An Analysis Of Teacher Talk In Senior High School English Classroom

"Teacher talk" refers to the language used by teachers in organizing classroom teaching as well as providing knowledge. Therefore, it is not only the tools used by teachers to carry out language teaching but also an important resource by which students acquire second language. The quality and quantity of "teacher talk" make great influence in students’ language input and the success of language teaching. As one of the students majoring in English education, the author considers what kind of "teacher talk" seems to be more effective in promoting students’ learning second language. This thesis applies both qualitative and quantitative research method and makes an analysis of "teacher talk" on the theoretical basis of Krashen’s comprehensible language input, Swain’s comprehensible language output and Long’s interaction theory. The subjects involved in this paper are three in-service teachers in The High School Affiliated to Minzu University of China. The data were collected based on classroom observation and transcriptions from taped lessons. In addition, students’ questionnaires and interviews with teachers were adopted to enrich the thesis.The first part is the introduction, which presents the background, literature review on previous studies on "teacher talk" home and abroad, and the objective and significance of the study. Then Chapter One introduces the theoretical basis. Chapter Two tells readers the main design of this study, such as research questions, research subjects, research instruments and data collection and analysis. The latter part gives the detailed description of the study, namely, results and discussions. In this chapter, the writer analyzes from two sections. The first section is conducted through classroom observation and students’ questionnaires, and the second section is teachers’ interviews. Chapter Four presents the major findings and Chapter Five shows some suggestions and implications. At last, it also points out the conclusions of this research.The analysis and results were conducted by using SPSS 21.0 from the perspective of two functions in organizing classroom teaching and providing language teaching. The main research questions are:(1) What are the differences and similarities of "teacher talk" among these three teachers in the function of organizing classroom teaching and providing language knowledge? (2) What are students’ responses to the quality and quantity of "teacher talk" in organizing classroom teaching and providing language knowledge?Through the analysis of data and interviews, the author finds out that the three in-service teachers improve a lot in the usage of "teacher talk", compared to the former studies related to "teacher talk". Their application of "teacher talk" reveals their own teaching style, which also has some slight differences when it comes to students’ responses. However, problems still exist, such as the types of questions and the ways of giving feedback. Teachers put up more open questions than before, but the number of fixed questions is still more than open questions. Students expect that the number of fixed questions and open questions are equal. What’s more, students want the positive feedback with some comments rather than simple compliment.