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The Effect Of Teacher Talk On Learners' Output In College English Class

Posted on:2010-08-21Degree:MasterType:Thesis
Country:ChinaCandidate:Y Y SunFull Text:PDF
GTID:2155360275462458Subject:Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
Abstract/Summary:PDF Full Text Request
Teacher talk is the language used by teachers in classroom. Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics defines teacher talk as "that variety of language sometimes used by teachers when they are in the process of teaching. In trying to communicate with learners, teachers often simplify their speech, giving it many of the characteristics of Foreigner Talk and other simplified styles of speech addressed to language learners."Teacher talk is very important to classroom teaching, especially EFL classroom teaching, because the sharp difference between EFL classroom teaching and other classroom teaching is that language is not only a carrier of teaching forms and methods, but also a most important language learning environment for English learners. In the course of second language teaching and learning, teacher talk is the most important part of language environment in the classroom in which the teacher plays a model role, corrects learners' output and acts as an equal participant as well. Nunan(1991)says teacher talk not only is a tool to impart knowledge, but also serves as a crucial source of input. In China where English is the foreign language and students can find few chances to communicate in English outside English class, classroom is the main place for learners to have regular contact with English and acquire this language. Teachers are responsible for providing adequate comprehensible input and maximizing students' exposure to the target language. The amount and quality of teacher talk in language classroom has a great effect on classroom teaching and is even a decisive factor of the success or failure of it (Hakansson 1986).Since teacher talk plays such an important role in language teaching, lots of studies about classroom as language environment in the research field of second language acquisition (SLA) has been carried out since the late 1980s. Most of the studies are about classroom language, especially the descriptive studies of teacher talk, the studies of the verbal interaction between teacher and student, and experimental studies of the relationship between teacher talk and language acquisition. But in China, English teachers and researchers paid more attention to teaching method and content for a long time, therefore there were still not enough researches about teacher talk.This thesis attempts to do some analyses on teacher talk based on the Comprehensible Input Hypothesis, Comprehensible Output Hypothesis and Interaction Theory. The purpose is to deal with the problem of what kind of teacher talk will lead to a satisfying output and give some suggestions on how to improve the teacher talk in foreign language teaching. Teachers and students of grade 2 from a normal university in Shandong province are chosen to be the subjects. The college English class of these 6 classes have been observed and recorded to get the data, and then the data have been transcribed. And we can get the characteristics of Teacher Talk of each teacher. And then we can get the answer for what kind of Teacher Talk will lead to a satisfying output by analyzing the students'CET4 results.It is concluded that there is some relationship between Teacher Talk and Learner Output. We must deal with the relationship between them in an objective and scientific way. And we can draw implications for the foreign language teaching in China from input and output hypothesis. In the practice of teaching, both input and output should be emphasized. We should try to increase the quality of Teacher Talk, and provide more opportunities of output for learners. Thus, we should create interactive classrooms, in which natural environment of communication and suitable communicative topics for interaction are offered. Interactions between the teacher and the students and interactions between the students are also strongly recommended. Consequently, the quality of learners' output and the efficiency of foreign language teaching can be improved.
Keywords/Search Tags:teacher talk, comprehensible input, comprehensible output, interaction
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