School failure consists of a persistent problem in our educational system. This paper aims at contributing to understand the issue by presenting and theoretically discussing empirical data concerning the dynamics of teacher-students interactions. We draw our analysis on a constructivist sociocultural theoretical framework, which stresses the interactions between sociocultural factors and human agency, claiming for the unison, intertwined nature of affect and cognition. Interactive processes lie at the basis of knowledge construction, which takes place along convergent and divergent interaction frames, particularly during negotiations about goals and rules for educational activities. Two second-grade classrooms were investigated, the results of microgenetic analysis being especially highlighted and discussed. We show how communicative and metacommunicative strategies, together with teacher beliefs, may promote or inhibit teaching-learning processes. We conclude by discussing how meaning construction processes are profoundly intermingled with the affective-cognitive dimension of human development, and how it may decisively contribute to learning possibilities.
meaning; teacher-student; learning; knowledge construction; school failure