Investigating eight- to nine-year-olds' self-regulatory self-talk in the context of their classroom tasks

Abstract

Self-talk has been recognised as an important tool used by children to regulate their thinking and behaviour. Existing studies typically characterise children's self-talk according to broad categories that do not allow for investigation of selfregulatory aspects of children's internalised self-talk. The findings reported in this paper are based on a pilot study aimed at eliciting information on self-talk that eight- to nine-year-olds employ in the context of their classroom tasks and at a stage when the children's self-talk is largely internalised. The findings offer useful insights into the types of self-regulatory self-talk employed by children in the classroom and suggest that these aspects should be considered in the characterisation and study of children's self-talk.