Multisystemic Approach of the English Language: Digital Guided Discovery

Abstract

The Multisystemic Approach of Language, idealized by Castilho (1998, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2020) is associated with studies that conceive language as a complex system and understands linguistic categories, in their processes and products arranged in four systems (Grammar, Semantics, Lexicon and Discourse), as part of the linguistic knowledge of speakers. Such systems are autonomous in relation to each other, not admitting that one derives from another, nor that there is a hierarchical relationship among them, which is the principle of intersystemic indetermination. In this way, any linguistic expression can display, at the same time, lexical, discursive, semantic and grammatical features. In a classroom, these linguistic products and processes and the continuum between them emerge from different didactic strategies; Guided Discovery is one of them in which teachers allow students to take responsibility for their own learning and to discover new ideas/ information (PEARSON, 2018). Through this discovery, lexical, discursive, semantic and grammatical systems are activated in different exercises. The prototypical activity considering this strategy is filling the gaps: a task in which the students have to complete pre-determined blanks in short sentences in order to increase their vocabulary in a lexical, semantic and/or discursive way, or to practice a grammatical topic. Educational digital games in potential, such as Kahoot and Bamboozle! (a platform created by Ronan Casey in 2015) enable guided discovery considering the activation of different systems in various ways, such as think-pair-share, taking into account a teamwork in a context we split the students into collaborative small groups to use the platforms in favor of a productive and creative learning/teaching process.