Inner Speech Processes Experienced in a Group Piano Lesson

Abstract

This paper presents the analysis of an interactive episode in a Group Piano lesson for children, which was intended to identify and understand the processes of the inner speech intermediated by the peers. It is a study that, by analyzing the encounter with the peers, observes the mediations and identify multiple ways to signify the inner speech and, thus, the music learning: either by gesture, word, or by the playing itself. Still, the collective context of piano lesson allows several modes of meanings to the learning. The process of the social context towards inner speech contributes to the construction and the learning of latest, since there are different modes of meanings—by the teacher and the other students. For this purpose, it was considered the singularity of each participant, the way they learned and the modes of cultural functioning, which define acts of learning. A collective Group Piano lesson was carried out, which was video recorded, transcribed and registered on a field diary, which was how the search data of the present study was constructed. In addition to the registration and description of the search data, the study also involved a commitment to theoretical, methodological, and intersubjective research interpretation. Emphasis was given to different modes of language based on Vygotsky’s Cultural Historical Psychology approach.KeywordsInner speech processGroup Piano lessonsLearning in peersModes of meaningsMusic learning