"Vamos tentar um tandem?": histórias de ser pesquisadora, novas tecnologias e poder

Abstract

I can t say if this dissertation is the story I will tell or if this story is the dissertation I will present. Both story and dissertation are too imbricated to be distinguished. I aim at narrating and analyzing the attempt to propose an experience of learning in Tandem practice through MSN Messenger in a public school in the Triangulo Mineiro region, based on the principles of Narrative Inquiry, according to Connelly; Clandinin, 2000, 2004, 2005) and Ely (2007). I relate throughout this report mainly studies on, and experiences with, tandem practice, according to Migliorança (2007), Telles (2006), Telles; Vassallo (2005), and Brammerts and Calvert (2003); teaching and learning languages and new technologies, based on Moita Lopes (2005), Paiva (2006) and Warschauer (1996, 1997); and language and power, according to Fairclough (1989, 2009). The stories lived during the research were analyzed from the sense making principles, based on Ely, Vinz, Downing, e Anzul (2001). I could notice that the relations of power present in the research field, including assumptions I had about the use of new technologies, influenced on the research routing, resulting on the non-occurrence of the tandem practice according to the former plan and on the change of the analysis perspective after the qualification session. Despite of the (un)expected aspects what Narrative Inquiry always foresees -, technology had a meaningful role in the discovery of English learning resources by the student participants and to the beginning of a possible process of change in the teacher s practice. Furthermore, technology enabled the participants to contact students of a foreign school and moments of a cultural tandem, which seemed to have a possible impact on their learning in relation to motivation, autonomy and understanding of cultural aspects.