Some considerations on why a new language is acquired by being used

According to the prior assumption that a L2 is acquired by being used as a tool for doing things with others, this article is devoted to an attempt to analyse certain mechanisms which teacher and pupils use in order to build up the meaning of their interaction in the target language. More precisely, it is postulated that it becomes feasible to use a language which the pupils do not yet know because the process of making meaning in this L2 is presented as a social process, initially other‐regulated, in which the joint action undertaken with all the classmates is so organized that it can be used cooperatively as a first shared indexical territory.