A Study On English Teacher Questioning In Junior Middle School From The Perspective Of Cooperative Learning Theory

Cooperative Learning Theory, a kind of Learning Theory and learning style,coincides with Quality Education and is proposed by the new round of curriculum reform.It is a breakthrough and supplement to the traditional forms of teaching organization andis used by English teachers more and more widely in classroom teaching in China.Classroom Questioning is the core of classroom teaching. Reasonable and effectiveclassroom questioning can make students get information maximally, exert teachers’leading role and students’ principal role, regulate teaching timely and improve teachingefficiency.A great many of educators at home and aboard have conducted many researches onteacher questioning and cooperative learning theory respectively. However, in China,little has been done in teachers’ classroom questioning from the perspective of cooperative learning. Over the years, the focus of English teaching has changed, and thecultivation of students’ ability of cooperative learning is gradually emphasized. Therefore,how to combine teachers’ classroom questioning with students’ cooperative learning isthe motivation of this paper.After studying teacher questioning at home and abroad, the author sums up theresults as the fact that most of the researches have mainly focused theoretically on thefunctions and techniques of teacher questioning and empirically the number,classification, teachers’ wait-time and feedback. Compared to the studies abroad, thestudies at home lag behind, especially in the depth and breadth of empirical research.Based on the former researches, the study takes six English teachers and their160students from Yu Ying Middle School of Yan’an city as objectives. In order to fulfill thepurpose of the research, this paper adopts the classroom observation, questionnaires andinterviews among the teachers and the students. The author has conducted a half-yearinvestigation to find the answers to the following questions:(1) what is the situation ofstudents’ cooperative learning?(2) What are the purposes of teachers’ questioning inEnglish classes in Yu Ying Middle School? What is the content of teacher questioning inEnglish classes in Junior Middle School?(3) Do teachers’ questioning behaviors reflectthe concept of cooperative learning from the purposes and contents？The authorrecorded five lessons of each English teacher and then consolidated the recordingmaterials and analyzed the quality and quantity of the information collected. In order todescribe the situation of teachers’ questioning accurately, the author compared therecording and in-class written records of observation with the results of questionnaires,and combined them with the results of the interviews.The results of this study showed:(1) The situation of cooperative learning isn’tsatisfactory, which is reflected in the following aspects：firstly, cooperative membershave different opinions and some of them spend lots of time and energy arguing witheach other; secondly, when students discuss questions, some students are inactive, andbehave negatively, which decreases learning effect; thirdly, there will inevitably appeargroup competition during the process of study, which can hurt the feelings of some groupmembers.(2) The purposes of teachers’ classroom questioning in junior middle schoolare mainly finding and checking the problem and recalling concrete knowledge or information. The number of display questions (75.8%) is much larger than referentialquestions (24.2%). The main questioning form is wh-questions; the questioningapproaches are mainly nominating and chorus-answering; the questioning objects aremainly medium and good students.(3) A couple of teachers practice their cooperativelearning through teacher questioning while the other teachers don’t realize theimportance of cooperative learning in English teaching.Therefore, teachers should strengthen theoretical study and update teachingconcepts. They must study the new curriculum carefully and define the ideas, tasks andaims of their English teaching. In addition, they should try their best to create aharmonious atmosphere for the effective questioning. In order to make their teachingmore effective, they should use easy, clear and accurate language to deliver the questions.And the teachers should bear in mind that it is crucially important to cultivate students’ability of cooperative learning by all possible means.