Planning and Strategies for Mediating Chats

Abstract

Intending to contribute with the adequate use of chat tools in online educational contexts, this paper investigates chat sessions that had as objective the realization of an interview, and which were considered satisfactory by their mediators. The objective is to understand how the planning, known as important for the success of chats in many investigations (Collins et all, 2003; Gervai, 2004), and the mediation strategies also known as fundamental in teaching-learning contexts (Vygotsky, 1934; Wells, 1999) may have contributed for the satisfactory development of the chat sessions. The investigations were sustained by systemicfunctional grammar concepts (Halliday, 2004). The results indicate the importance of planning in chat sessions, and some strategies that can contribute for their success.