Mahon2009

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Mahon2009
BibType ARTICLE
Key Mahon2009
Author(s) Merle Mahon
Title Interactions between a deaf child for whom English is an additional language and his specialist teacher in the first year of school: combining words and gestures
Editor(s)
Tag(s) EMCA, Classroom interactions, Gesture, Language Learning, Deaf
Publisher
Year 2009
Language
City
Month
Journal Clinical Linguistics & Phonetics
Volume 23
Number 8
Pages 611–629
URL Link
DOI 10.1080/02699200802491140
ISBN
Organization
Institution
School
Type
Edition
Series
Howpublished
Book title
Chapter

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Abstract

This paper provides a description of the interactions between a nursery‐aged prelingually deaf child and his specialist teacher recorded at four consecutive time points during the first year at school. The child comes from a hearing, Somali‐speaking family where English is an additional language (EAL). Using Conversation Analysis procedures, findings show how, with the teacher's support, the deaf child accomplishes ‘multi‐element’ turns (that is, turns in which semantic referents are combined using words and gestures—‘elements’) within and across time points. Gestures remain an essential feature of the child's communication at all times. The teacher's prior and next turns create and support language learning opportunities for the child, and this support is continually adjusted in response to the child's turns. It is suggested that these sequences of talk are an important mechanism driving the child's learning of spoken English.

Notes