Identifying Linguistic Markers of Collaboration in Second Language Peer Interaction: A Lexico‐grammatical Approach

Abstract

Although there is consensus that collaboration refers to two or more learners working together to accomplish a task (Davin & Donato, 2013;Ohta, 2001), debate remains about how to assess collaboration. Researchers have pursued two approaches to evaluate collaboration during peer interaction: rater judgments (e.g., Ahmadi & Sedeghi, 2016;Winke, 2013) and qualitative coding of interactional patterns (e.g., Galaczi, 2008;Storch, 2002a). Largely absent, however, has been any attempt to describe the linguistic features of collaboration. Therefore, the present study uses corpus linguistic techniques to identify the linguistic markers of collaborative and noncollaborative peer interactions. Students of English as a second language (N = 80) enrolled in an intensive English program carried out a paired oral test as part of the program's formative assessment procedures. Their interactions were audio-recorded and rated using an analytic rubric with three categories (collaboration, task completion, and style), and transcripts were analyzed for 146 linguistic features using the Biber Tagger (Biber, 1988). Linguistic features associated with high collaboration included first-and second-person pronouns, wh-questions, that deletion, and subordinate conjunctions, whereas low-collaboration interactions were characterized by nominal forms. The collaborative and noncollaborative functions served by these linguistic features are discussed.

Discourse Markers in Peer Reviews of Academic Essays By Future Teachers of English as a Foreign Language

“…Arguably, the present finding validates the view of peer review writing as a form of interaction that provides EFL learners with an opportunity to exchange linguistic forms and apply these forms to the practical use in academic and peer review writing (Crawford, McDonough & Brun-Mercer 2019). At the same time, it is observed in the data that in contrast to the DMs that are found exclusively in E2 and R2, there is a group of DMs which is present only in E1 and absent in R1, R2 and E2.…”

The Causes of Anxiety in Highly Anxious Students in Japanese Communicative EFL Classes

“…This is supported by MacIntyre et al's (1998) assertion that inter-speaker relationships, including power relations, the level of intimacy, and social distance, are important elements in second/foreign language (L2/FL) communication. In terms of language learning, it has also been reported that other learners play an important role (Thomas & Rose, 2019), and that peer interactions help to improve TL proficiency (Chen, 2018;Crawford, McDonough, & Brun-Mercer, 2019). Students need to help each other more often (Dörnyei, 1997) and to exchange ideas with their classmates (Murphey et al, 2014).…”

A Mixed Method Study of Teachers’ Strategies in Reducing Students’ Anxiety levels

“…To make the interview data anonymous and to get ready for the establishment of categories, the interview data were first transcribed, translated into English, and coded. The coding categories were based on the causes of anxiety, including risk-free environments with lower stress levels (Shao et al, 2013), more seeking practices (Dewaele, Petrides, & Furnham, 2008), and more pair group work (Crawford, McDonough, & Brun-Mercer, 2019). The interview data was analyzed then to find any patterns or relationships…”