A conversation analytic study of interaction in vocabulary teaching in Turkish as a foreign language classroom: A2 level

This study aims to reveal, from a Conversation Analytic (CA) perspective, the function of "hedef kelime+ne demek" (NDK) (what does "the target word" mean?) questions as a resourceful classroom discourse in Turkish as a foreign language classes, creating various opportunities of learning in vocabulary teaching interaction. Since both learning and teaching a foreign language positions the interaction at the heart of educational goals, achieved through co-constructed interaction of both language learners and teachers (Markee, 2000; Seedhouse, 2004, 2005; Sert, 2015; Walsh, 2011), an investigation into interaction in L2 language classrooms could explicate the way teaching and learning are shaped in a detailed way. CA has a methodological strength to scrutinize those explications which are seen-but-unnoticed (Garfinkel, 1967) by participants of interaction, in this case by teachers and learners. Classroom interaction has its own interactional patterns; there is an interactional asymmetry between a student and teacher. Most of the time, teacher has an unquestionable authority of knowledge, and thus, manages the learner contributions in accordance with pedagogical aims (Gardner, 2013; Mehan, 1979; Sert, 2016). The data was collected within two-week period in 2017-2018 from a Turkish as a foreign language teaching institution in the southern region of Turkey, and consisted the transcription of 11-hour of video recordings, selected out of 52 class hours. As the first comprehensive study of Turkish as a foreign language classroom from CA perspective, the analysis has shown that preferred learner responses (e.g. providing an example, the definition, a synonym, the translation of target vocabulary item or using body language) can be elicitated through NDK questions in vocabulary teaching interactions. The findings of the study also reveals that preferred responses can be facilitated through the usage of various interactional resources (e.g. clues, repairs, repetitions, and dialogical explanations) together with classroom discourse that may be used for this purpose (discourse markers, prosodic resources, spatial resources and reformulations). Therefore, this study has implications for Turkish as a foreign language instructors to provide useful interactional patterns to achieve certain interactional and pedagogical goals. This study has also implications for L2 language teaching, specifically for Turkish as a foreign language teaching, such as providing a new perspective to be able to improve L2 teaching practices.