Embodied Resources in a Repetition Activity in a Preschool L2 Classroom

Children's Research Center-Turkey. Via Tower Is Merkezi, Bestepeler Mahallesi, Nergiz Sokak No 7-35 Sögütözü, Ankara 06530, Turkey. Tel: +90-312-2190219; Fax: +90-312-2190321; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: http://www.novitasroyal.org/

Y

25

Second Language Learning; Preschool Education; Preschool Teachers; Preschool Children; Learning Activities; Repetition; Foreign Countries; Teaching Methods; English (Second Language); Second Language Instruction

1307-4733

The interactional architecture of L2 teaching and learning in preschool classrooms has been explored only to a limited extent despite the growing literature on L2 classroom discourse. The existing literature on these settings mainly describes an interactional site with limited L2 interactional repertoires of the very young learners. Accordingly, preschool teachers seem to draw on repetitions and interactional routines to create opportunities for learner participation. Against this background, this study sets out to describe a preschool L2 classroom in which a pre-service language teacher education project is implemented. Based on a conversation analytic examination of the interactional unfolding of a "repeat after me" activity, aimed at eliciting the students' self-identification, the current study documents the interactional management of embodied resources. The findings demonstrate that the teacher repeatedly deploys embodied directives and recurrently draws on repetition of the focal form. Consequently, the students show active engagement and participation in the activity. The findings also provide implications for teaching English to very young learners and research on classroom interactional competence, L2 classroom discourse, embodiment, and multimodality.

As Provided

69

2018

EJ1177687