A Study Of English Teacher Talk In Junior Middle School Of Lanzhou

Nowadays, teacher talk is increasingly becoming an important aspect in studying the foreign language teaching by many linguists at home and abroad. In China, English teaching is mainly carried in classroom which is a major place for most of the middle school students to be exposed to and use English. Therefore, teacher talk plays a crucial role in English classroom teaching. It is not only a medium of teaching which represents the teaching method and implements the teaching plan, but also works as a target language which is an important source of language acquisition for students. Doing research on teacher talk can help us have a better understanding of the real classroom situation, and then improve the English classroom teaching effect.Based on the Comprehensible Input Theory, Output Hypothesis, Interaction Hypothesis, and Constructivism, this thesis will take the middle school English classroom of LanZhou as an example, as two English classes and 102 students in Grade 8 from Lanzhou No 16 junior middle school were recorded, transcribed and analyzed. At the same time, questionnaires are employed by 208 students from the same Grade, interviewed by two English teacher, in order to explore the state of English teachers’ attitude and expectations on teacher talk from four aspects:discourse quantity, teacher questioning, interactional modification and teacher feedback.According to the survey and data analysis, the study shows the following results:(1) the teacher no longer dominates the speech in these classrooms, They could use the teacher talk properly to arouse the interest of students and promote the output of the students. Furthermore, the students expect teachers can control and adjust the amount of classroom discourse reasonably, to give students more chance to participate in class. (2)When questioning, English teachers in middle schools put forward more display questions and less referential questions. Most teachers prefer to use nominating answering. After questioning, most teachers give students appropriate time to think over. Meanwhile, students expect more referential questions, encourage volunteering, and enough post-question waiting time. (3)In terms of negotiating and interacting with students, instead of confirmation checks and clarification requests, teachers prefer to use more comprehension checks. However, higher lever students expect the former way to create a more natural language learning environment. (4) Most teachers adopt positive feedback and students expect their teachers often encourage and guide students to self-correct, if there is an error. On the basis of the findings, the author concludes some implications for teaching and learning and puts forward some suggestions to improve teacher talk in junior middle schools.Besides that, this thesis also aims to strengthen English teachers’, attention to the teacher talk and provide some beneficial suggestions and enlightenments for promoting teachers’ professional development, improving the quality of middle school English teaching of Lanzhou, and constructing an efficient English classroom.