Most often, the teacher-student communication is:

Concept

A type of communication is named after the function the exchange performs for the people taking part in it. An exchange is utilitarian when it is instrumental — it exists as a practical means of getting a shared task accomplished. It is critical when its function is evaluation and fault-finding, spurious when its content is fabricated rather than genuine, and confrontational when the parties engage each other as adversaries.

Application

Routine classroom exchange between a teacher and a student exists to get an instructional job done: the teacher explains, sets tasks, questions and corrects, while the student asks, answers and reports back. Neither party enters the exchange in order to deceive, to sit in judgement, or to oppose the other — both use the talk as a means to the shared end of learning. An exchange defined by the practical purpose it serves is, by the definition above, utilitarian.

Cross-check

Testing each offered description against what ordinarily happens in a classroom:

• Spurious describes an exchange whose content is fabricated or counterfeit; ordinary teaching exchanges carry genuine subject content, so this is not the usual case.

• Critical describes an exchange whose purpose is to judge and find fault; evaluation is one episode inside teaching, such as a test or a correction, and not the character of most exchanges.

• Confrontational describes an exchange in which the parties stand opposed to each other; that is a breakdown of the classroom relationship rather than its normal state.

• Utilitarian describes an exchange used as a practical means to an end, which is exactly how teaching-and-learning talk functions day to day.

Result

Most often, teacher-student communication is utilitarian.