The document summarizes a study that investigated the use of private speech by adult English language learners during a collaborative task. Private speech is self-directed speech used for self-regulation and problem-solving. The study found that private speech was used to assess and correct language, understand tasks, and stay focused. It also helped learners visualize gaps and work together by expressing doubts. Private speech benefited both individual and group knowledge construction. However, it was not always enough to solve linguistic problems alone and required cognitive skills. The analysis of private speech provided insights into how tasks challenge learners.
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Private speech use in the collaboration between EFL learners
1. I ENCONTRO NACIONAL DE ENSINO-APRENDIZAGEM DE LĂNGUAS E A TEORIA SĂCIO-
HISTĂRICO-CULTURAL E DA ATIVIDADE: O RESGATE DO DIĂLOGO
Private speech use in the
collaboration between EFL learners
Isis da Costa Pinho (UNISINOS/UFRGS)
MarĂlia dos Santos Lima (UNISINOS)
2. Motivation
âą The analysis and understanding of the use of
private speech in EFL teaching and learning are
of great interest to the sociocultural theory since it
offers evidences of the learnerâs internal process
of mobilization, reflection, creation and
transformation of linguistic knowledge.
3. Motivation
âą Second language (SL) or foreign language (FL)
acquisition research supported by Vygotskian
sociocultural principles indicates the need to study
the use of private speech by adult learners in
collaborative tasks within a FL context.
(LANTOLF, 2000, 2006; LANTOLF; THORNE, 2006).
4. Objective
âą This study aims to investigate the role of private speech
in EFL learning focusing on its use by adult learners
engaged in a collaborative task.
5. Theoretical Framework
âą The sociocultural theory seeks to understand the socio-
cognitive development of the individual through the
relationship between the interaction with the social
environment (interpsychological mediation), and the
interaction in the cognitive space (intrapsychological
mediation), which is established through language
appropriation, internalization and use (VYGOTSKY,
1987, 2003; NEWMAN; HOLZMAN, 2002).
6. Theoretical Framework
Self-regulation
âą It is considered to be a voluntary regulation
internally oriented that shows that the individual is
capable of an autonomous functioning.
âą It does not consist into a level of permanent
development, but it relates to specific tasks, being
characterized by the acquisition of an individual
potential for development.
(DICAMILLA; ANTĂN, 1997, 2004; LEE, 2008)
7. Theoretical Framework
ZPD
âą It is the potential for learning generated by the
interaction between learners in specific tasks, from
which one may observe structures acquired and in the
process of internalization.
(VYGOTSKY, 1978; LANTOLF, 2000)
8. Theoretical Framework
Collaborative Dialogue
âą Interaction support that takes place between learners in
performing a task in which language mediates SL
learning during the resolution of gaps highlighted by the
production. In this dialogical relationship, meanings are
co-constructed, appropriated by individuals and reused
in subsequent tasks.
(SWAIN, 1995, 2000)
9. Theoretical Framework
Private Speech
âą It is a self-directed speech that the learner employs
usually before a task that promotes cognitive challenge
in the seek of a greater control over himself, the SL/FL
performance and over the task.
âą It represents the mediation of the verbal thought in
search of a behavior regulation for the problems
solution.
(VYGOTSKY, 1986, 1987; LANTOLF, 2006; LANTOLF; THORNE, 2006)
10. Theoretical Framework
âą Ferreira (2000) claims for the dichotomy of social and private
speech to be abandon, assuming, instead, the dialogism
constitutive of the phenomenon.
âą The author adds to be difficult to distinguish between the
regulatory function and the communicative function, and the
isolation of social speech present in the private speech, and
the private contained in the social.
âą Thus, the term private itself, directed only to oneself, has
flaws by not considering the co-presence of the
communicative and self-regulatory functions that constitute
speech.
11. Theoretical Framework
Private Speech
It is an experience both subjective and negotiated, in
which an intrapsychological self-regulatory activity may
have interpsychological consequences.
The social speech can move on to exert a private function
so that the joint resolution of a problem triggers the
activation of the learner's cognitive space, who
appropriates the collective production to schedule his own
battles and to create strategies to approach and transform
language as learning.
(SMITH, 2007)
12. Theoretical Framework
âą Private speech in an ESL context also plays an
emotional role through expressions that demonstrate
relief or pleasure or that indicate anxiety and insecurity,
serving as an emotional support that promotes
psychological distancing and self-control before the
stress generated by the task.
(MCCAFFERTY, 1994)
13. The Study
âą This case study involved the application of the
collaborative task âJigsaw" (from SWAIN; LAPKIN, 2001)
to seven dyads of beginner and pre-intermediate English
learners aged between 32 and 54 years in an extension
FL course in a federal university in southern Brazil.
14. The Study
Metodology
âą Questionnaire for the construction of the FL learnersâ
profile;
âą Collaborative task âJigsaw";
âą Interview with the participants immediately after the task
to register their perceptions of the task, their
performance and the use of private speech;
âą Reflective session one week after the task, in which the
pairs should reflect on their speaking and writing
production.
15. The Study
âą After the observation of the dialogues, it was considered
private speech a self-directed speech (questions,
statements, answers, comments and exclamations) in
which the speaker did not maintain eye contact with his
partner, and generally decreased the tone of voice.
16. The Study
âą It is asked: What is the nature and function of private
speech within a collaborative dialogue and what are its
effects in the self-regulatory process of individuals?
23. Results and Conclusions
The link between social speech and private speech of a
collaborative nature seems to be stronger than the
mere presence of a potential listener, as the less
collaborative dialogues proved to be unsuitable for the
emergence of private speech.
24. Results and Conclusions
âą The participants revealed to "think aloud" for themselves
to put their thinking and production as objects of
evaluation and contribution of their peers, an intention
both cognitive and social.
25. Results and Conclusions
âą The private speech occurrences, because they
happened in the presence of the other, benefited not
only the construction of individual knowledge, but also
the collective knowledge, giving continuation to the
narrative with the acceptance and assessment of
contributions made by the peer.
26. Results and Conclusions
âą The private speech in the form of questions and
comments that indicated doubt and frustration
led to the understanding that the speakers
would be receptive to the assistance from their
partners, encouraging their collaborative
participation.
27. Results and Conclusions
âą The use of private speech allowed the observation of the
reaction of learners to the task and the auto-regulatory
process of the individuals on themselves, on their own
cognitive system and on the task (VYGOTSKY, 1987;
LANTOLF, 2000).
28. Results and Conclusions
âą The private speech was used as a cognitive
resource for language assessment and
correction in the search for answers to problems
emerged in the social speech and by the
challenges of FL meaning-making. Furthermore,
learners used PS to understand and to stay
focused on the task, organizing their thinking.
29. Results and Conclusions
âą The private speech showed that, faced with the
challenge of producing the FL, the mother language
was a means for conceptual processing in search of FL
words and structures, besides facilitating the filling of
communication gaps.
30. Results and Conclusions
âą Another strategy used was repetition to search
for and select words or structures for their
analysis, to stay focused and continue the
production by parts, thus facilitating learnersâ
performance.
31. Results and Conclusions
âą The data suggest that when the level of proficiency was
lower than the task demands, private speech alone was
not enough to solve linguistic problems, serving more as
a means to visualize gaps in the language system for a
latter work. Therefore, not only private speech, but
cognitive skills are necessary for a success in the task.
32. Results and Conclusions
âą From the need to test tasks that promote language
learning, the study of private speech showed to be
relevant for the analysis of how a specific task challenges
the learner to expand his cognitive system.
33. References
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34. Transcription conventions
Based on Atkinson and Heritage (1984)
, comma â continuity intonation;
. end point - falling intonation;
? question mark - rising intonation;
: two points - extension of the sound;
[] brackets - simultaneous or overlapping speech;
() empty parentheses - speech segment that can not be
reproduced;
(()) double parentheses - observations.