Introducing sociocultural theory / James P. Lantolf -- Sociocultural contributions to understanding the foreign and second language classroom / Richard Donato -- Rethinking interaction in SLA : developmentally appropriate assistance in the zone of proximal development and the acquisition of L2 grammar / Amy Snyder Ohta -- Subjects speak out : how learners position themselves in a psycholinguistic task / Regina Roebuck -- The output hypothesis and beyond : mediating acquisition through collaborative dialogue / Merrill Swain -- Playfulness as mediation in communicative language teaching in a Vietnamese classroom / Patricia N. Sullivan -- Social discursive constructions of self in L2 learning / Claire Kramsch -- Second language learning as participation and the (re)construction of selves / Aneta Pavlenko and James P. Lantolf -- Side affects : the strategic development of professional satisfaction / Deryn P. Verity -- The appropriation of gestures of the abstract by L2 learners / Steven G. McCafferty and Mohammed K. Ahmed -- Second language acquisition theory and the truth(s) about relativity / Steven L. Thorne -- From input to affordance : social-interactive learning from an ecological perspective / Leo van Lier
Summary
This book represents a major statement of the current research being conducted on the learning of second languages from a sociocultural perspective. The book is divided into a theoretical and an empirical part. Specific topics covered include: learning and teaching languages in the zone of proximal development; L1 mediation in the acquisition of L2 grammar; sociocultural theory as a theory of second language learning; gestural mediation in a second language; and constructing a self through a second language