A Study Of Interactive English Teaching In Senior Schools

The Communicative Approach was introduced to China in the 1970s, the core of which is interaction. In recent years, this approach has been emphasized in English teaching in China. However, in the reality of practical application, there are still some problems.The traditional way of English teaching restricts classroom interactions, which causes students'low efficiency in learning and teachers'low effectiveness in teaching, as a result, students'linguistic competence and especially their language performance cannot reach the required levels. Interactive teaching emphasizes the reciprocal effect between the teacher and students or between students and students. According to the analysis of random samples chosen from 150 different levels of senior high middle schools in Sichuan Province, the statistics indicate some problems in current senior high middle schools: silent classes in some English classes; low quality of teacher-student interaction; little or no student-student interaction. The author analyzes the reasons that have caused the problems based on Second Language Acquisition (SLA) theories: Input Theory, Output Theory, Interaction Theory and some psychological theories: Lev Vygotsky's (1978) Social-cultural Theory, Jean Piaget's (1961) Constructivism, and Jerome Bruner's (1966) Discovering Learning Theory, and Deway's (1938) theory of"Learning By Doing". They believe that learners construct their knowledge by interacting with the environment, and that this promotes learners'cognitive development. The author aims to shed some light on current senior high school English teaching in large-scale class instruction in China. The author proposes some suggestions and ways to help teachers in their instruction of English. The thesis is comprised of six parts.Introduction: It briefly introduces the importance of Interactive Teaching, and presents some problems existing in current English teaching. It shows the author's aim in writing this paper.Part One points out the problems in English classroom teaching: silent classes, low quality of teacher-student interaction; little or no student-student interaction. It also analyzes the results of the problems: low efficiency in teaching and learning, students'incomplete development.Part Two is a survey of interaction research undertaken within and outside of China. A study on SLA Theories, Interaction Theory and Psychological Theories mentioned above. These theories claim that interaction plays an important role in language teaching and students'construction and reconstruction of their knowledge. It introduces some principles of Interactive Teaching to guide language teachers so that quality of instruction can be improved.Part Three is an analysis of the multi-faceted reasons that have caused the existing problems: The causes of silent classes are: Teacher-centered class, Exercise-based class, and students'lack of intrinsic learning motivation and interests. The reasons that cause low quality of teacher-student interaction: 1) teacher-directed interaction limits sufficient interaction between a teacher and the students, 2) form-based IRE model results in interaction which lacks meaningful elements, 3) teachers talk most of the class time, while students get insufficient talking time (STT) (Harmer, 2001) and opportunities to initiate questions, 4) there is a shortage of Target Language (TL) input, which limits students'interaction with the TL. In terms of student-student interaction, the author focuses on two factors: exam-oriented education and large-scale class instruction. Part Four puts forth the solutions to the problems. It focuses on such elements: the shift of teachers'ideas from the traditional to the modern, creation of a stress-free classroom atmosphere, teachers'adoption of eclectic methods, especially Task-Based teaching, use of pair work and group work, encouragement of cooperative learning and negotiation of meaning, emphasis on meaning-based teacher-student interaction, reduction of teacher talking-time, increase of student talking-time, improvement of teachers'questioning strategies, teachers'use of more TL in strategic instruction, and use of modern educational technology. It calls on teacher development and improvement of assessment system, which are the basis of realizing effective interactive teaching.Part Five is the conclusion. It gives a summary of the whole paper, and claims the author's aim to write the article at a high degree: the author suggests applying interactive teaching to large classes in China. Teachers will try their best to overcome the difficulties in large classes to achieve the requirement of the New National English Curriculum.Part Six is an appendix, including questionnaires.