Having the concept of collaborative dialogue (SWAIN, 2000) as its base, this paper presents the results of an investigation which had two dyads of Portuguese as a second language learners and two dyads of English as a foreign language learners as its informants. The learners interacted in cooperative tasks. The collaborative dialogue derived from learner interaction was audio-recorded and transcribed to detect and analyze the negotiation for meaning and form between the interactants. The learners were also interviewed after the tasks to express their opinions and perceptions about task development and the potential relationship between the cooperative task and language learning. The analysis of such data reveals that learners reflected upon the target language, tested hypotheses and reformulated their output in order to promote mutual comprehension. Besides, the results reveal that the interaction established during the production of the collaborative dialogue can yield second and foreign language learning as the students notice linguistic gaps in their language and seek solutions together.
collaborative dialogue; tasks; language learning; SL