Scaffolding Functions Of English Teacher Feedback In Junior Middle School

In teaching area, an increasing number of scholars begin to pay attention to the foreignlanguage class, and teacher talk has become one of the research focuses. As an essential partof teacher talk, teacher feedback refers that teachers provide verbal responses to students’performance in class, which is an important teaching strategy of assessing students anddemonstrating target language. What’s more, it can provide students with learning scaffolding.According to Vygotsky’s ZPD, Wood, Bruner and Ross define the term “scaffolding” asthe support through which the learners can extend or construct current skills to higher levelsof competence and they propose six scaffolding functions, which are divided into cognitivefunctions and affective functions. In this study, six English teachers of Grade Two in TaichengMiddle School were investigated and their teaching classes were observed and recorded. Afterclass, questionnaires for students were issued and interviews with four English teachers andsix students were conducted. On the basis of the classroom observation, questionnaires andinterviews materials, the study has been discussed theoretically and empirically. Itsummarized the main types of teacher feedback used in English classroom, analyzed students’perspectives to teacher feedback and emphasized the cognitive functions and affectivefunctions of feedback from teachers participated in this survey, exploring the effectivestrategies of providing feedback and promoting the effectiveness of classroom teaching. Andthe major findings can be concluded as following:1) Different students require different feedbacks, and they expect teachers to give fullplay to scaffolding feedback on account of students’ needs and instructional constraints;2)There are multiple scaffolding functions of teacher feedback in junior middle school, whichcan divided into cognitive function and affective function.3) In class, teacher feedback isusually employed without sufficiency and flexibility, while positive strategies can promote theefficiency of scaffolding feedback.From the results and discussion, the teacher feedback in English class in junior middleschool has a great impact on students’ cognitive ability and learning emotion. But itsemployment is not mature enough, lack of skills and flexibility. In particular, when there aredeviations of teacher feedback between teachers’ usage and students’ expectation, it is morenecessary for teachers to improve the efficiency of feedback with reflection constantly, giving full play to its scaffolding functions.This thesis is made up of five chapters. The first chapter gives a brief overview of thebackground, purpose and significance of the research. It indicates the importance andnecessity of the study and sum up the framework of this paper. Chapter two makes theliterature review, including the studies on teacher feedback and scaffolding functions at homeand abroad, as well as the relevant theoretical foundations. Also, some main problems inprevious research are explicated. Chapter three gives a description of the researchmethodology employed in this study, which covers the research questions, subjects,instruments and procedure of the empirical research. In chapter four, from the classroomobservation, questionnaire and interviews, usages of English teacher feedback andperspectives of students to teacher feedback in junior middle school are elaborated, and thensome scaffolding strategies of teacher feedback are put forward. Chapter five makes aconclusion, which sums up the major findings of this study and presents the pedagogicalimplications. Moreover, limitations of the research and suggestions for further study areexpounded.