Sociocultural discourse analysis: analysing classroom talk as a social mode of thinking
Journal of Applied Linguistics, 6/16/2004,, (June 2004)Description
Analyses the classroom conversation of primary school children, over a ten week period, by using socio-cultural discourse analysis (Vygotskian). Mercer argues for a more productive research methodology that combines quantitative and qualitative research and classifies conversation (in relation to solving academic problems) into distinguished into three types: Exploratory, cumulative and disputational. The paper concludes that the linguistic process through which people seek intersubjectivity, can be found in collaborative conversations throughout primary schools but suggests that conversation that asks questions and solves problems is still not fully recognised or encouraged in younger children.