A Study Of Chinese Students’ Attitude Towards English Teachers From The Perspective Of Knowledge, Skill And Ethics

English teachers are executors in English teaching process. Quality ofEnglish education depends on teacher qualities. Teacher qualities are dynamicconcepts which change with social development, students’ quality and mode ofthinking. Consequently, in order to keep college English teaching advance with thetimes, it is necessary to study teacher qualities dynamically. At the present, relativestudies are usually from teachers’ point of view or from the perspective ofpedagogy. Famous scholars like Shulman, Richards and Liu Runqing haveconducted researches on teacher qualities while studies on students’ attitude areinadequate. This research is, from the student’s point of view, to study students’attitude toward teacher qualities from the perspectives of knowledge, skill andethics.Adopting empirical approach, this research investigates students’ attitude andexpectations of English teachers’ quality through questionnaires to146collegestudents in Harbin Institute of Technology. Meanwhile, contrast and comparisonstudies of two genders as well as English-major and non-English major studentsare also conducted.By data collection and analysis, it is found that different from traditionalrequirements, today’s students have new demands and expectations. Firstly, in theperspective of teachers’ knowledge, besides language knowledge, students expecttheir English teachers to acquire knowledge of Chinese history, traditional culture,Chinese language as well as custom, history, national conditions and culture ofEnglish-speaking countries, at the same time, they hope teachers have interculturalcommunication knowledge and possess artistic accomplishment. Secondly, in theperspective of teaching skill, other than lecturing and blackboard writing, studentslike teachers to play video clips and adopt PowerPoint in class. They prefer group discussion and expect class atmosphere to be active and relaxed. When they makelanguage errors, they hope to be corrected in a mild way after they finish talking.What’s more, students also give suggestions on teaching content and classinnovation. Thirdly in the perspective of teachers’ ethics, teachers’ authority is nolonger suitable in today’s class, students prefer teachers talking in easy-going,equal and mild tone, not too strict. They expect teacher-student relationship to befriendly and equal. Students’ privacy and self-esteem need to be respected andprotected. Teachers should be outstanding, upright and noble, meanwhileout-going, humorous and easy-going teachers are more popular among students.Additionally, there is no significant difference between the two genders. However,English-major and non-English-major students have similar requirements forEnglish teachers in teachers’ ethics, but different requirements in knowledge andteaching skill, e.g. for teachers’ knowledge, English majors pay more attention toteachers’ knowledge of speaking, Chinese and intercultural communication whilenon-English majors care more about teachers’ knowledge of grammar, foreigncustom and art.Based on the findings, new evaluation criteria of English teachers is proposedand suggestions are put forward to improve teachers’ performance in class:teachers should perfect knowledge structure, enrich knowledge scope and knowstudents’ interest according to students’ demand. Teachers should keep a sensibleand reasonable mind to judge students’ requests and make constructive decisionsto improve English class. Besides, teachers should enhance ethical cultivation, beresponsible and conscientious, and be equal and friendly to students in order tobuild harmonious teacher-student relationship.