Autonomous Mutual Learning through Interactions among Japanese Learners of English

2019 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15H03226
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Foreign language education
• Research Institution: Waseda University
• Principal Investigator: Harada Yasunari 早稲田大学, 法学学術院, 教授 (80189711)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2020-03-31
• Keywords: インタラクション（相互作用） / 自律的相互学習 / プライミング / 同調 / 共感

Outline of Final Research Achievements

In order to elucidate how Japanese learners of English actually learn from each other through meaningful oral exchanges in English, we recorded learners' activities in what we call "oral response practice," in which learners are organized into groups of three, and one of them would read aloud a question printed on a small card (twice to make it easier for the other parties to understand) and another would have ten seconds to think and 45 seconds to respond to it, and the third one would serve as the "time keeper" and "recorder" with a video camera or an IC recorder or a 360 degree video camera in hand. After a response is given, the three parties each evaluate it and then exchange their roles. Each year, about 60 to 80 learners forming 25 groups or so engaged in this activity every week for 30 weeks and five years of this project culminated in about 1,800 hours of those recordings that include rich instances of lexical and syntactic priming, synchronization, attunement and entrainment.

Free Research Field

認知科学・統語理論・形式意味論・教育言語学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

今日の大学英語教育の現場においては、批判的思考力の涵養を一つの目標として、資料の読解や音声・動画資料の聴解などを批判的に行いつつ、即時的あるいは比較的厳しい時間的な制約の中で、口頭で自分なりに整理をして意見を述べたり、他の学生の発言に対してコメント・質問するというような形態での授業が求められている。こうした比較的高次の思考能力を求める活動が、英語の語彙・文法などの知識の獲得と学習者がすでに持っている英語に関する知識の実践的な運用にいかにつながるかの理論的・実践的検討にはまだ不十分なところがあるが、本研究計画による「応答練習」と作文を中心とした活動の記録によって、学習過程の一端が明らかとなった。