7. Operational structure of speech activity

Like any other type of human activity, speech activity has its own, rather complicated operational structure.

According to A.A. Leontiev, “a single act of activity is the unity of all its three sides (or phases). It begins with the motive and the plan and ends with the result, the achievement of the goal set at the beginning; in the middle lies the dynamic system of concrete actions and operations aimed at this achievement ”(120, p. 43). Actions and operations are the main structural components of the activity. In addition, successful, and most importantly - the effective implementation of activities (and its constituent actions and operations) is largely determined by its qualitative characteristics, such as skills and abilities . Let us dwell in greater detail on such constituent elements of speech activity as action, operation, skill, and skill.

Human activity exists as an action or a chain of actions. “If you mentally subtract actions from an activity,” A.N. Leontyev, there is nothing left of the activity. The same can be expressed in another way: when a specific process is developed in front of us - external or internal, then it acts as a human activity from the motive side, and as an action or system, a chain of actions as a subordinate goal ”(ibid., P. 13 -14).

Action in modern psychology (in the theoretical concept of activity) is defined as one of the components of human activity, prompted by its motive and correlated with a specific goal. [76] The action is always aimed at achieving a certain goal (which in a typical variant is as though “intermediate” in relation to the general, final goal of the activity); action always involves the solution of a specific, “private” task within the framework of the whole activity. Each specific type of activity is realized by performing certain, often quite specific actions.

The holistic action (according to the theoretical concept of P.Ya. Halperin) consists of three parts: an indicative basis, a process of implementation and a process of control over it (50). The action is characterized by the following parameters:

• level of performance (for example, in expressive speech - this is a complete speech statement, fully consistent with the norms of a given language; in speech for oneself, inner speaking is “in mind”, that is, at the level of inner speech);

• degree of generalization and shortness;

• finally, the degree of development and “automation”. A separate action differs from the activity as a whole, first of all by the lack of its own “motivation”. The motive for each action within the framework of a holistic act of activity is the motive of the activity itself (137, 133).

Studies of Russian psychologists (A. N. Leontiev, P. Ya. Halperin, D. B. Elkonin, and others) allowed to establish that on the basis of external material actions, through their consecutive changes and reductions, internal, ideal actions are performed, performed in mental plan and provide a person with a comprehensive orientation in the outside world (50, 135).

To define speech action in psycholinguistics (with the suggestion of foreign specialists X. Jackson, C. Osgood, D. Skinner, and others), the term “speech act” is most often used, which by its meaning “implies” both speech motivation and its social determinacy , and the individual-personal aspect of the practical implementation of RD. At the same time, it is impossible not to notice that “in the methodological aspect”, as applied to the content of the “speech” work, this term-concept is not entirely successful. It is a kind of general term for action, not filled with concrete content. In addition, the basic meaning of the word “deed” (social action, behavioral reaction, etc.) is quite firmly fixed in the lexical system of any language, which determines the need for constant abstraction from this basic meaning when using this word-concept to denote speech action. For the practice of correctional speech therapy, a different term-concept proposed by A.A. Leontiev (129, 133).

In terms of their scope and structure, speech utterances (PB) are divided into separate (or single) utterances and detailed speech utterances (description, narration, reasoning). The first of them corresponds to such a unit of language as a sentence, the second - the text. “Separate statements” and “sentences”, “detailed statements” and “text” are not identical synonyms-concepts. The first of them relate to units of speech and, accordingly, to psycholinguistic units, the second to units of language (95, 119, 133).

A separate statement can be implemented in a combined form: some of its structural-semantic components can be expressed by signs of the language, others by non-verbal signs (gesture, mimicry, non-verbal sounds, voice intonation without the phoneme producing syllables and words), and yet it remains speech utterance. RV can be (in exceptional cases) realized only through the use of non-linguistic signs (for example, the “string letter” of the ancient Indians of North and Central America). With regard to units of language (sentence, text) such an “assumption” is impossible; these are “strictly normative” sign units, in connection with which any non-normative version of their sign expression is always uniquely interpreted as “erroneous”, as a deviation from the speech, language norm [77] (200, 218).

According to their “communicative orientation” (task), speech statements are divided into: (1) statements that are used to transmit “new” information; (2) statements, the purpose of which is to obtain the necessary information (at the level of individual statements, they correspond to interrogative sentences); (3) utterances — motives for non-verbal and verbal actions (or imperative utterances); and (4) utterances — conclusions.

Speech utterance is considered in psycholinguistics (95, 133, 216) as an action that has its “signified” (subject of the utterance corresponding to the general subject of the RD) and “signifying”. The “signified” is what the person wanted to express with his speech action; “Signifying” is the form of realization of the action (for a speech utterance, this is the corresponding language form of the expression).

The semantic content of the utterance transmitted by the subject of the RD is used as “signified”. The communicative form is the lexical-grammatical and intonational design of speech. In view of the above, a speech statement is realized in speech activity at the level of a message or judgment expressed in the form of a sentence or text.

The second structural component of the activity is the operation. The operation is also one of the components of human activity, correlated with the objective-objective conditions for achieving the goals of the activity.

Operations are formed as a result of the transformation of actions during their execution. At the same time, the action, changing its focus, becomes a condition, a means of implementing another action, a condition for achieving a new goal.

By its nature, the operation is almost identical to the action. Their main difference between them is as follows. The history of the formation and development of human society indicates that initially any activity was formed and carried out on the basis of successive equal rights actions. Gradually (in the course of socio-historical development), individual actions began to be carried out in the most automated way, conscious control over their implementation gave way to the subconscious, and the actions themselves ceased to correlate with the solution of some particular, intermediate task in the course of the activity.

A specific feature of speech activity is that its main actions, the actions of generating a speech statement and its perception and understanding, include a whole set (several dozen) of interrelated operations . [78]

In the psychology of speech, linguistics and, of course, in psycholinguistics it is customary to differentiate operations according to their subject and purpose. Thus, it is customary to distinguish operations with signs of the language — language operations, semantic operations — operations with RV sense units (“semes”) and proper speech operations ensuring the realization of speech activity (various types and forms of speech). Speech operations that provide a mechanism for constructing and implementing speech actions (speech utterances) include the comparison operations , the choice of semantic and linguistic elements, the “set” (making up the whole from parts), as well as the permutation, replacement, construction of a statement by analogy , etc. speech operations is, in particular, the choice of the necessary elements of the semantic complex (field) in the process of lexical design of a statement. (126, 133).

Operations in the process of speech activity are brought to automatism. This, in turn, contributes to bringing the operating side of speech action to the skill level .

Skill is defined in the psychological theory of activity as the optimal quality level for performing an action or operation. This is a level of their implementation in which the consciousness of a person - a subject of activity - is fully or almost entirely focused on the content side of this activity. In this case, the subject of activity is distracted, "abstracts" from the technical side of the implementation of actions and operations.

By analogy with operations, a skill can be linguistic, if the means of forming thought and constructing speech statements are “automated” (brought to perfection), and speech, if ways of forming and articulating thought, ways of implementing speech communication are automated (IA Zimnyaya, 92 , 94). The main language skills (in linguistics and psycholinguistics) include:

• skills in the selection of language means (mainly words and phrases) in the construction of speech statements for the purpose of adequately reflecting the subject of speech;

• skills of inflection (change of words according to grammatical forms) and, accordingly, skills of selection of word forms (necessary grammatical form of words);

• skills of correct design of the grammatical connection of words in phrases, as well as the construction of phrases themselves;

• skills of word formation (the formation of some words from others using different methods - “language strategies”);

• skills of correct grammatical structuring (design) of sentences;

• skills of normative design of the grammatical relationship between the sentences in the text.

Accordingly, the skills of semantic analysis of the subject of speech and the definition of semantic elements of the content of a speech utterance are attributed to speech skills in psycholinguistics; speech skills; dialogue skills (dialogical communication); skills of monologic utterances (and in their composition - skills of retelling, composing story-description, story-message on a visual support, etc.). The division of skills into language and speech is rather conditional, since speech skills "include" linguistic skills (since without them the normative construction of speech statements is impossible), and language skills without their use in speech activity, in speech actions and operations have no independent value for a person do not have. At the same time, the differentiation of skills into language and speech plays an essential role in the methodological aspect from the point of view of proper organization of “speech work”, especially in relation to the practice of speech therapy. It is very important for a specialist who is professionally involved in shaping children's speech (especially in the conditions of developmental pathology) to consciously and methodically approach the preparation of a program of correctional and pedagogical work, in the structure of which it is necessary to observe a strict “balance” of priorities and objectives of “speech work”, not allowing distortions ”in the actual speech or language work and without detracting from the meaning of both directions in the work on the formation of speech. The methodological analysis of correctional speech therapy programs with different categories of children with speech disorders offered by different authors should be carried out by a practicing speech therapist also taking into account the differentiation of speech and language skills.

No less important for a correction teacher is the knowledge of the parameters for assessing the formation of a skill, which has not yet received sufficient distribution in the practice of “speech” (including speech therapy) work. In this regard, it is important to consider the basic criteria for the formation of a skill. These include:

• the correctness and quality of the performance of an action or operation (as applied to a speech action - compliance of the content of the speech statement with the objectives of the RD, and its language design - with the norms of the language, i.e. the language norm ); no errors;

• the optimal speed (pace) of the action and the individual components of its operations;

• lack of consciousness directed at the form (“technical” side) of performing the action;

• lack of tension and fatigue;

• elimination of intermediate operations; [79]

• sustainability - the quality and timing of actions (operations) must remain unchanged in the context of increasing complexity (up to a certain limit) of the activity of which they are an integral part.

It should emphasize the role of speech practice in the formation of speech skills. All skills (both linguistic and proper speech) are formed during the multiple execution of speech actions. At the same time, the implementation of speech activity implies that speech actions should be brought to such a level of perfection as “skill” (IA Zimnyaya, [92, 95]).

Thus, a speech skill is a speech action or operation that is performed according to optimal parameters. “Such parameters are unconsciousness, complete automaticity, compliance with the norm of the language, normal pace (speed) of fulfillment, stability ...” (133, p. 221). If, according to these parameters, a speech action or operation satisfies the needs of speech communication, it means that the learner performs it correctly, hence the speech skill is formed.

If the concept of “skill” correlates with the action and operation and determines a sufficiently high level of their implementation, then “skill” can be correlated with the activity as a whole. “When assimilating speech units and the rules for their use,” indicates I.A. Winter - a person has a speech ability, which is formed, improved under the influence of speech communication. This ability is speech skill ”(92, p. 39). Speech skill as an integral system includes four components of its subsystem: lexical, grammatical, pronunciation and semantic. Each of the subsystems contains a set of interrelated skills and "private" skills, as well as corresponding images-representations, including reference images. A person’s speech ability “is realized in the process of selecting, selecting the necessary words (units of language, denoting both objects and phenomena and their relationships) and composing messages from them according to the relevant rules of the given language” (93, p. 43).

Speech skills, by their nature, are quite stereotypical, “mechanical” actions (94, 133). At the same time, communicative speech skills are creative, since the conditions of communication are almost never repeated completely, and every time a person has to re-select the necessary language tools and use the appropriate speech skills. Consequently, the methods of teaching communicative speech skills should differ from the methods of teaching speech skills.

I.A. Winter considers speech skill as an obligatory factor of speech activity. “Speech activity is determined by the interaction of 3 factors: knowledge of language units and the rules of their combination, skills of using these units and rules, and the combination of using existing knowledge to express a new thought in a new situation” (92, p. 11).

The subject content of the main subsystems of speech skills can be represented as follows.

Based on the analysis of the internal structure of speech skills, we can conclude that the lexical and grammatical subsystems of speech skills are directly related to the language ability of a person, while the pronunciation and, to a certain extent, semantic subsystem can be considered as components of the actual speech ability .

The system of interrelated skills, constituting the internal content of each of the subsystems of speech skills, reflects the overall content of speech, including correctional and speech therapy work. At the same time, each of the subsystems corresponds to a separate, independent line of work on the formation of speech activity. Коррекционным педагогам (прежде всего логопедам-практикам) необходимо учитывать, что речевая способность не есть какое-либо одно, пусть и достаточно сложно организованное умение – оно включает в себя целый комплекс разнообразных навыков и частных умений,[80] формирование которых и составляет основной предмет «речевой работы». Это имеет особое значение в связи с тем, что «в общественном сознании» практическая логопедия в большинстве случаев связывается с коррекцией недостатков произносительной стороны речи, и многие логопеды-практики сами видят основную цель своей работы в формировании речепроизносительных навыков, в то время как основное предназначение коррекционной логопедической деятельности состоит в формировании у каждого ребенка с нарушениями речи комплексного речевого умения способности к адекватному осуществлению речевой деятельности во всех фо рмах ее проявления.

«Сформировать речевой навык, – указывает А.А. Леонтьев, – это значит обеспечить, чтобы обучающийся правильно построил и реализовал высказывание. Но для полноценного общения нужно, чтобы мы умели использовать речевые навыки для того, чтобы самостоятельно выражать свои мысли, намерения, переживания; в противном случае речевая деятельность оказывается сформированной только частично, в звене ее реализации» (133, с. 221). Нужно, чтобы обучающийся мог произвольно и осознанно варьировать выбор и сочетание речевых операций (навыков) в зависимости от того, для какой цели, в какой ситуации, с каким собеседником происходит общение. Когда человек овладел указанными действиями на достаточно хорошем уровне, можно сделать вывод о том, что у него сформировано соответствующее коммуникативно-речевое умение (там же, с. 221–222).