The Portuguese story task can be described as follows...
| goal: | communicative with more than one possible outcome; no specific information needs to be conveyed to reach the goal |
| process: | discussion of short story; genre is a mix of academic discussion and conversation |
| topic: | content about a short story (which presumably mentions shoes), however not defined precisely so the topic can shift between personal and impersonal topics |
| location: | all in the same computer lab |
| timing: | some time for planning individual comments, but discussion limited by the class period |
| participants: | the instructor and learners |
| roles: | instructor controls aspects of task such as the goal and location, but not the topic which is only loosely controlled and partially negotiated by the learners and instructor (who assumes the status equal to the students when the discussion is underway); other facets of the roles are negotiated among the learners |
| relationships: | learners know each other through the class and are probably members of the same cultural group; they are likely to have divergent task goals |
| knowledge: | learners vary in their knowledge of the topic (depending on their reading and understanding of the story); learners are familiar with the task from this class; learners' language is good enough to sustain discussion of the story |
| interest: | learners are interested in the topic and the task |