MC AUTHORS

Introduction: today I have invited here 2 Greeting

authors who have recently published an
article named “What’s in a ZPD? A case
study of a young ESL student and
teacher interacting through dialogue
journals” so we can learn more about case
studies

introduce the name Hossein Nassaji

Alister Cumming

Câu 1: what is ZPD? (Author hỏi khán We have prepared a video about the ZPD
giả - Thảo Trần giơ tay trả lời) please pay attention to the screen
I have never heard before
(Hỏi khán giả)

ZPD (zone of proximal development: vùng phát

triển gần )

Paper summary Thank you Alsiter, for giving those essential

information to our audiences today. I have to
emphasize that if you do not understand the concept
“ZPD”, it’s hard for you to understand the whole
research paper. So now let me give you an
overview about our research. Our research paper
investigates the concept of the Zone of Proximal
Development (ZPD) in the context of language
teaching and learning, focusing on the interactions
between a 6-year-old ESL student and his Canadian
teacher through dialogue journals. We analyzed the
written data over 10 months to identify patterns of
complementary, asymmetrical scaffolding and

Câu 2: Why can you claim your Author phản hồi
research is a case study? (Hồ Hằng:
excuse me  MC sẽ mời phát biểu)
So what is the purpose of the research? Despite a growing number of publications over the
What are you looking for?
So what is the context of the research? Context
Who gets involved in the research
process?
sustained intersubjectivity in the written
conversations.
past decade advocating that language teaching and
learning be conceptualized as sociocultural activity,
following Vygotsky’s seminal definition of the
ZPD, very few publications have documented
precisely what the ZPD is, particularly how it is
constructed in language instruction
As a consequence, the notion of the ZPD remains
something of a mysterious entity, but seldom
systematically accounted for or critically evaluated.
So we would like to document and interpret how
the ZPD may have been formed, in this one sample
instance, over a longitudinal perspective, so that
language educators may be able to perceive, utilize,
and evaluate the concept of the ZPD further.
- in a classroom, specifically in a public
school located in a multiethnic part of
downtown Toronto.
- focused on a student 'Ali' 6y Iran to Can;
teacher, 'Ellen,'. experienced teacher, taught
a split class of grades 1 and 2.
- analysed 95 continuous and interactive
dialogue journal exchanges between Ali
and Ellen.
- written over a span of 10 months, covering

Are the participants chosen at random or purpose, not random. Ali - ESL student, recently
on purpose, why were they chosen?
So what theory did you base your research
on?
Did you create a new framework yourself
or based on someone else's
the latter half of Ali's grade 1 year and
the first three-quarters of his grade 2
- part of routine classroom activities, written
every few days, and served as a naturalistic
source of data for the study.
Who were the participants?
A student named 'Ali' and his teacher, 'Ellen.' Ali, at
the beginning of the research, was a six-year-old
student who had recently moved to Canada from
Iran. Ellen was an experienced teacher instructing a
split class of grades 1 and 2 at a public school in a
multi-ethnic part of downtown Toronto.
moved to Canada. Ellen - experience and
instructional approach - whole language approach,
it involves frequent and diverse uses of oral and
literate communications based on students'
experiences and interests.
Their relevant characteristics?
Ali: ESL student => Ellen: experienced teacher
Ali: relocated from Iran, move to Canada => Ellen:
teaching in a multi-ethnic environment
Ali: 6yo => Ellen: teaching G1-G2
- influenced by sociocultural theory,
particularly associated with the work of
Vygotsky - emphasizes the role of social
interaction and collaboration in the
learning process.
- The focus on analyzing written
interactions within the context of dialogue
journals to elucidate qualities of (ZPD)
 - Besides, scheme of 14 language functions
developed by Shuy (1993) for his study of
dialogue journal interactions in an ESL
teaching context:
1. Reporting personal facts
2. Reporting general facts
3. Reporting opinions
4. Requesting personal information
5. Requesting academic information
6. Requesting general information
7. Requesting opinions
8. Requesting clarification
9. Thanking
10. Evaluating
11. Predicting
12. Complaining
13. Apologizing
14. Giving directives

Câu 3: What was the role of the The role of the researcher in this research is a
researcher? (LK hỏi – chị Vy trả lời) detached observer.
Did you get involved in any process?

What data collection procedures were collected the interactive dialogue journal
used? How much time was spent exchanges written over 10 months between Ali and
collecting the data? Ellen (95 in total). The journals were written every
 few days as part of routine classroom activities,
forming a continuous flow of exchanges in a
single notebook.
(author pause để audience ngắt lời)
Câu 4 (ngắt lời): I remember u All the journals were written prior to either Ali or
mentioned that you got naturalistic Ellen being aware of our research purposes, so they
source of data. How can you make sure represent naturalistic classroom data.
that u have obtained naturalistic source
of data? (Thu Hương)

BREAK 15m

How data analyzed? First, as we mentioned earlier, we based on the

scheme of 14 language functions developed by
Shuy (1993). Please take a look again at the slide.
After classifying the journals into these functions,
we found out that only 11 functions of those were
available among the data that we collected.
Beside that, we also followed Hunt’s definition of
T-unit (1970) to analyse the data. To make it clear
before we go further, and for those who haven’t
known about T-unit, T-unit is “the shortest units
into which a piece of discourse can be cut without
leaving any sentence fragments as residue”, in a
simple way, it’s like a clause. We broke down all
the journals and found 703 T-units. Most of the
units were produced by Ali (for 566 T-units) and
just only 137 T-units by Ellen.
Additionally, we use 2 other ways to classify the
data: based on a weekly period => 23 different but
continuous weeks. And we also group certain of the
language functions on the basis of logical similarity
as well as frequency.
How about the findings? Could you share Thủy: It demonstrated two salient characteristics of
with us what you have found out in final? the ZPD in this dialogue journal writing context:
a, sustained intersubjectivity
b, complementary, asymmetric scaffolding
Chị Thủy pause lại

Câu 5: Can you explain more about 2 cảm ơn bạn vì câu hỏi trên. Vậy tôi xin phép được
characteristics you have just giải thích và làm rõ thêm về 2 characteristics mà
mentioned? I am not really cleared chúng tôi đã đề cập ở phần findings.
about that? (cướp lời) – anh Đức Thứ nhất: sustained intersubjectivity là sự bền
vững trong tính liên chủ thể. Tính liên chủ thể có
thể được hiểu là sự tương tác, trao đổi qua lại giữa 2
người hay giữa 2 chủ thể. Tại sao, nó lại là một
trong những đặc tính quan trọng và rõ nét của ZPD
trong nghiên cứu này? Vì đây là nghiên cứu case
study về 2 đối tượng - chủ thể trong sự tương tác
trao đổi qua đối thoại của họ. Trong nghiên cứu
này, chúng tôi thấy rõ nhất về sự phát triển của tính
liên chủ thể khi nhận ra sự phát triển trong các lượt
lời trong cùng một chủ đề trò chuyện của họ. Nếu ở
đoạn đầu, ta thường chỉ thấy two-part exchange
structure - Ellen hỏi thông tin và Ali trả lời, thì dần
dần về sau, structure này chuyển thành three-part
exchanges => lengthen the discourse and sustain
their intersubjectivity. Cấu trúc các lượt lời bây giờ
có dạng: request for information - answer -
acknowledgement. Như vậy, tính liên chủ thể được
phát triển và ngày càng bền vững.
Thứ 2 về hình thức scaffold bất đối xứng, bồi đắp,
có thể được thấy rõ qua 3 khía cạnh sau:
1, Về frequencies - mức độ thường xuyên: sau khi
phân loại các lượt lời của Ali và Ellen, không khó
để nhận thấy sự chênh lệch trong functions mà
 Ellen và Ali sử dụng. Ali thì gần như chỉ trả lời,
cung cấp thông tin và Ellen thì hỏi, thường xuyên
lặp lại cho đúng những từ mà Ali viết bị sai. Chúng
tôi cho rằng, Ellen làm như vậy là đang cố gắng
scaffold cho Ali, thúc đẩy Ali tham gia vào đoạn
hội thoại nhiều hơn.
2, Về việc đặt câu hỏi: sự bất đối xứng cũng xảy ra
tại đây. Ban đầu, Ellen thường đặt câu hỏi, Ali trả
lời. Nhưng sau đó, số liệu thống kê cho thấy tỉ lệ
đặt câu hỏi của Ellen giảm từ 39% to 27%. Tương
ứng thì tỉ lệ đặt câu hỏi của Ali lại tăng từ 26% to
40 %.
3, Xét chủ yếu về 2 functions mà Ali và Ellen dùng
nhiều nhất là Reporting and requesting. Trong khi
Ali thường sử dụng reporting, thì Allen lại dùng
requesting more. => đây cũng là flow rất điển hình
trong những cuộc hội thoại của gv và hs
Chốt lại, thì càng ngày Ellen càng cố gắng cắt giảm
sự thể hiện của mình trong cuộc hội thoại, rút dần
sự scaffolding của mình để tạo cơ hội cho Ali được
thể hiện nhiều hơn. Đây chính là sự bất đối xứng và
bồi đắp trong việc scaffolding. Như vậy, chúng ta
thấy thực sự ZPD đã có tác dụng, với vai trò là
expert - người có tầm hiểu biết hơn, Ellen đã có thể
hỗ trợ Ali với vai trò là novice learner có những
phát triển nhất định về các kỹ năng ngôn ngữ.

What conclusions can you draw? Is it - intricate patterns of written communication

related to descriptive data? between a language teacher and a young
ESL student, showcasing the sustained
conditions for the student's to learn English
within (ZPD).
- emphasizes the reciprocal and
 complementary nature of the interactions
over nearly a year, demonstrating the
functional dimensions of interpersonal
communication.
- raise issues of more general significance
concerning the unity of language teaching
and learning, as well as the need for
research appropriate to understanding them.
- highlights the fragmented view of
education in many other inquiries into
second language education and emphasizes
the importance of preserving the integral
linguistic, psychological, and
sociohistorical dimensions in the contexts
of real educational activities.
Furthermore, the research acknowledges its
limitations and raises questions worthy of further
inquiry to understand the ZPD in language teaching
and learning. It prompts further research to address
issues such as how to know for certain when a ZPD
is being constructed, how to evaluate the quality of
a ZPD, and how teachers and students themselves
perceive their ZPD.
The conclusions drawn from the research are
logically related to the descriptive data presented,
as they are based on the observed patterns of
communication and interactions between the
teacher and the student over a significant period.

What is the contribution of the study to our - found a lack of studies and theoretical
knowledge of EL/FL learning or teaching? models (other than the ZPD) that can
explain how teaching and learning occur in
a way that preserves, rather than
 fragments, their integral linguistic,
psychological and sociohistorical
dimensions in the contexts of real
educational activities.
- our paper counted the dilemma of
fragmentation and divergent foci by
presenting a unified account of the ongoing,
reciprocal dimensions of language
teaching and learning, highlighting certain
processes of functional interaction that set
conditions for learning through
complementary written interactions.

From this paper, do you have any Language Teaching and Learning: By
implications for teaching? understanding how the ZPD is constructed, teachers
can better facilitate language learning and provide
appropriate guidance and support to learners.

Functional Interaction: The research highlights

the importance of ongoing, reciprocal, and
functional interactions between teachers and
students. Through dialogue journal writing, teachers
and students can engage in meaningful and
interactive communication, which sets conditions
for learning and supports the development of
language skills.

Unified Account of Teaching and Learning: The

research seeks to present a unified account of the
interconnectedness of teaching and learning. It
emphasizes the need to consider the linguistic,
psychological, and sociohistorical dimensions of
education and to avoid fragmentation these
 elements. By understanding the ZPD and its role in
teaching and learning, educators can create a more
holistic approach to language education.

Teacher Expertise: The research raises questions

about the craft of a skilled teacher in constructing a
ZPD. It explores how teachers can effectively
facilitate learning within the ZPD and distinguish
their expertise from other knowledgeable users of
the language.

Evaluation and Improvement: The research

prompts further inquiry into evaluating the quality
of a ZPD and understanding its effectiveness and
limitations. By evaluating the ZPD, educators can
identify areas for improvement and enhance the
teaching and learning process.

Câu 6: Case study thuộc mục đích nào we make many assumptions about what Ali may
theo phân loại của Yin (MC đặt câu hỏi have learned in this context as well as what Ellen
– anh Dũng reply) was trying (either implicitly or explicitly) to do. So
our interpretations, though grounded in empirical
/ɪmˈpɪrɪkl/ data, are at most exploratory /ɪk
ˈsplɒrətri/ and paradigmatic rather than verified
or representative

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