An Investigation Into Senior High School Students’ Reticence In English Classroom

According to the interaction theory of Allright(1984), classroom interaction plays a big role in the teaching efficiency and students’ language proficiency. The degree of students’ participation in the classroom was seen as one of the measure standards of successful classes. Many domestic and foreign scholars have done research on reticence in English classroom, but most of the research objects are overseas students and college students. Then, does reticence exist in the English classroom of Chinese senior high school?In order to further understand the current situation of the reticence in the English classroom of Chinese senior high school,the author investigated 198 students and 4English teachers of the first grade from Nanchang No.23 senior high school. By using the instruments of questionnaire, interviews and classroom observations, this study aims to search the following three questions:1. Does reticence exist in the English classroom of senior high school?2. What are the main reasons for senior students’ reticence in English class?3. Are there any differences in reticence between high proficiency students andlow proficiency students in the English classroom of senior high school? If so,in what way?All the data of the questionnaire were analyzed by SPSS13.0, including descriptive analysis, frequency description, multiple regression analysis and independent t-test. All the recorded conversation of the interviews as well as classroom observations were transcribed and analyzed qualitatively.The result of this study shows that reticence exists exactly in the English classroom of Chinese senior high school, and appears to be a common phenomenon.The factors contributing to students’ reticence consist of four aspects: students’ factors, teachers’ factors, classroom environment factors and cultural factors. By the way of multiple regression analysis, the effects of these factors were investigated.Finally it was found that students’ low English proficiency, passive learning habits and teachers’ traditional teaching method are the main three factors contributing to senior students’ reticence in the English classroom and students’ low Englishproficiency play the key role of these three factors. In addition, there are significant differences in classroom reticence between students at high proficiency and those at low proficiency. It shows that low proficient students are more silent than the high proficient students and students at a high level behaved more actively than those at a low level in English class. High proficient students are more confident in their oral English and willing to show themselves in English classroom.Basing on the findings above, this paper hold the idea that reducing students’ reticence needs the efforts of both teachers and students. From the aspect of teachers’ teaching, they should change their traditional teaching methods to improve their teaching strategies and organize the teaching activity in a student-centered way to help students participate into classroom activities. From the aspect of students’ learning, students should set up the concept of autonomous learning and form active learning habit. Furthermore, students should insist on improving English learning strategies and English proficiency, thus participate in the classroom actively.