O Ponto e a vírgula nas produções escritas e na orientação da leitura de alunos do Fundamental Maior

Abstract

This research examines, with the support of oral and written activities, the main problems on comprehension and usage of comma and full stop punctuation marks with students from Grade 7 of a public school in the city of Abaetetuba - Pará. For this purpose, it was analysed the relevance of sociolinguistics factors in these activities. Having examined the students‟s text problems, it was created an educational intervention proposal at pedagogical level to support professionals with punctuation marks teaching, as well as to motivate students to reflect on it. Theoretical framework comprises: Kail (2013) and the language acquisition; Fayol (2014) and the writing acquisition process; Marcuschi (2008), whose approach lies on oral expression and its relation with literacy and social practices; and Antunes (2003), who refers to the importance of studying punctuation marks by reflecting about it and bounding it to spoken language. In order to accomplish this research work, which methodology is descriptive and qualitative, it was analysed fable, experience reports, and opinion essays, together with a cognitive test and an oral activity, both according to Educational Sociolinguistics principles. Through the analysis and the current literature on this issue, it was possible to notice that in the genre fable the students did not have difficulties in the usage of speech marks (colon and quotation marks). However, comma and full stop were not employed or misapplied. It happened throughout all worked genres, showing a peak in the experience reports, but having such a lower incidence in the opinion essays. It was possible to observe that boys presented more problems with not only the comma and the full stop use than the girls did, but also to understand how these changes might interfere in the texts. These difficulties are considered to be due to punctuation has been still taught in a prescriptive and out of context approach, that is to say, not connected to reading and writing activities. Therefore, this work provides insights on learning punctuation marks with the text as a teaching unit, likewise developing oral and written activities through different contexts, enabling students to realize how important punctuation is for the meaning construction, and how it remains textual coherence. Hence, it is such an essential tool for the production and comprehension of texts.