L2 learning context

The Sociocultural perspective

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

Vygotsky stated that language emerged as a

result of the social interactions between

individuals.

Sociocultural theory views speaking and

thinking as two related processes. Speaking

and writing mediate thinking. ??

people gain control over their mental

processes as a consequence of internalizing

what they say to others and what others say

to them.

Vygotsky’s theory has been compared to several notions in the field.

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

Vogotsky’s ZPD and Krashen’s i+1 (comprehensible input) ??

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

These two concepts differ in relation to their

view of how development occurs.

ZPD is a metaphorical situation in which

learners co-construct knowledge in

collaboration with other people.

Krashen’s i+1 is about the comprehensibility

of the input that is beyond the learner’s

current level of development which comes

from outside the learners.

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

So, ZPD emphasized the re-construction

of the learner’s knowledge which is

based on the interaction with their

interlocutor or in Private Speech (i.e. the

language we use when we are talking to

ourselves).

Vygotsky and the Interaction Hypothesis

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

They differ in the way they emphasize the

internal cognitive processes.

In The Interaction Hypothesis, the emphasis

is on the individual cognitive processes in

the mind of the learners. Interaction

facilitates those cognitive processes by

giving the learners access to the input they

need to activate internal processes.

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

In Vygotsky’s theory, the emphasis in

on the conversations themselves

because learning occurs through these

social interactions.

Sociocultural theory states that people

gain control of their cognitive processes

as knowledge is internalized during

social activity.

How do you think we can apply Vygotsky’s theory in L2 learning context??

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

Second language applications: Learning by talking

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

Many researchers were interested in

investigating how interaction with other

speakers helps learners acquire the language.

ZPD is the interaction not only between an

expert and a novice (teacher/student), but

also between novice and novice

(learner/learner).

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

Some researchers such as Swain (1985)

proposed “The output Hypothesis” as opposed to

Krashen’s comprehensible input hypothesis.

Swain argues that asking the students to write

or speak pushes the learners to process the

language deeply because they have to pay more

attention to meaning.

This proposal was suggested after several

studies that concluded that most learners are

weak in writing and speaking than in reading and

listening comprehension.

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

Although Swain’s work was influenced by

the cognitive theory, his recent work was

influenced by the sociocultural theory. ??

Swain and other did a series of experiment

to study the affect of the “collaborative

dialogue” on the co-construction of the

learners’ knowledge of the language. They

tried to investigated how this collaborative

dialogue draw the students’ attention to the

forms and meanings.

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

They noticed that students test their

hypotheses about the language, discuss

these hypotheses and decide which forms

were best to express their meaning.

As a result, Swain concluded that

collaborative dialogues is the cognitive

and social activity where language use

and language learning can co-occur.

The difference between the sociocultural perspective and that of other researchers who focused on interaction.

Miss. Mona AL-Kahtani

Sociocultural theory assumes that cognitive

processes begins as an external socially

mediated activity which will be internalized.

Other interactionist models assume that

modified input and interaction provide

learners with the raw material for internal

cognitive process.