Markers of Discourse Structure in Child-Directed Speech

Although the language we encounter is typically embedded in rich discourse contexts, existing models of sentence processing focus largely on phenomena that occur sentence internally. Here we analyze a video corpus of child-caregiver interactions with the aim of characterizing how discourse structure is reflected in child-directed speech and in children’s and caregivers ’ behavior. We use topic continuity as a measure of discourse structure, examining how caregivers introduce and discuss objects across sentences. We develop a variant on a Hidden Markov Model to identify coherent discourses, taking into account speakers ’ intended referent and the time delays between utterances. Using the discourses found by this model, we analyze how the lexical, syntactic, and social properties of caregiver-child interaction change over the course of a sequence of topically-related utterances. Our findings suggest that cues used to signal topicality in adult discourse are also available in child-directed speech and that children’s responses reflect joint attention in communication

Discourse representation of dialogic principles in teacher-learner communication

Abstract. This article presents a consideration of the problem of discourse representation of pedagogic dialogue in teacher-learner interactions. The functional parameters inherent in the pedagogical process condition an understanding of pedagogic dialogue as a personality-centered type of communication based on the principles of value oriented treatment, alterocentrism, personal inclusion, metaposition of the teacher, personal authenticity and thereby distinguished from the liberal and democratic paradigm. As a special challenge for this study there has been elaborated a scheme of dialogic discourse specified in corresponding discourse patterns, markers and speech acts. The focus is made on those discourse elements featuring the principles of pedagogic dialogue. In the course of inclusive observation conducted on the basis of this scheme there were determined three basic communication styles featuring different levels of communicative disposition: dialogic, semi-dialogic and monologic. The statistics reveal comparatively low percentage of young teachers possessing dialogic dispositions and strategies in pedagogic communication which calls for certain alterations in the system of teacher training as well as personality development of future educators