Conversations between an adult and a child are effective ways to promote language and vocabulary development in young children. Considerable attention has been paid to teachers asking open-ended questions to promote conversations. However, the feedback that follows the question is also an important part of promoting back-and-forth dialogue, and…

In this article, focus is on students' oral production in two classrooms in Swedish for immigrants (SFI). The study focuses on practices with interaction patterns where students are involved in negotiation of meaning. Theoretical basis is the importance of interpersonal interaction for language development, with a focus on students' use of varied…

Language learning is an important developmental experience for young children during their preschool years, and book reading is an important context for promoting this growth. Book reading introduces children to a wider range of words than is evident in typical conversations and provides meaningful opportunities to practice using new words in…

This paper presents an exploratory analysis of treatment-control differences in the quality of classroom interactions in 4th through 7th grade urban classrooms. Word Generation (WG) is a research-based academic language program for middle school students designed to teach novel vocabulary and literacy through language arts, math, science, and…

This study focused on a specific feature of preschool teacher talk, revoicing (a situation in which the teacher repeats, fully or partially, what the child said in the immediately preceding turn), within a specific interactional context, circle time, in order to gain a deeper understanding of the type of language mediation that occurs in this…

Current attention in L2 acquisition research focuses on the integration of message-focused and form-focused instruction. One way to accomplish this is through the incidental focus on form during meaning-focused activities. Some studies have investigated incidental focus on form in different contexts and shown that it exists in L2 classes and…

Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) has been promoted by the European Union as a means to achieve multilingualism. While in Germany and other European countries the trend to use the L2 as a medium of instruction is increasing, in Hong Kong, however, we see a converse development. Many schools switched from English as a medium of…

This paper describes a form of teacher-student interaction, incidental teaching, which works to elaborate oral language within everyday classroom activities. The research basis of the methodology, an overview of the method of incidental teaching, and examples of its applications for the classroom are given. (Author/AM)

Classroom interaction, both student-teacher and student-student, provides a stimulating atmosphere for literature and creative writing discussions. Various recent research studies support the thesis that literature is an important influence on children's creative writing. Thus, teacher directed discussions require special skills involving not only…

Investigates the ways in which primary school-aged children engage a teacher's attention through active solicitation. Argues that examining these interactions reveals both what the children do and allows for a redefinition of a conceptualization of "talk engagement." (FL)

Traditionally, classroom instruction has been viewed as a structured, deliberately sequenced process leading to predetermined goals within given time limits. However, classroom second language instruction appears to be less efficient than non-classroom language acquisition. The reason may lie in the distinction between linguistic input (all…

Communicative competence is defined as "...the ability to use appropriate speech for the circumstances, and when deviating from what is normal to convey what is intended." A study was undertaken to show that children's sociolinguistic communicative competencies and incompetencies can be identified and described in components of the "Ways of…

Teachers of young children affect not only their ability to speak correctly but also the way they learn to think. Since children view the world in different ways depending on cultural heritage as well as individual perception, and since different experiences require differing ways of thinking and differing ways of expression, it is important for…

To provide classroom teachers with an understanding of some of the properties of language and of their effects on classroom interaction, this booklet reviews research in the area and offers teaching suggestions based upon that research. The first section of the booklet presents an overview of the American idea of language "correctness" and its…

An instructional approach that promotes an interactive or experiential model rather than a reductionist model in special education is discussed. The approach, called instructional conversations, encourages students to use meaningful language without focusing on the correctness of form. The teacher's role is one of facilitating genuine dialogue…