Within-teacher differences in one-to-one teacher-student interactions in instrumental music lessons

The aim of this study was to look at within-teacher differences in scaffolding behaviors and patterns over longer periods of time. We analyzed scaffolding on different levels of increasing complexity, ranging from frequencies of scaffolding behaviors to measures of the variability of the teacher-student scaffolding interactions. We tested whether the scaffolding behaviors and patterns were systematically different when the same teacher interacted with four different students, and whether these patterns changed over the course of 18 months. Overall, the findings confirm that differences in scaffolding patterns in the interaction with different children exist, especially between the high-performing student and the other below-average performing students. Specifically, the teacher-student interaction with the high-performing student showed higher levels of contingent scaffolding and more intra-individual variability in the interactional patterns. In general, little evidence was found for systematic increases or decreases of scaffolding quality and intra-individual variability measures over time.