A sociocultural analysis of discussion-based oral feedbacks on writing tasks

Using language as a social mode of thinking has been brought up by Mercer’s (2004) sociocultural discourse analysis. His methodology for classroom talk analysis was applied in this study in order to investigate the students’ thinking through language and their negotiated meaning making through writing tasks. The typology of different forms of talk proposed by Mercer (1997) was used to analyze the recorded and transcribed data produced by 40 sophomore Iranian EFL language learners through discussion-based feedback sessions in which they received feedback on their writing. Seven categories of talk were found in the corpus, among which, Cumulative talk had the highest frequency which can be due to the social and cultural factors of the context. The categories of talk and their frequencies found in this study can be justified by the Lantolf and Poehner’s (2014) argument that the conversations considered micro-level practices are affected by macro-level contexts in which they are developed.

A sociocultural analysis of discussion-based oral feedbacks on writing tasks Keywords:

Academic writing , Classroom talk , Discussions , Negotiated meaning , Sociocultural