The understanding of language learning - Article Example

?Response Paper Main Issues/Points Discussed in Article The main aim of this research article is to bring out facts about our understanding of language learning as co-constructed development in situated discursive practices. In order to do this, it closely observed the acquisition of an unfamiliar discursive practice by an adult Vietnamese learner of English. This study revolves around the “interactional competence framework” for perceiving the nature/ construction of interaction and participation of this process or discursive practice. It also develops the theory of situated learning or legitimate peripheral involvement in arguing that changes in the student’s and instructor’s patterns of co-participation demonstrate processes by which the student moved from side-line to more complete participation. As the process of learning went on, it was observed that the trainer involved in the process in such a way that underpinned the student’s learning. Personal observations/comments Before reading this article, I was unaware of the trainer’s involvement in a student’s learning process. This article acts as an eye-opener for me in this regard. As referred by Young & Miller the turn-taking system that speakers use to manage transitions from one speaker to the next as mentioned helped to examine how all participants co-construct a practice. The interactional pattern of the interaction is a configuration of six discursive resources that participants develop and these have been analyzed using the methods of systemic functional linguistics. Hanks suggested the co-construction of changing participation over time provided the “matrix for learning” and this has been observed in this case. Not only had the student participated more fully in the revision talks his ESL writing instructor changed her participation, complementing his participation. The view of learning as changing participation is radically different from theories of second language (L2) acquisition that frame language learning as a cognitive process residing in the mind-brain of an individual learner. Many scholars in the cognitive tradition have accepted a view of language as a set of clearly delineated and internally coherent structures that are best understood as a self-contained system. The methodology followed here is that of participatory research and the main limitation of the same is the possibility of bias of the researcher owing to his or her involvement. Not enough is said about the unbiased nature of the method though we find that the researcher learns in the process. Moreover a cross sectional analysis would have led to a more justifiable and generalized set of results. The method followed here is a specific case though structured longitudinally. Also the main limitation of the study is the inability to capture the ethnic or racial differences reflected in the discursive practice because the study is based on a Vietnamese learner. The representations of the findings and the final analysis or conclusion of the researchers are presented in a complex manner and at times the observations are repetitive in nature. Even considering all limitations, the purpose and findings of the study are interesting and revealing in the area of discursive practice and interactional process of research. Capturing the over time changes in communication is the most significant part of the research. Again study explores both verbal and non verbal methods of communication which makes it more complete though not very inclusive in terms of sample choice. Excerpts i. Just before the opening of revision talk in the first conference, in Excerpt 1 “the instructor and student discuss a tragic event in the student’s life that he had written about in his paper. Years before, he had stepped on a land mine in his native country of Vietnam and, as a result, lost part of a leg. Although the event was mentioned in the student’s paper and, thus, we could say the topic of their interaction emerged from the text, their conversation focuses on topics not mentioned in the essay: the student’s age at the time of the tragedy, the location of the mine, and the instructor’s expression of sympathy toward his suffering. Neither participant mentions the rhetorical or textual features of how that topic was addressed in his paper and, for this reason, we characterized this interaction as informal social talk rather than revision talk. The instructor closes their informal social talk with the comment, “That’s very sad” (Young & Miller, 2004,pp.522-523) ii. Closing of revision talk in the third conference, “in Excerpt 2, the instructor offers a strong, positive evaluation of the student’s just-completed revision, a truncated utterance of perfect, followed by praise for his awareness of the mistakes he had made in the essay. With the production of this evaluation, the revision talk sequence ends. It is further marked as complete when the instructor turns the paper over and invokes a new topic by asking the student if he thought he had enough information for rewriting his third and final draft (Young & Miller, 2004,pp.522-524) iii. “The revision talk focusing on the main idea in the student’s paper continued in the turns following Excerpt 3a. After producing the opening moves of thepractice, led by the instructor’s problem identification (Excerpt 3a), the instructor demonstrates her full participation in this revision talk practice by continuing to produce most of the acts in this interaction. She next provides an explanation for the revision by noting that the main idea is too general and needs to be narrowed. She then supplies a justification for narrowing the main idea, noting that the student was writing about only one person, his pastor.After uttering an explanation and a justification of the need for revision, the instructor does not direct the student to supply a candidate revision of the main idea in the essay, but supplies one herself. She suggests that he could write the sentence as, “One of the most important people who helped to raise me was my pastor.” She repeats her justification for the change, reiterating that it is a little more specific) and then directs the student to write the candidate revision.” (Young & Miller, 2004,p.525) This highlights, change in student’s participation and instructor’s as well. Questions i. How do novices acquire expertise in a new practice? ii. Does learning involve the acquisition of abstract knowledge? iii. Does learning involve increasing participation in relevant discursive practices? Reference Young, R.F. & E.R. Miller (2004), Learning as Changing Participation, The Modern Language Journal 88, iv, 519-535 Read More