Abstract:
Oral development in an additional language is surrounded by diversified hindrances (pronunciation, interactional, social, linguistic aspects, etc.), which might become considerable challenges for language teachers and learners (LIMA, SOUZA, LUQUETTI, 2014;). If one is able to speak a different language, this one shows the understanding and knowledge of the basic units of oral communication in an additional language, such as pronunciation patterns, word and sentence stress, sentence structures among others. Bringing the State school context to attention, it is noticed a gap surrounded by difficulties, fulfilled with impossibilities and hindrances portrayed in a negative semiology of unfavorable consequences with reference to the oral development in an additional language. More specifically, with regard to the English language teaching field, the still commonplace belief such as “it is not possible neither achievable to work on oral development of students in the Brazilian State school context” is occasionally widespread. The academic literature concerning the Brazilian State school context has long been showing that even reading development has been seemingly meaningless (SILVA, 2011). In order to work with such difficulties, the international English language teaching field academic literature, as well as the official Brazilian documents have suggested that the use of additional technologies in languages teaching is a research field that needs to be more thoroughly explored in the context of additional languages teaching. In light of the previously mentioned challenges, a joint and collaborative project was carried out in this PhD thesis, which concerned the oral development in English (named My city – My world by our students). This project collaboratively entailed the use of additional technology and digital resources together with the joint actions of the teacher in class and was carried out in a State school in a country town in Rio Grande do Sul. Undertaking the collaborative action research theoretical background principles (BURNS, 2015), it was intended in this research to act upon the English language oral development of students, since the activities were jointly crafted with the teacher in classroom with reference to the sociocultural and collaborative learning epistemological axioms (VYGOTSKY, 2003). This PhD thesis was based on a research that aimed at bringing possible positive changes to the current educational context (BARBIER, 1996) as for the oral development of the current students in the school context. Building up bridges and not walls between the university and State school teaching current situation is the pillar on which the project in this thesis was developed, in line with one of the basilar objectives on which the Applied Linguistics field is situated (CELANI, 2006; ROJO, 2006; MOITA LOPES, 2009). This means bringing up possible social practices and a more sensible comprehension concerning problems towards language practices, whether they take place in social, political, economic or educational contexts. The research questions address specifically the potentialities of using additional technologies in oral English development, the viewpoints of students and the teacher about their oral development and the role of collaboration in English oral development. Research results have shown that there is effective collaboration among the teacher, the researcher and the students. Oral development was possible thanks to the harmonious collaboration among the research participants and their engagement to develop the language collectively. Students’ and the teacher’s viewpoints stand out for a positive perspective towards the use of digital technologies in oral development and school teaching practices.