Étude de l’activité de définition de noms chez des enfants de 9-11 ans issus de classes sociales contrastées

Abstract

This study analyzes the oral responses of 63 french students aged 9-11 years old on a vocabulary task such as word definition. The overall performance, but also the organization and accessibility of categorical, functional or perceptual information are examined by considering the children's social background. The quantitative results of the study confirm those obtained from research on the relationship between socio-economic background and vocabulary breadth. The qualitative data from the analysis of the structure of 567 definitions, highlight moderate differences in the evolution towards the canonical form of the definition, according to social class. This questions our ways of thinking about the teaching-learning of vocabulary and invites us to further explore the mechanisms at play in the unequal access to knowledge of the meaning of words.

Keywords

• TESE descriptors (2009) : social classes - language skills
• others: definitional activity - deep vocabulary - developmental sociolinguistics