Abstract
This paper presents an exploratory examination of video-mediated classroom interaction in school and university settings, a modality of teaching and learning which has recently experienced a rapid growth as a consequence of the Coronavirus emergency. Based on a corpus of audio- and videorecorded virtual classes, we analyze how instructors and students cope with the challenges of not being physically co-present and lacking direct visual contact in the virtual enviroment, and discuss how fundamental mechanisms of face-to-face classroom interaction – participants’ mutual orientation in the opening phase, speakers’ identification and recognition, as well as instructors’ actions like comprehension checks, solicitations for questions/comments, questions and evaluations – are partially modified in the virtual enviroment, making it more complex, for instructors, to enhance students’ active participation. Final considerations are devoted to the possible implications of these preliminary findings.