in One-To-One.
Table 17
Engagement in LREs in group, one-to-one and individual modes * percentage of total LREs in each mode and task
LREs %* M
Elaborate Passage Editing Group (n = 15) 126 31.0% 8.4 One-to-one (n = 15) 131 36.5% 8.7
Individual (n = 15) 151 64.3% 10.1
Written Composition Group (n = 15) 54 23.1% 3.6 One-to-one (n = 15) 32 18.6% 2.1
Individual (n = 15) 35 27.1% 2.3
Limited Passage Editing Group (n = 15) 177 43.6% 11.8
One-to-one (n = 15) 117 32.6% 7.8
Individual (n = 15) 84 35.7% 5.6
Written Composition Group (n = 15) 144 61.5% 9.6 One-to-one (n = 15) 95 55.2% 6.3
Individual (n = 15) 94 72.9% 6.3
Elaborate + Limited
Passage Editing Group (n = 15) 103 25.4% 6.9
One-to-one (n = 15) 111 47.4% 7.4
Written Composition Group (n = 15) 34 14.5% 2.3 One-to-one (n = 15) 45 26.2% 3.0
In PE, individuals produced significantly more LREs characterised by elaborate engagement (64% of their total LREs) than group (31%) or one-to-one (37%). Many of these instances of individual elaborate engagement took the form of a justification for a correction based on the degree of formality of the expression, as demonstrated in Irene’s PE response:
Irene: which reminds me, could you, because can is quite informal so could you, give me …
Similarly, Ingrid justified an alternative for “with you” based on her perception of the formality of register:
Ingrid: I think in this sentence is “if I would come to study with you, how much would I need to pay in total”, it’s, is not a correct form, because it’s very informal to say to speak with the university so it think it’s better if we put for example if I would come to study in your university
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It is important to note, however, that the significantly higher percentage of elaborate engagement LREs in the individual mode is most likely a result of there being no elaborate + limited engagement option for individuals. In group and one-to- one modes, conversely, elaborate + limited engagement accounted for over a quarter of LREs. Engagement in group and one-to-one modes was only coded as elaborate when both participants demonstrated elaborate engagement, which probably resulted in significantly fewer episodes being coded elaborate than for individual learners.
A more telling statistic, given its applicability to all three modes, is the proportion of episodes characterised by limited engagement. Limited engagement differed to a far lesser extent between modes than elaborate engagement, representing between 36% and 44% of PE episodes, and 62% to 73% of WC episodes. Of the six pairwise comparisons made between the three modes across the two tasks, there were two statistically significant differences in limited engagement: a higher proportion of limited engagement LREs in group than one-to-one in PE, and a higher proportion in individual than one-to-one in WC. The other four comparisons produced non- significant differences. On the whole, then, limited engagement characterised LREs to a broadly similar extent across the three modes, with slightly less limited engagement observed in one-to-one.
The qualitative analysis of one-to-one episodes revealed possible reasons for this pattern. There was a tendency towards interactions in which the teacher sought justifications for corrections made by the learner, and the learner responded using metalanguage; hence, elaborate engagement in both participants. One example of such interaction occurred between Oscar and his teacher, in which Oscar initiated and correctly resolved a grammatical LRE involving a second conditional sentence. Oscar was already moving on to subsequent forms, without having elaborately engaged in the episode, when the teacher interrupted to elicit metalanguage from Oscar regarding the correction. This seeking of metalanguage constituted the start of the teacher’s elaborate engagement, which concluded in his paraphrasing comment at the end of the LRE. Oscar’s elaborate engagement was evident in his ability to justify the correction by naming the structure. It seems likely that had the teacher not elicited it, the metalanguage would not otherwise have been spontaneously produced by Oscar, and his engagement would have remained limited:
155 Teacher Then if I
Oscar If I would come to study with you, how much… if I came Teacher Very good, yeah…
Oscar Came to study with you, how much would I need to pay in total Teacher Yeah why, why, why is it came
Oscar Came because it’s the… the second conditional
Teacher very good
Oscar To clause the present simple or the past simple
Teacher Exactly so the clause with if you need the past simple not would you can’t have if would, good
The qualitative analysis therefore revealed that teacher engagement often consisted of seeking justifications to check learners’ understanding; learner engagement, on the other hand, often consisted of providing rather than seeking justifications, in response to the teachers’ use of questions. This marked a qualitative difference with elaborate engagement in learner-learner episodes in group mode, in which both learners tended to provide justifications rather than seek them. The following exchange between Guillermo and Giuliana was characterised by elaborate engagement in both learners, who discussed and justified their responses to the expression “which reminds me”:
Giuliana Yes, these languages in your university, which reminds me Guillermo No, it’s not remind
Giuliana No no Guillermo Which
Giuliana Remind me… me recuerda [it reminds me] remind me, erm, because it’s plural languages, it’s plural so is it’s remind me
Guillermo No
Because remind me er is you say remind me something, I forgot to close the door
Giuliana Remind
me that I go to the bakery or something like that
Guillermo So doesn’t make sense here we can say in another, in another way Giuliana Me recuerda, [it reminds me] which reminds me
Despite these qualitative differences in elaborate engagement episodes between group and one-to-one modes, it is interesting to note that there were no statistically significant quantitative differences between them: while structurally different, the proportions were similar. This suggests that dyadic interaction, whatever the identity of the interlocutor, is not only a context in which numbers of LREs are statistically similar between group and one-to-one modes, but in which language can be discussed in an elaborate way by both participants.
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The elaborate engagement data may be explained by Vygotskian sociocultural theory. LREs characterised by elaborate engagement may be considered evidence that concepts had been internalised by learners; that is, they had developed from being spontaneous concepts that learners were able to utilise without fully understanding their form, to scientific concepts, about which learners had some formal awareness. In the previous example, Giuliana demonstrated spontaneous knowledge of “remind” by indicating she was aware of the meaning (she provided a translation in her L1), but also demonstrated scientific awareness by proposing that the verb form ought to be singular. Had there been no elaborate engagement evidenced by the presence of metalanguage, it would have been more difficult to demonstrate that the form had yet moved beyond a spontaneous concept.
It is also noteworthy that elaborate engagement was not restricted to certain LRE foci. It might be assumed that some types of LRE – those focussing on register, for example – would be characterised by elaborate engagement, in the form of a mention of formality, and others – for example mechanics – would be characterised by limited engagement, as there is not always a great deal to discuss when correcting a contraction or punctuation error. Storch (2008), for instance, found that level of engagement appeared to depend on LRE focus: verb morphology, article choice and word forms involved elaborate engagement, probably because they are structurally more difficult and require consideration of rules, meaning, and verb-tense consistency; LREs about prepositions, on the other hand, demonstrated less elaborate engagement, as the correct preposition is lexically rather than semantically determined. In the present study, however, there were in fact many instances of mechanics LREs that involved lengthy and elaborate discussions. Gualterio and Grisela, for example, demonstrated elaborate engagement regarding the capital S in Spain:
Gualterio “The language learning is really important for students here in Spain”… language learning, OK… not just English, ah, ah but English is also, is a… English is with a capital letter no?
Grisela Languages Gualterio Yeah, English Grisela Spanish
Gualterio English, Spanish, with a capital letter, I think yeah
Grisela I think cos
Gualterio English with a capital letter Grisela In Spanish is not…
157 Grisela I think is with…
Gualterio Yeah this is the same we are, we are now, we are here now…
Further ahead in their PE response, they went on to engage in an elaborate episode regarding spelling – a focus that might be assumed to be more closely related to limited engagement – by drawing on the isomorphic example of Budget Rent-a-Car and testing out alternatives with letters B and D in order to resolve the episode:
Gualterio A budget?
Grisela Approximate cost of the course or a budget, budget Gualterio Yeah?...
Grisela Some? No… Gualterio Con D [with D]? Grisela Con D [with D]
Gualterio Creo que sí… [I think so] bud, Budget Grisela Sí, [yes] with D
Gualterio Budget, budget?... Grisela Yeah
Gualterio I think is like this… I think a budget, a budget… @ ah Grisela Budget
Gualterio I think, I think is like this, budget, budget, ah no no no I I think is like this
Grisela Budget Budget Rent a Car Budget Gualterio Yeah?
Grisela Maybe with G yeah but is definitely with D
Gualterio yeah yeah yeah you’re right, right here, budget, well Grisela Budget…
A pedagogical implication is that even a language task that is mechanical in nature, such as correcting spelling or capitalisation errors, has the potential to stimulate LREs in which there is elaborate engagement.
5.3.2 Elaborate + Limited Engagement LREs: Evidence that