O papel da narrativa no ensino de inglês na escola pública

Abstract

The present work presents results of a study in which we intend to qualify the English teaching practice in primary school at a public school in Porto Alegre. The 5th and 6th grade students’ low interest for this chair motivated alternatives to traditional English teaching practices. We introduced oral narratives of stories for young children in these classes, to the effect of conjugating use and learning of this language. We investigated the role of narratives as a central element for the learning and development of communication in this “additional language”. In order to make this work possible, it was made an analysis (action-research) about the practice of telling stories in English, at the public school where I teach. The data were written down in a field-diary and the adopted material for the storytelling was made by me, helping the conceptual comprehension of the story. Thus, we showed that it is needed to resort strategies that give the students opportunities to organize their thoughts into a formal cognitive dimension, leading them to constitute their socio-cultural identities. As we promote interaction, the classroom structure of participation changes, becoming close to the common conversation and learning happens naturally in the Proximal Development Zone (PDZ), that, according to Vygotsky, is an interactional place where the learner performs tasks which are beyond his/her present abilities, through the assistance of more experienced partners.