Sociocultural understandings of the silent period: young bilingual learners in early years settings

This briefing draws from longitudinal Doctoral research (Bligh, 2011) to re-examine the emergent stage of English language acquisition, the silent period, through the experiences of two early years bilingual learners. Historical understandings of Vygotsky (1986) provide the platform through which sociocultural learning theory is applied in relation to the silent period. Legitimate peripheral participation (Lave and Wenger, 1991), is examined as a workable concept through which to explore the initial learning trajectory of an emergent bilingual learner whilst negotiating participation within, through and beyond an early years community of practice. The initial research employed multi-method ethnographic approach to data gathering, including participant observations, unstructured interviews with monolingual participants, participant narratives and significant auto-ethnographic accounts. In this briefing the researcher focuses upon ‘gaze following’ (Flewitt, 2005) as an adjunct to participant observations. The findings are revealed through a two stage analytic process. Data is initially funnelled through thematic analysis, (Braun and Clarke, 2006) and tested out against sociocultural theorising. The deductive process highlights nine vignettes which present the silent period as a crucial time for learning. One professional narrative account and one significant vignette are examined in this briefing. Examining the silent period through a sociocultural lens reveals the initial stage of language acquisition as a significant, but lesser acknowledged contribution to learning in the early years community of practice. Key words: bilingual; silent period; legitimate peripheral participation; sociocultural; ethnographic; participation.

http://www.tactyc.org.uk/workshop/Dr.%20Caroline%2...