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Learning Another Language With Conceptual Tools: an Investigation of Gal’perin's Concept-oriented Instruction

Year: 2017
Type: article
Abstract: This dissertation examines how eight adult beginners of Italian as a foreign language (IFL) used a Schema of a Complete Orienting Basis of Action (SCOBA) to learn the concept of Genre and Register in the typified situation of a service encounter in a restaurant. During six two-hour lessons, students participated in the Concept-Based Approach to foreign language education (Negueruela, 2003; Negueruela & Lantolf, 2008) based on Gal’perin’s (1967, 1992c) model of instruction. A qualitative analysis based on data from learners’ classroom interactions and study abroad experiences revealed that the learners were able to transform their SCOBAs according to their own communicative needs. Accordingly, students developed awareness of how to use cultural and linguistic concepts to orient themselves in classroom tasks and in study abroad experiences in Italy with native speakers. Additionally, students were able to recognize typified and non-typified situations (i.e., Register variation), produce personalized language with native speakers, and make language choices depending on the cultural context and the context of the interaction. Implications of this research indicate that the study of SCOBAs helps researchers track discourse development from other-regulated to self-regulated performance. No studies have focused on how students make use of a SCOBA as a learning tool or have documented how they move from dependence on the tool to independent language performance in authentic contexts. Moreover, this study indicates that teaching specific Genres and Registers orients students in their language use in the classroom context and in the study abroad context and gives them agency and control over their interactions in a FL.
Language: English
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2670788751
FWCI: 1.401
Cites: 68
Cited by: 7
Related to: 10