforced tightness and reiterated the overarching importance of the school's systems. When the bell rang, he stopped his work and stood straight. He also gave repeated, specific verbal prompts to the students to maintain the required orientation before greeting them. Whereas Ms. Kajihara did not stop her work when the bell rang, and used general prompts to initiate the greeting. This established a social tension which was a loose occasion for students during the opening phase of her lesson. This indicates that bodily orientation plays a crucial role in creating social tension.
"This study involving the multimodal analysis on the materials and spaces in the classroom interaction is unique. Its most valuable part is the social tension based on the Goffman's theory of looseness and tightness. It will provide practical knowledge to classroom teachers and teacher educators," concludes Dr. Ishino.
About Associate Professor Mika Ishino from Doshisha University, Japan
Dr. Mika Ishino is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Global and Regional Studies, Doshisha University, Japan. She received her Ph.D. in Language and Culture from Osaka University, Japan, in 2018. Her research interests include applied linguistics, socio linguistics, language teacher education, English language education, and conversation analysis. She has authored 36 research articles in these fields. She has been felicitated with the Best Paper Award from Japan Society for Educational Sociology in September 2022. She is a member of different societies, including The Japan Society of Educational Sociology and The Japan Association for Language Teaching.
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