Resumen de Group work in EFL: constructing zones of learning
There seems to be agreement amongst EFL researchers that group work is one of the most important interactional contexts for promoting communication in the EFL classroom. However, the reasons underlying this accord cannot be taken for granted and still need closely scrutiny. The present study attempts to provide some arguments in favor of group work and the ways in which it may be implemented as a potentially rich zone for EFL learning. For this, the discussion has been framed by the concept of the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) and the way group work can generate interaction within it. Based on this, the study ineludes an analysis of group work from a communicative, a cognitive, and a social-affective perspective which introduces the concept of revoicing as a key interactional process that seems lo link these three perspectives and allow students' utterances to become mediating devices in their in-group learning process. Other concepts like intersubjectivity, frameworks of interaction, and power relations are also discussed.
