One way that language educators can extend a role-play is by adding a complication to encourage the learner say more. This study uses multimodal conversation analysis to explore such obstacles to progressivity among Japanese learners of English at an experiential language learning facility. We first examine an interactional practice in which the…

We examine the syntactic structures exhibited by persons with dementia in conversation. Traditionally, research on the linguistic abilities of persons with dementia is either observational (reports kept by caregivers) or experimental (e.g. based on comprehension tasks), and the focus is not on the syntactic competence of the speaker. We combine…

Our paper aims to present students' interactions in a teletandem--that is, tandem through desktop videoconference [Telles, J., ed. 2009. "Teletandem. Um contexto virtual, autônomo, colaborativo para aprendizagem das linguas estrangeiras no século XXI". Campinas, SP: Pontes Editores]--telecollaborative project between third-year…

Business letter-writers are advised to develop reader empathy and benefit before they ask a favor. The author analyzed two model 16th century letters of request to determine if similar advice was given in the past, and found that the request was subordinate to building a mutually beneficial relationship. (PD)

Presents a study of foreigner talk (FT) in a minority language (Welsh) in a bilingual community and describes some of the most prominent features of Welsh FT. FT is defined as a simple form of a language used by native speakers to communicate with non-proficient speakers of the language. (SED)

This research study delineates some of the factors in classroom communication involved in the process of classroom interaction in the elementary schools and explores the psychological relevance of some matters brought up in ordinary language philosophy and modern linguistics. Samples of classroom speech were collected from twenty grade school…

As part of a larger study of the oral reading of elementary school students representing eight linguistic populations in the United States, a study was conducted to discover why readers make the same miscues at the same point in a text and to discover factors in the text that contribute to this phenomenon. Subjects were second, fourth, and sixth…

In any successful conversation, a speaker must select both what is said and how it is said on the basis of various estimates of the listener's abilities, knowledge and interests. Most research on linguistic input to children has focused on the tendency of speakers to simplify their speech for the younger listener. Little attention has been paid to…

This study of code switching among Puerto Rican children attending a New York City public school focuses primarily upon the correlation between interaction rules, as perceived by the participants, and code switching. Code switching strategies of a seven-year-old boy, an eight-year-old girl, and a 10-year-old girl in the bilingual third grade class…

The ability of children at different ages to distinguish instructions to "ask" from instructions to "tell" and the types of structures used to express these directives were studied. Subjects were 120 children, aged 2 years 6 months to 6 years 6 months. Children were instructed to either ask or tell an adult or another child to give them puzzle…

A sample of 48 middle and lower class kindergarten and second grade students participated in a study to determine what speech adjustments school-age children made for listeners of different ages. Half the second grade subjects learned about two performance tasks--a board game and constructing columns of colored blocks--from the researcher, after…

The question of whether the English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) classroom is an environment that promotes input, feedback, and the production of output that is necessary for successful second language learning is addressed. Such questions have arisen within the context of a growing emphasis on communicative activities and student-to-student…