Collaborative tool-mediated talk - an example from third graders

Abstract

The importance of language and social interaction in learning mathematics has been widely emphasized the last decades. In this paper, we present a dialog between two eight-year-old girls, working on a multiplication task. The study is video-based, and carried out within a sociocultural framework. The analysis shows that the girls’ communication skills and their competence to use drawings and other written representations are intricately interlaced. On one hand, the mathematical progress is dependant of the girls’ ability to accompany their written work with verbal explanations and gestures, on the other hand, the written representations act as means to elicit the girls’ thinking. Our study thus adds to the field throwing light on how representations like drawings, are necessary mediational means in young learner’s collaborative talk.