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143
GESPIN 4
Abstract
Based on longitudinal video data of picture-book reading
routines, we investigated the employment of depictive
practices in young children. Our sequential analysis focused
on the interplay between a childs mastering of the sequential
organization of the activity and the acquisition of referential
practices. Taking into account both the caregivers and the
childs actions, we examined what bodily and verbal resources
young children employ for labeling objects and what role the
caregivers interactive demands and support play for the
childs achievement of referential communication. Our
findings not only demonstrate how depictive gestures are used
in early adult-child interaction; they also shed light on how
different methods of representation emerge developmentally.
Index Terms: representational gestures, depictive
practices, reference, language acquisition, social interaction,
sequential analysis
1. Introduction
From early on, children participate in interactionally organized
activities. Especially routines such as picture-book reading are
geared towards involving the child in referential
communication [1-3]. For the child, the challenge is to
discover that communication is meaningful in the sense of
getting things done with words [4]. First, establishing
reference is heavily supported by the adult participant: the
caregiver ascertains the childs visual attention, points to
pictures and labels them. Yet soon the child is asked to take on
tasks, e.g. to localize depicted objects by pointing and to
identify referents by labeling. While it is obvious that
caregivers refer to objects and events by introducing novel
words to their children, it is still an open research question
how children come to grips with establishing reference.
One strand of research investigating how children learn to
refer to objects is represented by an early study by Ninio and
Bruner [1]. Based on video recordings of one mother-childdyad (8 to 18 months), they examined the interplay between
the childs mastering of the sequential order of routines, i.e.
highly structured exchange(s) on non-concrete objects (p.
6), and the ability to make reference to objects. The authors
argue that the acquisition of reference does not only include
mastering a relationship between sign and significate, but
[] an understanding of social rules for achieving dialogue in
which that relationship can be realized (p. 15). They suggest
that it is not so much imitation, but rather the reciprocity of the
dialogue structure that is reinforcing the child. This early
study has convincingly shown that the acquisition of a lexicon
is situated in interactive contexts and based on the pragmatic
learning of their sequential order. Yet, albeit mentioning nonverbal resources, the study did not pursue a systematic
analysis of bodily resources and their role in young childrens
achievement of reference.
2. Methodology
The methodology draws on the analysis of embodiment-ininteraction and CA. Thus, verbal and nonverbal resources are
144
3. Data
The longitudinal analysis presented here is based on videorecordings of dyadic interactions taking place between four
typically developing children aged between 10 and 24 months
and their caregivers. The mothers educational background
was comparable; all of them had university degrees. All
mothers spent a min. of four hours per day with their child.
Each family was visited at home once every six weeks (12
points in time). Two different activities were video-taped, free
play (lasting 2025 min.) and picture-book reading (lasting 5
10 min.). For the latter activity, the dyads were provided a
book; each page showed photographs of two related objects (a
spoon on a mug) or a person and an object (e.g. a child on a
swing). Using the same book across the 12 sessions allowed us
to compare conversations about the same pictures
longitudinally. For space reasons, only excerpts from one dyad
are presented and analyzed here.
All interactive sequences in which child and/or caretaker
employed depictive practices were transcribed in ELAN,
following the notation conventions of Gesprchsanalytisches
Transkriptionssystem 2 (GAT2) [19]. The transcripts depict
participants verbal, non-verbal and para-verbal actions in
their sequential order. Each intonation unit is notated in a
separate line; an intonation unit is realized in one cohesively
perceived intonation contour (symbols for rising pitch
movements are ?, , and for falling pitch movements: ;,
.) and shows at least one focus accent (indicated by capital
letters and exclamation marks for outstandingly prominent
accent). Prosodic features are notated (e.g. :: for lengthened
sounds or syllables) and aspects of turn-taking such as overlap
([ ]) or latching (=) are shown, too. The alignment of
nonverbal and verbal behavior is transcribed in separate lines
and indicated by vertical bars. All transripts have been
checked by two research assistants. On average, the
transcribed corpus per dyad encompasses 18.5 minutes.
4. Results
The following section presents episodes in which children use
different practices for establishing reference (4.1) and
depicting events (4.2). Acting is used first (4.1.1); the same
manual schema is then later reused, however with a different
method of representation, namely as handling (4.1.2). The
second subsection shows how acting (4.2.2) is combined with
other semiotic resources and later replaced by modeling.
03
04
05
O
M
06
07
08
O
M
09
10
11
12
13
14
15
((turns page))
|((points to spoon in the book))|
|mh::;
|
LFfel und?
spoon and
((promptly points to mug))
TASse;
mug
fu:p;
chu::p !AH::!;
geNAU;
exactely
chu:p AH::;
|mit dem LFfel
| was kann man damit MAchen;
with the spoon
what does one do with it
|((points to spoon))|
((stirring movement))
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GESPIN 4
((turns page))
|((points to mug in the book))|
03
04
05
06
07
08
09
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
O
M
|pf::
h:::;
was ist DAS?=
what is that
[=ne TASse
] mit EInem?
a mug
with a
[points to mug]
|Ffel;
|
oon
|((stirring movement))|
LFfel;
spoon
[geNAU::;
]
exactely
[((repeats stirring movement))]
!(H)EI!;
(h)ot
ja ist HEI;=
yes its hot
=muss man PUSten?
do you have to blow
f::
f: f:
dann kann man die milch TRINken;
then you can drink the milk
146
M
O
03
04
05
06
07
!OH!
|((points to picture))|
|ATa;
|
!SCHAU!kel;
swing
oh NOno;
(a boy)
ein JUNge;=
a boy
geNAU:;
exactely
der junge SCHAUkelt, (---)
the boy swings
08
09
10
11
12
/HIN (.) /
back
/und he:r;/
and forth
|HIN|
back
|moves hand back and forth))|
/HIN
/
back
/und HER;/
and forth
|!ATS! !ATS!
|
|((moves open hand back and forth))|
hin hnd;
back
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GESPIN 4
02
03
04
05
06
07
08
09
guck mal;
look
was MACHT der junge da;
what is the boy doing there
|ups|
|((places Ole on her lap))|
der ist im GARten der junge.
he is the garden
the boy
at
((crawls away))
DA:te;
2
|1da !EI!
ha
|
in there
(forth)
|((1moves fist downwards, 2back/forth))|
10
11
12
13
14
15
O
M
HIN:back
HIN und HER;
back and forth
es !EK!;
(it/is gone)
|und er fllt
| NICHT runter von der schaukel;
and he does not fall from the swing
|((points to boy))|
hm:;
der kann das schon GUT;
hes already good at that
148
6. Conclusions
The study presented episodes from picture-book reading.
Although depictive practices in our data also occur in free
play, picture-book reading seems to provide an especially
fertile context for developing new methods of representation
[3]. Indeed, the activity of reading pictures could have
played an important role in these achievements. To see
pictures, Streeck [16, p. 286) reminds us, basically means to
see something in them. The same holds for depictive practices,
although to different degrees. In acting and handling we still
see the hand acting. When performing and observing abstract
motions and modeling, however, we disattend the fact that
they are actions of the hand and instead see something in
them. To better understand the role of picture-book reading for
developing new methods of representation, different activity
contexts should be compared systematically.
7. References
[1] Ninio, A. and Bruner, J., The achievement and
antecedents of labelling, J. Child Lang. 5(01):115,
1978.
[2] Marcos, H., How adults contribute to the development
of early referential communication, European Journal of
Psychology of Education 6(3): 271282, 1991.
[3] Rohlfing, K.J., Grimminger, A. and Nachtigller, K.,
Gesturing in joint book-reading, in B. KmmerlingMeibauer et al., K. Nachtigller and K.J. Rohlfing [Ed],
Learning from picturebooks. Perspectives from child
developmentand literacystudies. Routledge, 99116, 2015.
[4] Bruner, J., Childs talk. Learning to use language,
Norton, 1983.
[5] Capirci, O., Iverson, J.M., Pizzuto, E. and Volterra, V.,
Gestures and words during the transition to two-word
speech, J. Child Lang. 23(03):645673, 1996.