Book reading has been demonstrated to promote vocabulary. The current study was conducted to examine the added value of an interactive shared book reading format that emphasizes active as opposed to noninteractive participation by the child. Studies that included a dialogic reading intervention group and a reading-as-usual control group, and that…

We describe a computer assisted language learning (CALL) system that uses human-machine dialogue as its medium of interaction. The system was developed to help students learn the basics of the Maori language and was designed to accompany the introductory course in Maori running at the University of Otago. The student engages in a task-based…

Inspired by Bakhtin's and Vygotsky's theories of learning, this project explores how "allowing not-knowing" is enacted within collaborative student-led seminar discussions. Earlier research on student reflections (Feito, 2002) suggested that in successful seminars, participants regularly acknowledge their lack of understanding, offer…

This volume is an elementary Marathi conversation text for adult learners of Marathi, both foreign and Indian. Designed to be used in conjunction with "Marathi Structural Patterns. Book One," the volume presents over 80 conversations that include material required in everyday situations. Each section contains basic and more difficult…

A study tested the assumption that a number of independent constructs are needed to explain phenomena associated with spoken language communication. Measurement was operationalized through the use of categories of talk statements used in interpersonal communication. These categories, labeled "comemes," were derived through the use of an…

While most previous research has implied or assumed that the conversational structure giving each speaker a turn to speak is universally normative, findings of one study suggest that in interactions with at least four participants, alternatives to this rule are possible. A phenomenon called "conversational fission" occurs when a four-…

The author argues that communication is not only a means of informing but also a means of creating. He gives some examples of this. These include transmission, reciprocity, intersubjectivity, and internal dialogue. The educational implications of each are touched on briefly. (Author/CT)

A series of conversations depicts the kind of encounters an imaginary immigrant might have with French people. (MSE)

Recent years have seen a growing interest in the role of dialogue in children's learning and conception of self. Most research to date has focused on the elements and functions of classroom discourse and on adult-child or teacher-pupil conversations in educational settings. Little is known, however, about children's informal talk in which children…

Explores the hypothesis that speech acts cannot be located without bringing in knowledge beyond that of the textual referent itself. Points out that speech acts are made up of sentence context pairs through which one must search for a formal motion of context as a framing of speech activities. (FL)

Discusses the process of understanding of intent by which participants, through the comparative interpretation of a series of cues and symbols as they are revealed in speech, develop categories for a contextual model of communication. Argues that discourse is essentially dialogic and phenomenologically realizable. (FL)

Describes experimental technique for improving relationship between the structural and functional components of language teaching using dialoguing as an in-class game. (BK)

Contends that the organization of comments made by one discourse participant on the contributions of another reveals a hierarchy of relevance and informativity. Illustrates this with discourse samples subjected to a particular method of analysis. (FL)

Looks at Robert Frost's "The Death of the Hired Man" as a "representative anecdote" for Frost's work, which, taken as a whole, shows readers how to lose themselves among the overlooked places and turnings, the topics and tropes, that make up Frost's rhetorical home, the place of everyday human talk and gossip. (TB)

Introduces a generic, application-independent model of human-computer information-seeking dialog, the Conversational Roles (COR) Model, and reviews the theoretical background. COR is represented as a recursive state-transition-network that determines legitimate types and possible sequences of dialog acts, and categorizes dialog acts on the basis…