"¿Sabés qué es ?" Explicaciones de niños tutores en torno a vocabulario no familiar. Un estudio con niños de poblaciones urbano marginadas de Argentina / "Do you know what it is ?" Explanations of child tutors about non familiar vocabulary. A study with children from marginalized urban populations of Argentina

Resumen En el presente estudio se analizan situaciones de alfabetización entre díadas de niños de 12 años, que asistían a la escuela primaria y niños de 5 años de jardín de infantes generadas en el marco del programa de niños tutores en alfabetización "De niño a niño" (Rosemberg y Alam, 2009) orientado a promover el aprendizaje de la lectura y la escritura de niños, quienes viven en poblaciones urbano marginadas de Argentina. El análisis se focaliza en las secuencias de intercambio en las que los niños mayores (tutores) explican palabras poco familiares a los niños pequeños (aprendices) durante dis tintos tipos de actividades: lectura de cuentos y actividades focalizadas en el sistema de escritura y el vocabulario. Durante el año escolar, se llevaron a cabo 7 sesiones y las sesiones de 8 díadas fueron filmadas y transcriptas. Se identificaron 89 secuencias donde el tutor explicaba una palabra al apren diz. Para el análisis, se elaboró una categorización que da cuenta de la estructura conversacional de las secuencias de explicación -modalidad monologal o dialogal- y del tipo de información empleada -estrategias que recurren a aspectos semánticos y de contextualización. A fin de comparar cómo se despliegan estas secuencias en cada tipo de actividad, se emplearon pruebas estadísticas no paramé tricas. Los resultados mostraron una preeminencia de la modalidad monologal y un mayor empleo de estrategias que recurren a aspectos semánticos en las situaciones de lectura. En las otras actividades de alfabetización, prevaleció la modalidad dialogal y el empleo de estrategias de contextualización.

Abstract: This study analyzes literacy situations between dyads of 12-year-olds attending primary school and 5-year-old kindergarten children generated in the framework of the "De niño a niño" program (Rosemberg & Alam, 2009). The goal of this program is to promote reading and writing learning among children living in urban-marginalized populations in Argentina. The analysis focuses on the interventions used by older children (tutors) to explain un familiar words to younger children (apprentices) in the context of different types of activities: reading stories and activities focused on the writing system and vocabulary. During the school year, 7 sessions were held. The tutoring sessions of 8 dyads were videotaped and transcribed. Eighty-nine exchanges in which a tutor explained a word to the apprentice were identified. For the analysis, a categorization was elaborated focusing on the conversational structure of the explanation sequence modality - monologal or dialogal - and the type of information used for the explanation -strategies that resort to semantic and contextual aspects. In order to compare how these sequences were deployed in each type of activity, nonparametric statistical tests were used. The results showed a pre-eminence of the monologal modality and a greater use of strategies that resort to semantic aspects in reading situations. In the other literacy activities, the dialogal modality and the use of contextual aspects prevailed.

Vocabulario, narración y argumentación en los primeros años de la infancia y la niñez. Una revisión de investigaciones / Vocabulary, narration and argumentation during the first years o infancy and childhood. A research review

Resumen Se presenta una revisión de investigaciones que atienden al desempeño psicolingüístico infantil referido al vocabulario, al discurso narrativo y al argumentativo. En el marco de una amplia presentación de trabajos de investigación en el tema, el foco de la revisión son los trabajos previos realizados en el marco de la línea de investigación que llevamos a cabo en Argentina con niños de diversos grupos socioculturales. Se incluyen, a modo de ilustración de los conceptos, intercambios audio o videofilmados a niños de dos años y seis meses a cinco años en diferentes contextos de interacción en el hogar y en la escuela. En la presentación conceptual, así como en el análisis de los intercambios, se señalan las interrelaciones entre el vocabulario y el discurso narrativo y argumentativo en las interacciones sociales durante la consecusión de las actividades que configuran la vida cotidiana en el hogar, la comunidad y el entorno escolar. Asimismo, se señala la necesidad de atender, desde una perspectiva multimodal, al contexto de interacción social en el que se insertan tempranamente las palabras infantiles cuando los niños comienzan a producir discursos que les permiten realizar su intención comunicativa.

Abstract We present a research review of studies about children's psycholinguistic performance regarding vocabulary as well as narrative and argumentative discourse. Within the framework of a wide array of research studies on the subject, this revision focuses on the line of research that we have been carrying out with children from diverse sociocultural groups in Argentina. In order to illustrate the concepts, we have included audio or video conversational exchanges among children between two and half years and five years old. The exchanges were recorded in different contexts of interaction at school and at home. In the theoretical presentation, as well as in the analysis of exchanges we point out the relationships between vocabulary and narrative and argumentative discourse, that took place within the social interactions in the daily activities at home, in the community, and school environments. Likewise, we highlight the need to attend to the context of social interaction in which a child's vocabulary is inserted early on, when children begin to produce discourse in order to carry out their communicational goals.

La construcción interaccional de narrativas de ficción entre niños de distintas edades: Un estudio con niños de poblaciones urbano marginadas / The interactional construction of fictional narratives between children of different ages: A study with children from marginalized urban populations

El estudio realizado se propuso analizar el proceso de construcción interaccional de narrativas de ficción por parte de díadas de niños de distintas edades (4 y 12 años) que viven en poblaciones urbano-marginadas de Argentina. Las narrativas, elicitadas a partir de una secuencia de imágenes, fueron video-filmadas y luego transcriptas. El corpus incluye 33 relatos producidos por díadas de niños de 4 y 12 años. Se realizó un análisis cualitativo que combina el Método Comparativo Constante (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Strauss & Corbin, 1990) con herramientas de la Sociolingüística Interaccional (Gumperz, 1982) y el Análisis de la conversación (Goodwin & Heritage, 1990). Dicho análisis permitió generar un sistema de categorías que dio cuenta de los roles narrativos (Goodwin, 2007) asumidos por los participantes y el modo en que esos roles eran negociados en la interacción. Los resultados mostraron que los niños adoptaban diferentes roles narrativos que se configuraban a partir de una yuxtaposición de campos semióticos -verbales, gestuales y proxémicos-. Los niños pequeños adoptaban el rol de narrador o el rol de audiencia, mientras que los niños mayores asumían roles de tutor, narrador o audiencia. Asimismo, el análisis permitió mostrar cambios en los roles adoptados durante la situación de interacción. La relevancia de estudiar las narrativas producidas por niños pequeños en interacción con niños mayores reside justamente en los resultados de investigaciones previas (Stein & Rosemberg, 2012) que señalan que en poblaciones urbano-marginadas las interacciones entre niños de distintas edades pueden dar lugar al aprendizaje y el desarrollo infantil.

This study aims to analyse the interactional construction of fictional accounts that 4-year-old and 12-year-old children from marginalized urban populations in Buenos Aires (Argentina) produced together. Recent research (Gardner & Forrester, 2010; Rosemberg & Menti, in press) suggests the need to link the study of child development and performance with the micro-analysis of interaction. As these studies point out, the concepts developed by Conversation analysis (Goodwin & Heritage, 1990; Sacks, Schegloff & Jefferson, 1974) and Interactional Sociolinguistics (Gumperz, 1982) allow to study in detail the processes through which children and their partners construct shared meaning in interaction. The narratives, elicited from a sequence of images, were video recorder and transcribed. The data corpus consist of 33 narratives produced by dyads of 4 and 12 year-old children. A qualitative analysis was performed that combined the Constant Comparative Method (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Strauss & Corbin, 1990) with tools from Interactional Sociolinguistic (Gumperz, 1982) and Conversation Analysis (Sacks, Schegloff & Jefferson, 1974). This analysis allowed the generation of a system of categories that identified the narrative roles assumed by the participants (Goodwin, 2007) and how these roles were negotiated in the interaction. Findings showed that children adopted narrative roles that were configured from a juxtaposition of information from different semiotic fields -verbal, gestural and proxemic-. 4-year-old children adopted roles of storyteller or audience, and 12-year-old children assumed roles of tutor, storyteller or audience. The tutor role was characterised by the initiations of the sequence employing elicitations. Also, tutors used different types of interventions -feedback, expansions and repairs- to scaffold the narrative elaborated by the young children. The body position, as well as the gaze of the tutor was directed to the story-teller and/or to the images, and also in some cases to the researcher. The storyteller role was characterised by giving verbal information about the narrative. The body position, as well as the gaze of the storyteller was directed principally to the audience and/or to the images. Finally, the audience role was characterised for showing interest in the narrative through different signals such as gaze direction to the storyteller, and a body position close to him and to the images. These results show the productivity of articulating the psycholinguistic perspective (Nelson, 1996, 2007) with tools of the Conversational Analysis (Goodwin & Heritage, 1990) to account for narrative performance. Results showed that while the 12-year-old children tended to adopt in most cases a tutor role, the 4-year-old assumed a storyteller role. The narrative roles adopted by the children show that children from different ages can negotiate narrative co-construction.However, in some cases both children adopted a storyteller role. In these situations the asymmetric relation between the 12-year-old and the younger childled the older child to impose his narrative not letting the 4-year-old to narrate. The microanalysis of the interactional sequences showed that the roles adopted could change during the interaction. This role change did not occur randomly, but responding to the sequence of actions in which each participant analysed the contextualization cues (Gumperz, 1982) provided by the other and acted according to them. The analysis of the exchanges showed the complexity of the interactional process with regard to the construction of the stories, in which it is not possible to comprehend the actions of one participant without referring to the actions of the other (Goodwin, 1984). The relevance of studying the narratives produced by young children interacting with older children lies in the results of previous studies (Stein & Rosemberg, 2012) which reported that in urban marginalized populations interactions be tween children of different ages can lead to learning and child development.