An Ethnography Research Of English Teachers’ Questioning In Junior High School

Classroom questioning is an indispensable way of classroom teaching and anessential link of the logical and emotional communication between teachers and students.Teachers of each level should raise questions to all students, but the difference lies in thequantity and quality of questioning. Good questioning methods will promote the languageoutput, encourage more participating in classroom activities, enhance interest and inspirestudents’ critical thinking and expressing skills.Considering the articles focused in English teachers’ classroom questioning in theworld, those researches could be divided into theory research and practice research.Theory research focuses on the type of questions, the function and effect of questioning etc.Practice research mainly divides into two categories: quantificative research andqualitative research. Quantificative research mainly employs the quantitative method toanalyze classroom questioning; Qualitative research focuses on using the methods ofobservation and interviews to study classroom questioning. Compared with researchesworldwide, the research employing ethnographic method has not been mentioned.This paper mainly adopts the method of ethnographic research to analyze theunderlying problems in teachers’ classroom questioning in junior high school based oncontemporary circumstances of classroom teaching. Meanwhile this paper applies Englishclassroom cases to comprehensively analyze and demonstrate teachers’ questioning. Itproposes four aspects of strategies and suggestions to improve English teachers’questioning. The strategies are the necessity of equality between teachers and students, theimportance of students’ classroom participation, the instant feedback of flexiblequestioning strategies and the effectiveness of vivid classroom wisdom. It is hoped to findout an effective way to optimize English classroom questioning methods and improve the communication and expression skills of students in junior high school.This paper divides into five parts: the first part is the introduction, which concludesthe basic condition of researches concerning English teachers’ classroom questioning injunior high school from three aspects: the research background, the related researchsummary in China and abroad and related concepts. The second part mainly elaboratesresearch purpose and meaning. It tells three aspects of increasing the interaction betweenteachers and students, promoting the development of students’ communicative ability,improving teachers’ professional development level. The third part adopts the ethnographicmethods to analyze classroom questioning in junior high school. The usage of classroomcase is targeted at finding out the underlying problems of classroom questioning. Thefourth part is the research conclusion and interpretation. English teachers’ classroomquestioning in junior high school could be developed from four aspects which are the thenecessity of equality between teachers and students, the importance of students’ classroomparticipation, the instant feedback of flexible questioning strategies and the effectiveness ofvivid classroom wisdom. Only in this way can we enhance the level of teachers’ questionsand promote exchange and interaction between teachers and students. The fifth part is thereflection of research. English teachers’ classroom questioning should pay attention to fouraspects which are the preparation before class, questioning art, the waiting time andteachers’ feedback. In addition, classroom questioning feedback of teachers should keeptheir eyes on student’s answer and make proper comments, timely praise andencouragement and reflecting the problems encountered in the process of teaching is ofkernel importance.The enlightenment of this study about English teachers’ classroom questioning injunior high school is that teachers should abandon "teacher-centered" opinion and establishequality relationship with their students, which means they should treat their students ascooperator. All teachers should do their best to encourage, help and guide students toparticipate in classroom activities and enhance the critical thinking and language skills ofstudents. Besides, the classroom feedback of teachers should be fast and flexible. Theycould use their vivid feedback to encourage their students into English learning. Theirevoking questioning skills of quantity and quality is kernel to the teaching process.Teachers’ questioning methods can create a vivid atmosphere to promote the secondlanguage acquisition and enhance English teaching quality.