28.978, Review: Applied Ling; Lang Acquisition: Sato, Ballinger (2016)

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Subject: 28.978, Review: Applied Ling; Lang Acquisition: Sato, Ballinger (2016)

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Date: Thu, 23 Feb 2017 10:58:23
From: Bronson Hui [huibronson at gmail.com]
Subject: Peer Interaction and Second Language Learning

 
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Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/27/27-2051.html

EDITOR: Masatoshi  Sato
EDITOR: Susan  Ballinger
TITLE: Peer Interaction and Second Language Learning
SUBTITLE: Pedagogical potential and research agenda
SERIES TITLE: Language Learning & Language Teaching 45
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
YEAR: 2016

REVIEWER: Bronson Hui, (personal interest - not currently working at a university)

Reviews Editor: Helen Aristar-Dry

Summary

Peer Interaction and Second Language Learning: Pedagogical potential and
research agenda, edited by Sato and Ballinger, consists of a total of 13
chapters divided into 3 sections: first, interactional patterns and learner
characteristics; second, tasks and interactional modalities; and finally,
learning settings. Chapter 1, by Dobao, is the first of the 5 papers in
Section I. It focuses on the silent learner in interactions. Using a
collaborative writing task, the author created opportunities for their
participants, who are American learners of Spanish at intermediate levels
(N=32, age: 18-24),  to work in dyads and groups. Their interactions were
audio-recorded, transcribed and analysed in terms of language learning
episodes. These episodes were then taken together with the data of pre- and
post-tests on productive vocabulary knowledge to determine whether or not
learning took place for different learners playing various roles in the
interaction.  Such roles include the trigger (i.e., the learner raising the
issue of talk) and the observer (i.e., the learner who did not express any
ideas). Results suggest that the observer was able to gain new vocabulary
knowledge from the interaction, almost as much as the trigger. This finding
evidences the active engagement of these silent learners despite their
silence. 

Chapter 2 looks at the effects of metacognitive instruction on feedback
provision by learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) in Japan. Fuji,
Ziegler and Mackey trained their participants to offer feedback in peer
interactions. This training included introducing the benefits of interactional
feedback and presenting successful negotiation processes as examples. The
learners were also taught useful phrases (e.g., ‘so you mean…’ to seek
confirmation) before practice. Adopting a quasi-experimental design, the
training was only given to the experimental group, and all participants took
part in two interactive tasks as the pre- and post-tests. The analysis of
their recorded interactions shows that the experimental groups generally
provided significantly more interactional feedback. When analysed by feedback
types, only clarification requests were made significantly more by the
experimental group. The data also show significantly more opportunities for
modified output experienced by the experimental group. The authors conclude
that metacognitive instruction could enhance interactional feedback in
subsequent tasks, and hence is ‘a useful and welcome addition’ to language
classrooms (p.84).

Both Chapters 3 and 4 delve into the influence of proficiency on group
dynamics and interactional behaviour. Sato and Viveros report, in Chapter 3,
the effects of proficiency on 4 aspects: offering corrective feedback,
providing modified output, engagement in collaborative interaction, and actual
language development. The participating 10th grade Chilean learners of English
were divided into a high proficiency and a low proficiency class. They all
received teaching involving presentation of a movie clip, followed by a
communicative activity intended to enhance their awareness in the target
grammar item (i.e., the past tense).  The final two stages of the teaching
involved guided production and free  communicative practices. The recorded
interaction data of a focus group of each class were collected and analysed.
Quantitatively, the low proficiency class showed improvements in knowledge of
the past tense as well as in their vocabulary size, while the high proficiency
group did not. In addition, the low proficiency class produced more corrective
feedback and modified output. They also demonstrated more collaborative
engagement. Qualitatively, the learners of lower proficiency were engaged in
collaboration, typically without anyone dominating the exchange.  In Chapter
4, Young and Tedick explore the influence of group composition on peer
interaction and collaborative dialogue. The 5th grade participants were
Spanish learners in America’s two-way immersion programme where students were
mixed in accordance with their linguistic backgrounds (i.e., Spanish home
language & English home language), creating opportunities for heterogeneous
grouping with group members of different proficiency levels placed together in
the classroom. Quantitative data analysis of the recorded sessions shows that
groups with members of similar proficiency produced more collaborative
dialogues. The qualitative micro-analysis on the interactions suggests that
less proficient learners are subject to marginalisation and becoming silent in
groups with different proficiency levels, casting doubt on heterogeneous
grouping as derived from the Vygotskyian school of thought. 

Section II moves away from learner characteristics to tasks and interactional
modalities. The first chapter, Chapter 6 by Loewen and Wolff, investigates
second language (L2) learners’ interaction in 3 modalities: face-to-face
(F2F), oral synchronous computer-mediated communication (SCMC) (i.e., oral
real-time communication on a computer; e.g., talking in a Skype meeting), and
written SCMC (i.e., concurrent messaging in writing; e.g., in a chat room).
The participants were from a university intensive English programme, and they
were randomly assigned to one of the three modalities before completing a
picture differences task, a consensus task, and a conversation task. The data
analysis involved coding for such interactional features as negotiation for
meaning, language-related episodes, and recasts. Results show absence of task
effects, while the written SCMC differed from the oral SCMC and F2F.
Specifically, there were significantly more confirmation checks in the two
oral modalities. The authors conclude that different modalities afford
different learning opportunities for learners. 

In Chapter 7, McDonough, Crawford and De Vleeschauwer focus on learners’
interaction in collaborative writing tasks and its relationship to the
eventual quality of the writing. Thai university learners of EFL were asked to
write a summary paragraph and a problem-solving paragraph in pairs. The
recorded interactions were coded based on the focus of their discussion, such
as content, language, and task management (e.g., discussing task requirements
and monitoring time). Task effects were apparent in this study in that the
learners, for example, spent significantly more time on talking about
organisation in the problem-solving task while spending more time on reading
and re-reading in the summary task. The correlation between the time spent on
content, organisation, and language and overall text rating was significant
only in the problem-solving paragraphs. 

Chapter 8, by Baralt, Gurzynski-Weiss and Kim, explores learners’ focus on
forms from social and affective perspectives. The Spanish learners were
assigned to 2 interaction environments (i.e., face-to-face or SCMC). They, in
pairs, then completed a cognitively simple and a cognitively complex task,
with the former requiring the learners to simply retell a story presented in
comic strips and the latter requiring, on top of retelling, deduction about 
the mental states and emotional reasoning of characters. After the tasks, they
all filled in a questionnaire targeting their cognitive, social and affective
engagement during the tasks. Analysis of their interaction and responses to
the questionnaire reveal that the face-to-face group reflected on the target
grammatical form in most cases across the two tasks. In contrast, this
cognitive engagement was not observed in the SCMC group. This difference is
attributed by the authors to the different levels of affective and social
engagement. The face-to-face group showed, in the course of completing the
tasks, more willingness to engage, joy and fun as well as encouragement,
support, and praise, all of which were absent in the SCMC group. Taken
together, the authors urge awareness of the potential implications of
affective and social engagement on cognitive engagement. 

García Mayo and Azkarai compare language-related episodes (LREs) and level of
engagement in written and oral modalities in Chapter 9. The Spanish-Basque
learners of English completed two written tasks (i.e., a dictogloss and a text
editing task) and two oral tasks (i.e., a picture placement and a picture
differences task). LREs were first identified from the recorded interactions,
before being coded according to the nature (i.e., meaning vs form) and outcome
(i.e., resolved vs not resolved) of the LREs. The learners’ level of
engagement was also analysed. Results show that LREs in the writing tasks were
significantly more formed-focused, while there were more meaning-focused talks
in the oral tasks. For outcome of the LREs and level of engagement, there were
no major differences between the two modalities. 

Chapter 10 presents research by Rouhshad and Storch looking at patterns of
interaction in face-to-face and computer-mediated modes during a collaborative
writing task. The adult learners of English were asked to complete 2 writing
tasks in which interaction took place in the face-to-face mode or the written
SCMC mode (i.e., through Google Docs where the 2 learners could write, edit
and chat concurrently). The analysis of the interactions was conducted in
accordance with 4 interaction patterns: collaborative (i.e., high equality and
high mutuality between the interlocutors), cooperative (i.e., high equality
and low mutuality), dominant/passive (i.e., low equality and low mutuality),
and expert/novice (i.e., low equality and high mutuality). LREs were also
categorised based on their nature (i.e., form, lexis, and mechanics), their
resolution (i.e., correctly resolved, incorrectly resolved, or left
unresolved), and the level of engagement (i.e., extensive and limited).
Significant results include that, first, collaboration was found to be common
in the face-to-face mode, while cooperation was the dominant pattern in the
SCMC mode. Also, the level of engagement in the SCMC mode was, perhaps
surprisingly, limited, leading the authors to suggest that teachers should
carefully consider the implementation of online collaboration tasks. 

The final chapter of this section, Chapter 11 by Moranski and Toth, deals with
the relationship between meta-analytic talk and grammatical performance. The
L2 adolescent Spanish learners were taught in a lesson following the PACE
paradigm, involving the teacher presenting the target forms (i.e., the Spanish
pronoun se in the present study) and drawing students’ attention to it, before
the students co-constructing the grammar rules to be applied to extension
production tasks. It was during the co-construction stage where learners were
expected to conduct meta-analytic talk. Such talk was recorded, transcribed
and coded according to their levels of analytical abstraction (i.e., high vs
low) as well as interactional patterns (mutuality vs isolation). The outcome
measures were the pre-, post-, and delayed-post tests of grammaticality
judgments. The major results are that individual analytic talk time was
positively associated with scores in grammaticality judgement tasks. Also,
less-participating learners in high mutuality groups improved their scores
too. It is concluded that analytic talk can facilitate grammatical
development, and mutuality is an important element in a successful group work.

Section III focuses on the effects of learning settings on interaction.
Chapter 12 by Martin-Beltrán, Chen, Guzman and Merrills, looks at the
interaction between learners in a two-way language exchange programme in an
American high school. The data were collected from a language ambassador
programme where students of complementary linguistic backgrounds (i.e., native
Spanish learners of English and native English learners of Spanish) took part
in community building and literacy activities. These activities typically
include students’ responding, in writing, to a prompt before verbally sharing
their thoughts and offering feedback on the language use by their peers. The
data analysis was based on the concepts of comity (i.e., communication being
not only information exchanges, but also negotiating interpersonal
relationships). Specifically discursive moves such as social inquiry,
solidarity and support as well as LREs were coded. This exploratory study
reveals the more instances of co-constructing language as the learners build
their social relationships. It concludes that relationship-building discourse
serves as a mediational tool for talk about language, highlighting the social
aspects of interaction in L2 learning. 

Bigelow and King investigate interaction between two asymmetrically paired new
immigrants in the US in Chapter 13. With beginner levels of English, they were
given a pair reading task in which they had to discuss the happenings of a
story. The data include video recordings of the learners’ physical interaction
with the book and the transcription of their verbal utterances. The findings
reveal 4 participation structures in which the authors suggest they brought
complementary skills and experience to the task. The study concludes that
while there might be limited L2 development as a result of the task, such
interaction could provide opportunities for the two learners to help each
other in ‘doing school’ (p.370).  

In the epilogue, Philp concludes the volume by bringing all chapters together
to shed light on new pathways in researching interaction. The author
highlights the different approaches to describing and exploring interaction
and the importance of social relations in learning through interaction, as
well as issues on engagement and the role of teacher in interaction. 
 
Evaluation

This book is one of the first, if not the first, volumes dedicated to peer
interaction (i.e., interaction between language learners), a specific and
distinctive field within the broader field of interaction research. It
succeeds rather well in achieving its aim to provide an up-to-date overview.
Thoughts are given to organising the chapters into the three sections, each of
which addresses a prong in this research. The methodology adopted by the
papers, often being the mixed-method approach, is exemplary: quantitative data
are capable of providing a global picture of trends and micro-analysis offers
the details of happenings during the interactions. The volume is written in
clear and succinct language, and is easy to follow for readers with varying
levels of experience and knowledge in the field. It certainly deserves strong
recommendations, especially to students of Applied Linguistics and Second
Language Studies, as well as language teaching professionals interested in
peer interaction research, all of whom should find it insightful, informative
and useful. 

Section I attempts to address the question: ‘How do interactional patterns and
learner characteristics affect L2 learning in peer interaction?’ (p. 1-2).
Given this objective, it might be surprising, perhaps, for some readers to
find that 3 studies (out of 5) in this section do not have a learning outcome
measure. In a case where there is an outcome measure (i.e., Chapter 3), the
reporting could have been more elaborated and clearly put together with other
findings (i.e., under ‘Quantitative results’). 

On the up side, this section has nicely captured some key uniqueness of peer
interaction: first, the silent learner, as looked at in Chapter 1, appears to
be a unique interaction role in peer interaction in the sense that interaction
with a trained teacher, for example, could result in the less proactive
learners being explicitly prompted to break their silence. Similarly, when all
group members are learners, the quality of the feedback could be a legitimate
concern, which could have an influence on its potential benefits; yet, the
findings in Chapter 2 have served as a first and important step to remove such
doubts fairly convincingly. Finally, the mixed findings of the research into
the influence of proficiency have demonstrated the complexity of how different
variables play out. The 2 papers in question, Chapters 3 and 4, have
altogether opened up opportunities for further investigation.  On a personal
note, the findings in Chapter 5 suggesting that the traditionally perceived
benefits of heterogeneous grouping could well be a myth were particularly
arresting for myself as a teacher-researcher. Given the scope of learner
characteristics, the papers in this section have collectively provided a
rather extensive coverage. 

The question Section II would like to address is: ‘How do tasks or interaction
modality affect interaction patterns and L2 learning?’(p.2). This section has
achieved this aim quite successfully. All chapters have shown clearly how
tasks and modalities could have an influence on interactional dynamics,
including the nature, outcome and features of their talk. It has been very
rightly pointed out that different tasks and modalities afford different
learning opportunities for learners. Perhaps there is not such a thing as the
best task or modality which is conducive to students’ learning; but readers of
this volume could gain a strong sense of how tasks and modalities matter. For
example, interaction in the oral modality appears to focus more on meaning
rather than grammar. This focus might be excellent for such teaching
objectives as introducing or consolidating the semantics of lexical items.
With these findings, language teaching professionals are able to make more
informed decisions as to what task and modality to use in order to promote
certain elements of interaction and hence learning. In this regard, this
section has been very useful for practitioners. 

Perhaps, a limitation would, again, be the lack of outcome measures. While one
study laudably includes an outcome measure (i.e., scores in grammaticality
judgement tasks) and indeed a delayed post-test designed to understand the
long-term effects of treatment, all other studies have not reported clearly
their outcome measures. As mentioned, some studies in Section 1 do not have
outcome measures indicating whether or how much students can learn from the
interactions as well. It is perfectly understandable that this volume sits
within a much larger body of interaction research which has rather clear and
sufficient evidence for learning benefits. In that case, when a study can show
that certain treatment/variable could promote interaction, one could 
logically claim that the increased negotiation for meaning, for example, could
at least potentially promote some learning. Yet, while this logic is fairly
cogent, caution might also be advised due to some fundamental differences
between traditional interaction with a teacher or a native speaker and peer
interaction. One of these differences is that learners may not be expert users
of the target language. This difference could have an influence on the quality
of their feedback to other learners. It is not clear whether or not learners
may acquire items that are not target-like in the course of peer interaction.
If it is possible, fossilisation of common errors resulting from negative
transfer from their native language, for example, could be a problem. 

Section III focuses on settings and interaction. The two chapters have
presented cases of a two-way immersion programme and immigrants with beginner
levels of the L2. The descriptive exploration is informative and insightful.
For example, Chapter 12 makes a strong case to consider how
relationship-building between learners of different backgrounds could have an
impact on their co-construction of the target language. One minor question
readers might have is the reason why Chapter 5, also on two-way immersion and
asymmetrical pairing/grouping is not placed in this section. It might have
been a plus if these chapters are linked even more closely together in the
volume. 

Overall, as an EFL teacher-research, I enjoy reading this book, and I have
acquired many insights. Readers who find this topic relevant to their work and
research interests should spend some serious reading time on it.


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Bronson Hui is currently a teacher-researcher in Hong Kong. He received his
Master’s degree in Applied Linguistics from University of Oxford. His research
interests include interaction, vocabulary acquisition, second language
processing, L1 use in second language classrooms. He has also written book
reviews for System and Asian Journal of Applied Linguistics.





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