Relative pronoun: sentence combining and writting
Relative pronoun. Sentence combining. Writting. Functional Linguistics.
We present here a proposal of work with the relative pronoun in a class of 9th year/level of elementary education, based on the functional perspective of language teaching. The objective is to improve the use of the relative pronoun in a situation of monitored writing of students in this stage of schooling. It is an interventive research of a qualitative nature, therefore, focusing on the interference of the researcher in the investigated reality. For this, a didactic sequence will be developed, composed by several activities, in which the relative pronouns, their uses and their role in the articulation of textual portions will be studied. We are anchored theoretically and methodologically in the Functional Linguistics (FURTADO DA CUNHA, OLIVEIRA, MARTELOTTA, 2015), particularly in the correlation of this approach with the Portuguese language teaching, based on Oliveira and Cezario (2007), Furtado da Cunha, Bispo and Silva (2014), Oliveira and Wilson (2015), on national curricular parameters (BRASIL, 1998). As a result, we find that students, a) in their writing productions and applied activities for the intuitive usage of the relative pronoun, used the pronoun what predominantly, a fact we related to the markedness principle and to the universalization of that pronoun; b) they used the relative pronouns preceded by preposition correctly, although in minimal frequency; c) understood non-canonical genitive relative clauses as possible variants in the language and susceptible of application in their texts, although considering the canonical form as the most correct; d) after revisions of the activities and the written texts, they showed some progress regarding the most monitored use of the relative pronoun, for its usage was more carefully applied in the final written production; e) they were enough able to improve the writing of the opinion article in the last version, regarding the structural and linguistic aspects, from the revision and rewriting carried out. We thus found that the applied didactic sequence gave the students a new vision about language uses and about the need of adjusting them to different communicative events. In that context, we refer to the understanding and the use of the relative pronouns as cohesive elements in the monitored writing productions, such as the opinion article.