Zachy transcript

Analysis of ‘Zach and the healing robot’, with comparisons of ‘Zach drawing a banana’

Despite the healing robot transcript being more recent, it is evident that Zach’s speech is disjointed and is perhaps not as fluent as the earlier transcript, 13 months ago. There could be a few possible reasons to suggest why his speech is not as fluent, as it is highly unlikely that his language development has stalled. It could be interpreted that Zach is using ‘heuristic’ language, one of David Halliday’s functions of speech, where language is almost accompanying children’s play and to discover and learn language in their environment. For example, ‘I had to put the deep buttons on’ almost sounds as though he is thinking out loud, or is giving us a running commentary as to what he is doing, suggesting that his speech may be more disjointed due to the proposition of Zach perhaps not knowing what he is actually doing. An important contextual factor of the piece is that Zach is the team leader, as this is a role which would suggest responsibility and taking charge, an idea he may be foreign to. Due to this, Zach may find it more difficult to construct sentences together due to nerves and a lack of understanding. When comparing the two transcripts, the earlier transcript shows Halla frequently asking tag questions to elongate the conversation, whereas in the more recent transcript, Zach is seen to be more independent. Although Halla does ask 15 interrogatives in the recent transcript, she uses 28 interrogatives in the earlier transcript, showing that she is perhaps not guiding Zach as much, perhaps explaining why his language is not as fluent.

In the transcript, Zach is the participant who initiates the conversation, however it is evident that Halla is still conducting the topic of conversation. It is interesting to consider the prospect that although Zach is team leader, Halla is still the most powerful participant in the conversation, and she has given this role to Zach to almost open the opportunity of Vygotsky’s ‘zone of proximal development’, to allow Zach to learn about responsibilities and perhaps making conscious decisions himself. Whereas in the second transcript, he is agenda setting much more, as he is often asking questions of what’s around him and how to do things; ‘It doesn’t go frough’ and ‘what’s this lasagne’. It could be interpreted that Zach is agenda setting less in the recent transcript because he has an enhanced understanding of his local topics and how to complete certain activities, therefore he does not need to ask for guidance from his caregiver.

It is evident that over the 13 months, Zach’s vocabulary has changed significantly due to exposure to experiences, more education and other contextual factors. A key aspect of the first transcript is that Zach is almost delving between holophrastic and telegraphic language, as he uses compound clauses such as ‘it’s got something on the top so it’s a banana’ yet uses minor clauses such as ‘look blown away’. However by contrasting with the recent transcript, it shows that Zach is veering towards telegraphic language and is starting to use more complex clauses such as ‘..that we need to put..’, which is showing that his understanding of sentence types and specific grammatical ‘rules’ are improving. It could also be interpreted that his language relates to Halliday’s functions of speech, specifically the ‘instrumental’ and ‘regulatory’ functions, as he is often asking his caregiver to help him with activities (‘can you do it mummy?’) and also expressing his desires (‘we’re not gonna have breakfast’). It also appears that Zach’s language is still based around his local topics, as he is mainly discussing about objects in his environment, similarly to the earlier transcript.

To expand on my analysis, I have looked at the mean length utterance of the first ten utterances of both transcripts. This was achieved by counting the number of morphemes in these 10 utterances and dividing it by ten, giving me the mean length utterance. I noticed that in the first transcript, Zach totaled a score of 9.0 MLU, whereas in the second transcript Zach’s MLU was 11.4. This could be interpreted that Zach’s utterances are becoming more complex and standard, and that during the time period he has developed well. However, it could be proposed that although the test was fair in quantifying the data, the topic of conversation may dictate the MLU of Zach. For instance, if the topic of conversation was found boring by Zach, then he may be completely uninvolved in participation, meaning that his MLU was noticeably low. It can also be interpreted that the fact his MLU score was higher in the recent transcript is down to the proposition that Zach actually sets the agenda in the transcript, meaning it is a topic he is interested in.

A specific pattern is Zach’s non standard usage of non standard verbs, where he states that the robot ‘is gone right’ and ‘got lots of hurt’.  Due to Zach potentially having a better understanding of clauses, this means that he must still be struggling to piece together certain word classes in the correct order to make sense. It could also be interpreted that Zach’s usage of non standard could be because he is almost thinking out loud whilst he is playing, meaning he is not thinking of what he is saying and is almost commentating over his play. For example, in the almost humorous clause ‘we’ll just have to wait an wait an wait’, the syndetic listing of ‘wait an wait an wait’ is almost as though he is not conscious of what he is saying, but perhaps saying it as he perhaps has heard it from a children’s TV programme.

Vygotsky’s theory ‘zone of proximal development’ can be applied to this transcript, especially considering that in the transcript Zach is undertaking a task which requires learning and thought. Within the first part of the transcript, Halla is almost guiding Zach with what to do, but in a way that is allowing him to do it himself by asking him interrogatives such as ‘so you have to go in next’. Scaffolding is also apparent in the transcript, however when comparing the usage of scaffolding with the earlier transcript, it comes to our attention that Halla is scaffolding much more, perhaps because of his age and understanding of language. Power is a foremost aspect of the transcript and as an adult we assume that we have the power in conversation over younger children due to their assumed knowledge. Although Zach is the team leader, Halla is still the most powerful participant in this conversation due to her role as a caregiver. However, within the transcript Zach almost argues back with Halla, and it could be suggested he is attempting to deflect Halla’s influential power. Despite this, due to Halla being the adult and the caregiver, she ultimately has the power within the conversation.

The data could perhaps be considered flawed due to the events occurring in the earlier transcript, whereas in the second transcript they are actually partaking in a activity. Due to the first transcript being much more laid back and casual, this means that the choice of language perhaps may differ to what it would be if the two participants were actually accomplishing something.