A Survey Of The Current Situation Of Native English Teachers' Oral English Class In Higher Educational Institutions Of Zhejiang Province

Along with an ever increasing demand of people with good oral English skills in society, oral English class has been paid attention to and put to a high and important position in the syllabuses for college students. Nowadays, more and more colleges or universities have invited English native speakers to teach oral English class for the students. It is therefore quite necessary to conduct a survey to study the current situation of foreign teachers and their oral English class in higher educational institutions. By analyzing their background information and observing what is going on in their classroom teaching, we will be able to find out the advantages by having English native speakers teach oral English class, and also some problems that may exist in the employment and management of foreign teachers. Then, implications and suggestions are brought out to solve these problems. Quite a few researches have been already conducted on foreign teachers and their language teaching, however, many published papers on this issue either put their focus on the language used by foreign teachers, or something like work reports and experience sharing. Very few scholars have made empirical study on this issue.Based on what have been mentioned above, an investigation was conducted on the current situation of the foreign teachers and their oral English class in higher educational institutions of Zhejiang Province. The study is to seek the answers to the following questions: 1) What are the main teaching methods that foreign teachers used in oral English class, and how do they organize classroom activities? 2) How do they look on the oral English class they are teaching? 3) How do students perceive foreign teachers and their classroom teaching? 4) What implications that would be drawn out by college leaders towards foreign teachers and their classroom teaching, and what improvements should be made by foreign teachers in oral English classrooms?The investigation lasted for one semester. Three representative universities were chosen for the investigation. The background information of foreign teachers in these three universities were collected, including the amount of foreign teachers who taught oral English, their gender, age, nationality, education and degree, and teaching experience. Three or four foreign teachers were randomly chosen for the investigation of their oral English classroom teaching from each university. One class of each foreign teacher was observed and recorded once a week or two weeks through the semester. Classroom activities and teaching methods used by foreign teachers were stressed on so as to figure out how foreign teachers organized and managed their classroom teaching. Foreign teachers whose classes were observed were interviewed by the researcher, mainly about their perceptions on oral English teaching. In addition, students were asked to fill out a survey questionnaire at the end of the semester about their perceptions of their foreign teachers and oral English class they were teaching.Interactive language teaching and culture teaching are used as theoretical basis to analyze data collected from the study. Interactive language teaching elicits students' willingness to participate in the classroom activities, learn how to communicate with others, and how to negotiate meaning in a shared context with the target language. Therefore, it is one method that is highly appropriate for teaching oral English. Culture is one factor that will affect the success of communication with people from other countries. Almost all the activities carried out in oral English classes involve culture of English speaking countries. It is important for the students to know about culture in English classes, especially in oral English classes.The study has made the following major findings. First, advantages and values of foreign teachers to teach oral English class are: 1) Foreign teachers often use interactive teaching and create many different kinds of interactive classroom activities. They adopt different ways and activities to transfer cultural knowledge to the students. 2) It gives students an exposure to a native speaker and different perspectives about teaching method. 3) Foreign teachers often provide a comfortable atmosphere in the class and take various forms of classroom activities for students to do. However, there are also some problems for native English teachers in teaching oral English class: 1) some games and classroom activities are too easy for students to carry out.; 2) the oral English class of foreign teachers is lack of pertinence, and the arrangement of the class is too loose.; 3) foreign teachers sometimes speak too fast to make students difficulty to follow.It is hoped that the findings of the investigation will, on the one hand, help leaders concerned to be aware of the advantages and values of employing foreign teachers and the problems that exist as well, so that they can improve the employment and management of foreign teachers; on the other hand, will help employed foreign teachers to teach more effectively.