The increasing linguistic diversity of the students in schools poses a major challenge for inclusive educational systems in which everyone can learn the language of instruction effectively and, likewise, can have access to contents, being language the necessary tool to the latter end. Research suggests that there is a robust connection between…

This study explores the dialogical nature of agency when two immigrant pupils, who are learning Finnish as their new target language, are authoring their selves. Bakhtin's dialogism was the inspiration for this examination of the discourses that surround the L2 pupils' agency and how they respond to discourses through their agency.…

This study addresses how Chinese learners of English as a second language (L2) perceive conversations in English materials as compared to speakers of English as a first language (L1). Data were collected through questionnaires completed by 48 participants (28 L2 English learners in China and 20 L1 English speakers in the UK), eliciting evaluations…

Unlike previous research on participation in mathematics classrooms that focuses on the teacher's role eliciting student talk, the purpose of this dissertation is to study the interactive process through which a teacher connected her reflection and practice, fostering transformations in the culture of participation in a third-grade Spanish…

Spanish learners engaged in two-way interaction gap tasks where, through social interaction, they identified and defined low-frequency vocabulary. Participants (referred to as actors to differentiate them from task partners) completed two such tasks. Each time, they collaborated with different partners of varying degrees of Spanish proficiency and…

Framed within the perspective of Vygotskyan sociocultural theory and models of third language learning, this study examined the impact of differing linguistic backgrounds and learning experience on the nature of dyadic interaction during task completion in the divide between true L2 and L3 learners. It was conducted in an EFL classroom with eight…

This study aimed to examine junior college students' group dialogues on the use of high-level comprehension features in an EFL reading class. The participants were one high-ability group and one low-ability group in terms of discussion proficiency. Eight representative discussions conducted in the students' first language served as the major data…

Increases in the number of English language learner (ELL) students in the United States has led to a significant need for research that explores teaching and learning for ELL students in science and other content-area classrooms. This qualitative study investigated middle-school ELL students' (N = 12) beliefs and practices surrounding science…

This paper is about the questioning patterns of teachers in an early intervention reading program and the exceptions to this typical interactional pattern. Literacy experts recommend a rich diet of oral language for young learners of English literacy. Teachers offer this rich diet by creating an appropriate learning environment in the classroom…