Introduction
One of the most important concepts in
Vygotsky’s (1978) sociocultural theory of
mind is the zone of proximal development
(ZPD). As to the importance of ZPD,
Karpov's argument (cited in Haywood &
Lidz, 2007) is revealing: “nowhere in the
field of human endeavors is Vygotsky’s
concept of zone of proximal development
more relevant than in education” (p. 74).
That is possibly why for Vygotsky (1978),
ZPD-sensitive instruction is the only
effective kind of instruction (Lantolf, 2005).
According to Vygotsky (1978), ZPD “is the
distance between the actual development
level as determined by independent problem
solving and the level of potential
development as determined through problem
solving under adult guidance or in
collaboration with more capable peers” (p.
86). Modifying Vygotsky's (1978)
definition, Ohta (2001) defines ZPD as the
distance between an individual’s actual level
of development realized by the individual's
independent linguistic production and
his/her potential level of development
realized through collaborated linguistic
production, i.e. language produced with the
assistance of a peer or teacher.
A distinction is made between learners’
zones of actual development (ZAD) and
their zones of proximal development (ZPD).
According to Vygotsky (1978), at ZAD, a
learner is expected to perform independently
of the others and with no help provided;
however, at ZPD the learner is expected to
perform beyond his/her actual zone of
development if the learner is provided with
scaffolding and if the scaffolding is timely
and ZPD-sensitive. It follows that
scaffolding should be neither too early nor
too late. This timely scaffolding has been
the essence of almost all ZPD-sensitive
studies over the past decades or so despite
the fact that some discrepancies may have
been observed in the terminology of the
studies conducted. In fact, the metaphor of
“scaffolding” proposed by Wood, Bruner,
and Ross (1976) seems to imply the same
idea as ZPD-sensitive assistance. The point
is that both refer to what Vygotsky (1978)
meant by cognitive development in terms of
which language used between parents
(teachers) and children (learners) facilitates
children’s (learners’) cognitive development
because it mediates the interaction between
the expert and the novice (Vygotsky, 1986;
Wertch, 1979). Such mediations indicate
that linearity of learning, including language
learning, is nothing but a fallacy because
learning is, according to Vygotsky (1978),
by no means a static, unidirectional flow of
knowledge from the more knowledgeable to
the less knowledgeable. Rather, learning is a
dynamic, dialogical flow in which not only
learners but also teachers are involved in a
game of give and take of knowledge. This
study purported to explore the interface
between the amount of
scaffolding/assistance provided to EFL
learners, their proficiency level, and
individual/group ZPD.
Literature review
The timely assistance provided to learners is
called “scaffolding” though other terms such
as "collaborative dialogue" (Swain, 2000),
and "instructional conversation" (Donato,
2000) have been proposed to refer to the
same concept. It is believed that scaffolding
is, to a great extent, responsible for language
acquisition since “acquisition occurs in
rather than as a result of interaction”
(Artigal, cited in Ellis, 2008, p. 234). Two
features of scaffolding may be worth noting
here: The first is that scaffolding not only
helps novice learners do the task
collaboratively but also provides
information that, when internalized, enables
them to perform the task independently
(Greenfield, 1984). Although Vygotsky’s
research was concerned mainly with the
cognitive development of children, another
feature is that scaffolding is applicable to all
learning including child/adult and
formal/informal learning on the one hand
and symmetrical (novice-novice) and
asymmetrical (expert-novice) groupings on
the other (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988; van
Lier, 1996).
Scaffolding, according to Ellis (2008), is “an
inter-psychological process through which
learners internalize knowledge dialogically”
(p.235). Wood, Bruner, and Ross (1976)
argue that scaffolding is the way an expert
helps a novice progress through a process.
Wood et al. (1976) enumerate six functions
of an expert scaffolding: (1) orienting the
novice's attention to the process; (2)
simplifying the situation in a way that the
novice can handle the process; (3) helping
the novice to achieve a specific goal thereby
motivating her/him; (4) highlighting the
most important features of the process; (5)
monitoring the frustration of the novice in
case of failure; and (6) providing the novice
with models of required behavior.
The six functions of scaffolding can be
placed on a continuum of the most implicit
to the most explicit assistance to be
provided to learners. Through scaffolding,
the scaffolder may have learners’ attention
drawn to the process (implicit help) or show
the required behavior (explicit help). These
functions of scaffolding have been studied
by SLA researchers in various forms of
ZPD-sensitive instruction. Although these
studies are few, especially when it comes to
L2 teaching and learning, the following are
among the ZPD-sensitive studies carried out
so far: Aljaafreh and Lantolf (1994), Nassaji
and Swain (2000), Kozulin and Garb (2002),
Poehner (2005), Ableeva (2010), Alavi,
Kaivanpanah, and Shabani (2012), Mosleh
(2011), and Tajeddin and his colleagues
(Tajeddin, Alemi, & Pakzadian, 2011;
Tajeddin & Tayebipour, 2012).
Aljaafreh and Lantolf (1994) conducted the
first study to investigate a mediator’s
collaboration with learners on the basis of a
regulatory scale which changed from most
implicit to most explicit. Drawing on this
study, Nassaji and Swain (2000) aimed to
find out if ZPD-sensitive mediation could
enhance performance or if any kind of
mediation could sufficiently aid learners in
moving beyond what they could do without
any help. The results demonstrated that
giving ZPD-sensitive mediation made
learners less accurate when they produced
the initial composition independently.
However, they outperformed the non-ZPD
learner on the final task owing to the
mediation they received.
Kozulin and Garb (2002) conducted a
similar study. The results of their study were
clearly in favor of ZPD-sensitive instruction
because it proved to be significantly
effective in promoting learners’ reading
comprehension skill. In Poehner's (2005)
study, the aim was to explore learners’ oral
abilities. The participants were assigned an
oral construction task on the basis of a
number of narratives in French. According
to Poehner (2005), the findings indicated
that ZPD-sensitive instruction can be highly
effective because it was helpful in
understanding learners' abilities and
language problems and promoting their oral
skill. In another study, Ableeva (2010)
examined the impact of ZPD-sensitive
instruction on listening comprehension. She
compared the results of a traditional
listening test with her ZPD-sensitive
instruction. The results indicated that ZPD-sensitive instruction illuminated the sources
of poor performance and that, through
interactions in the ZPD, not only learners'
actual level but their potential level of
development in listening ability was
diagnosed. In the same vein, Alavi,
Kaivanpanah, and Shabani (2012) tested the
applicability of a ZPD-sensitive approach
with a group of EFL learners in the context
of listening comprehension. The analysis
showed how scaffolding could pave the way
for establishing distributed help among
learners within the social space of the
classroom.
In a study which focused on pragmatic
ability, Mosleh (2011) compared ZPD-based
instruction with output and input-based
instruction of speech acts. Results of data
analysis showed that the ZPD-sensitive
group outperformed the output and input
groups, while the output group
outperformed the input group in the posttest
DCTs. In another pragmatics-related study,
Tajeddin and Tayebipour (2012) compared a
ZPD-sensitive approach with a ZPD-insensitive approach. The findings showed
that the groups in the ZPD-based approach
significantly outperformed those in the
ZPD-insensitive approach. The results did
not show any interaction between
proficiency and instruction, indicating that
instruction, rather than proficiency, had a
significant effect on the performance of the
learners. The findings supported the ZPD-sensitive approach and its applicability to L2
pragmatics instruction.
Against this backdrop, this study was
carried out to answer the following
questions:
1. Is EFL learners' language proficiency
related to the amount of scaffolding they
require for the production of the speech acts
of request and apology?
2. Are EFL learners' individual ZPDs related
to the ZDP of the group as a whole in the
production of the speech acts of request and
apology?
Method
Participants
In this study, a total of 20 participants were
selected from among 80 male and female
undergraduate university students whose
major was Teaching English as a Foreign
Language (TEFL). They were assigned
randomly to two groups of ZPD-sensitive
instruction. One group included low-proficiency EFL learners who were selected
from first-semester students. The other
group who consisted of high-proficiency
EFL learners was selected from eighth-semester students. The mean age of the
participants was 22. The participants spoke
the same language, and none had studied the
English language abroad. Attempts were
made to select as homogeneous participants
as possible in each group because, according
to Haywood and Lidz (2007), homogeneous
grouping decrease variability that can be
expected if some learners finish with a given
part of the task before others do.
Instruments
Two instruments were employed in this
study: (1) a general proficiency test, and (2)
a written discourse completion task. As for
the former, Oxford Quick Placement Test
(2003) was administered. The test consists
of three parts: Part One (1-40) includes
simple grammar and vocabulary items. Part
Two (40-60) includes more difficult
multiple-choice items and a cloze test. Part
Three comprises a writing section where
candidates are required to write a paragraph
of 150-200 words. From the three parts,
only the first was administered due to the
nature of the test, which requires second and
third parts to be administered only if the
testees can correctly answer more than 35
items out of 40. The second instrument was
a discourse completion task (DCT) on
request and apology speech acts (Appendix
A). It was compiled by drawing on Bergman
and Kasper (1993), Blum-Kulka and
Olshtain (1984), and Cohen and Olshtain
(1981). The test consisted of 12 items,
including 6 items on request and 6 items on
apology. The items required the participants
to read short descriptions of the situations
and write what they would say in the
English language for each situation
considering the interlocutors’ power and
distance.
Treatment materials
Treatment materials consisted of 12
discourse completion task (DCT) items,
including 6 items on request and 6 items on
apology speech acts. To provide a ZPD-sensitive instruction, Lantolf and Poehner’s
(2011) scale was adopted (Appendix B). In
this scale, 8 forms of mediation are provided
to the learners depending on their
responsiveness. If a learner’s response is
correct, the mediator gives no further
mediation. However, if it is not correct
and/or appropriate, the mediator moves one
step further until the last step where the
learner is provided with explicit explanation.
To run the treatment sessions, both groups
held meetings of 30 minutes, 2 days a week
and for a total of 6 weeks, i.e. 3 weeks for
teaching request strategies and 3 weeks for
teaching the strategies of apology in every-other-week order.
Data collection and analysis
The data for the study were collected using
two tests: First, a general proficiency test,
that is, Oxford Quick Placement Test that
was given to the participants to ensure that
the two groups were different concerning
their levels of language proficiency. Second,
a discourse completion test (DCT) that was
given to them to find out the extent to which
level of language proficiency of the
participants had any relationship with the
amount of scaffolding they needed to
produce the speech acts of request and
apology.
The rationale for giving the general
proficiency test to both low and high
proficiency learners was to make sure that
there was a significant difference between
the two groups before beginning the
treatment sessions. The rational for giving
the pragmatic test was to measure the
relationship between language proficiency
and pragmatic competence as the discourse
completion test required the participants to
read descriptions of some situations and
write what they would actually say for each
situation considering the interlocutors’
power and distance. The data collected
through the general proficiency test were
analyzed using an independent samples-t-test, and the data collected through the
discourse completion test were analyzed
using Spearman rank-order correlation.
Results
In this part, the descriptive statistics of low-
and high-proficiency participants'
performance on Oxford Placement Test
(OPT) is reported. Then, the difference
between the two is given using an
independent samples t-test. As Table 1
indicates, the mean scores of high-proficiency learners and low-proficiency
learners were 25.70 and 17.70, respectively.
To investigate if there was any significant
difference between the mean scores of high
and low proficiency levels on the
proficiency test, an independent samples t-test was run. The t-observed value was
2.567. This amount of t-value is greater than
the critical value of 2.101 at 18 degrees of
freedom. Based on these results, it can be
concluded that there was a significant
difference between high and low proficiency
levels’ mean scores on the proficiency test.
Thus, the two groups do belonged to two
different proficiency levels.
With respect to the research questions, the
first research question was raised to explore
if EFL learners' language proficiency was
related to the amount of scaffolding they
required for the production of speech acts of
request and apology. To answer the
question, Spearman rank-order correlation
was employed. To this end, first, every
individual learner's general proficiency
score was rank-ordered (which was based on
their linguistic proficiency), and then the
amount of scaffolding they needed to
produce the appropriate speech acts was
determined. In effect, two aspects of the
question were addressed, as described
below.
The first aspect dealt with the relationship
between low-proficiency learners' general
proficiency score rank and their scaffolding-getting rank while producing the speech acts
of request and apology. Regarding the
speech act of request, the result of Spearman
rank-order correlation indicated that there
was no significant relationship between
proficiency score rank and scaffolding-getting rank of the low proficiency learners
while producing request speech act (r=.59,
p=.072). Moreover, the result showed that
there was not any significant relationship
between proficiency score rank and
scaffolding-getting rank in low-proficiency
learners to produce apology speech act
(r=.14, p=.68).
The second aspect focused on the
relationship between the high-proficiency
learners' general proficiency score rank and
their scaffolding-getting rank when
producing the speech acts of request and
apology. The result of Spearman rank-order
correlation showed no significant
relationship between high-proficiency
learners’ score rank and scaffolding-getting
rank to produce the request speech act (r=-.067, p=.85). As to apology, the result
indicated no significant relationship between
high-proficiency learners’ score rank and
scaffolding-getting rank when producing the
apology speech act (r=.043, p = .91).
The second research question was aimed at
exploring the relationship between each
learner's individual ZPD and the ZPD of the
group as a whole in the production of the
speech acts of request and apology. The first
part of the question addressed the low
proficiency group. Table 3 depicts the
relationship between individual ZPD and
group ZPD in the low-proficiency learners
by showing the amount of scaffolding given
to each particular learner on the one hand
and the group on the other. As Table 2
indicates, to produce the speech acts of
apology and request, the low-proficiency
learners received a certain amount of
scaffolding from session 1 to session 6, i.e.
3 sessions to produce the speech act of
apology and 3 sessions to produce the
speech act of request.
As Table 2 shows, the amount of scaffolding
required by the learners turned out to be of
three types: decreasing, increasing, or
unchanging. More specifically, the amount
of scaffolding given to six learners, i.e. 1, 4,
6, 7, 9, and 10 (60%), to produce the speech
act of apology decreased. This means that
these learners were in need of less
scaffolding as they moved on from session 1
to session 3. This indicates that their ZPDs
grew from session 1 to 3. On the other hand,
three learners, i.e. learner 2, 3, and 8 (30%),
did experience a need for an increasing
amount of scaffolding, indicating that they
were in need of more assistance as they
moved on from session 1 to session 3. The
interesting case was, however, learner #5
(10%), who required an unchanging amount
of scaffolding from session 1 to session 3.
Similar results were obtained for the speech
act of request. In other words, seven
learners, i.e. learners 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10
(70%), showed that they needed less amount
of scaffolding, which is indicative of the
growth of their ZPDs. However, three
learners, i.e. 1, 2, and 3 (30%), experienced
a need for an increasing amount of
scaffolding which means that their ZPDs
were not growing.
With respect to the individuals as a group,
as Table 3 shows, the amount of scaffolding
given to the group decreased since the data
show a decreasing state from 52 mediations
to 32 in the case of apology and from 68
mediations to 48 in the case of request from
session 1 to session 3. Table 3 also shows
the amount of scaffolding given to the
whole group as well.
As Table 3 shows, to produce the speech act
of apology, five learners, i.e. learners 1, 2, 4,
8, and 9 (50%), needed a decreasing amount
of scaffolding as they went from session 1 to
session 3, whereas for one learner, i.e. 6
(10%), there was a different process. Indeed,
learner # 6 was in need of more scaffolding
as she moved on. The amount of scaffolding
needed by the other learners remained
unchanged. Considering the speech act of
request, five individuals, i.e. learners 1, 4, 8,
9, and 10 (50%), experienced a decreasing
state which means that they were in need of
less scaffolding because their ZPDs grew
over time. However, five learners, i.e. 2, 3,
5, 6, and 7 (50%), experienced an opposite
trend because they required more
scaffolding as they moved on.
As to the individual ZPD and group ZPD of
high-proficiency learners, two cases were
observed. If considered as individuals, the
number of mediations they needed either
decreased, increased, or remained
unchanged. However, when considered as a
group, the amount of scaffolding they were
provided with was constantly decreasing.
Based on the results obtained, it can be
concluded that there is a relationship
between individual ZPD and group ZPD
because both individuals (70% in the case of
low-proficiency learners and 50% in the
case of high-proficiency learners) and
groups (100% in the case of low-proficiency
learners and 100% in the case of high-proficiency learners) changed in a similar
fashion and learners in both levels required
less scaffolding as they moved on. In other
words, both individual ZPD and group ZPD
seemed to have been growing, albeit
asymmetrically. These results are indicative
of some degree of relationship between
individual ZPDs and group ZPD.
Discussion
The findings of this study showed that there
was no relationship between EFL learners'
language proficiency and pragmatic
competence. The study substantiates the
idea that linguistic proficiency per se should
not be regarded as a prerequisite for
pragmatic competence development as
pragmatic performance cannot be predicted
on the basis of learners’ general linguistic
proficiency. Furthermore, the findings
showed that relying solely on learners’
summative scores can be misleading,
meaning that if one's ZPD is not taken into
account, instruction may not make any sense
because it is only within one’s ZPD that
assistance may be internalized. As Lantolf
(2005) notes, for Vygotsky learning was
nothing but assisted performance and
development was the ability to regulate
mental and social activity as a consequence
of having appropriated, or internalized, that
assistance. Hence, if learning is assisted
performance, not only one’s product of
learning (one's final score) but also the
process(s) of learning (one's ZPD) should
matter since without the process of learning
an incomprehensive picture of one’s
learning is drawn. Another point is that
since learning is dynamic in nature, that is,
the route and rate of learning may change
from moment to moment, learners' ZPDs
should be constantly re-measured.
Therefore, the interrelationship between
individual and group ZPDs should be
considered in all phases of learning.
The findings of the present study also
showed that whereas the ZPDs of some
learners required more scaffolding to grow
and that the scaffolding given to them was
far beyond their competence, for some other
learners, the amount of scaffolding did not
change from session 1 to session 3. This
may mean that the amount of scaffolding
given either did not match the learner’s
proficiency level or was below it so that
scaffolding was not informative,
challenging, or motivating for the learner’s
ZPD to grow. In any account, the
performance of some learners highlights the
evolutionary trajectory of second/foreign
language learning, including pragmatic
development and underscores the fact that
language learning is not necessarily a linear
process to be predictable on the basis of
learners’ proficiency levels. That is possibly
why they manifested so many irregularities
and fluctuations. It follows that the findings
of this study confirm irregularities observed
in previous studies, such as the one
conducted by Aljafreh and Lantolf (1994).
According to Lantolf (2005) learner
development was not a smooth, linear
process; instead it followed the type of
irregular trajectory captured by Vygotsky's
description of development as a
revolutionary process. This showed up in
either of two ways: from one tutorial session
to the next a given learner required more
instead of less explicit assistance to locate
and correct an error; or a learner who
produced the correct form for a particular
feature (e.g., irregular past tense form,
"took") for two or three compositions in a
row, produced the form with regular past
tense morphology (p. 338).
The same irregularities were observed in
this study. While in the majority of cases
learners required less scaffolding as they
moved on from session 1 to session 3, in
some other cases they required more
scaffolding, indicating that their ZPDs were
not growing. Still, in some other cases no
change was observed, meaning that the
learners’ ZPDs were neither growing nor
falling back but being at a state of
stagnation.
The findings of this study are revealing in
that, first and foremost, the study
underscores the findings of Aljhafreh and
Lantolf (1994), and by implication, suggests
that ZPD-sensitive instruction should be an
essential ingredient of any instruction aimed
at developing learners’ pragmatic
competence. This is because ZPD-sensitive
instruction takes aspects of the learners'
social interactions into account based on the
view that “acquisition occurs in rather than
as a result of interaction” (Artigal, cited in
Ellis, 2008, p.234). According to Donato
(2000), since awareness of form and
function is made possible through social
interaction, "the theory [Vygotsky's
sociocultural theory] adds greater clarity to
the issue of modified interaction and the
negotiation of meaning in classroom setting"
(p. 46).
Nonetheless, a point that should be noted is
that individual ZPDs are unique and every
individual learner may be in need of a
specific amount of scaffolding due to his/her
learning background. In this respect, Donato
(2000) points out that "learners bring to
interactions their own personal histories
replete with values, assumptions, beliefs,
rights, duties and obligations" (p.46). These
personal histories may be responsible for the
irregularities observed in the present study.
Another point is that individual and group
ZPDs are related to each other, although
their exact nature is far from clear.
While this study focused on individual vs.
group ZPD, its findings is generally in line
with the other studies on scaffolding in
language learning. For instance, Pishghadam
and Ghadiri (2011) investigated the effects
of symmetrical and asymmetrical
scaffolding on reading comprehension. The
results showed the positive impact of both
types of scaffolding on reading
comprehension. In another study,
Abadikhah and Valipour (2014) paired each
elementary learner with an advanced learner
to form an expert-novice pair to work on the
transcripts of their oral presentations. They
found that the advanced learners used many
scaffolding techniques to help the novice
notice the linguistic gaps. Finally, the study
conducted by Ahangari, Hejazi, and
Razmjou (2014) is closely related to the
present study. They had the experimental
group undergo scaffolding. The findings
showed that the need for scaffolding faded
along the course due to the learners’
progress.
Conclusion
This study pursued two purposes. The first
was to explore the relationship between EFL
learners’ general proficiency and the amount
of scaffolding they required to produce the
speech acts of apology and request. In this
regard, since no significant correlation was
found between the two variables, it can be
concluded that EFL learners’ general
language proficiency should not be a sound
basis to predict their speech act production.
Therefore, it would be misleading to predict
one's pragmatic success solely on the basis
of general proficiency on the grounds that a
learner with a higher score in a general
proficiency test may not necessarily make
more progress in the acquisition of
pragmatic competence. As seen from the
findings, two learners with the same
language proficiency scores performed
differently while learning L2 pragmatics and
turned out to represent two different
proximal zones of development. The
conclusion one may draw is that a weak
relationship exists between learners’
language proficiency and the amount of
scaffolding they require while learning L2
pragmatics. It is the sociocultural context of
learning which determines a specific
learner’s process of pragmatic learning
irrespective of how high or low the learner’s
general language proficiency may be. In this
regard, Donato (2000) maintains that
"learning unfolds in different ways under
different circumstances. The circumstances
include the specific concrete individuals
each with their different histories, and signs
they use, and the assistance they provide and
are provided" (p.47).
The second purpose of this study was to
examine the relationship between learners’
individual ZPDs and the ZPD of the group.
The results partially confirmed the
relationship. Hence, there seems to be a
relationship between the two variables,
although their precise nature is still a matter
of question. In this study, the majority of the
individuals’ ZPDs as well as the ZPD of the
group grew from session 1 to session 3.
However, there were some irregularities
between the two types of ZPDs, i.e.
individual ZPD vs. group ZPD, making it
more difficult to make a claim with
conviction. In effect, as groups, the learners
did require less scaffolding as they got
closer to the end of their treatment sessions
whereas, as individuals, they manifested
irregularities. The majority of them (60%)
required less scaffolding as they went on
with the instruction, some of them (30%)
required more scaffolding, and some (10%)
remained unchanged. This indicates
individual variation in the route to pragmatic
development. Besides, the patterns of
individual ZDPs for the two speech acts
manifested dissimilarities. This adds to the
complexity of ZPD growth as it depends not
only on individual variation but also the
type of speech act. The overall conclusion is
that there is a relationship between the two
ZPDs, although the extent to which the two
ZPDs go together is uncertain. More
research is needed to draw stronger
conclusions about this relationship.
