A Case Study On Cognitive Dimension Of EFL Teachers' Questioning In Primary School Reading Lessons

To develop students' thinking ability is one important aim of EFL reading teaching.And teachers' questioning is one of the most effective teaching techniques.Through analysis on current teachers' questioning in reading lessons based on the cognitive dimension in the revision of Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives,this study aims to cultivate students' thinking ability by exploring teachers' questioning in reading lessons.This paper adopts qualitative case study method,employing classroom observations and interviews as research instruments.Ten videos of excellent reading lessons teaching by different EFL teachers in Qingdao public primary schools are the subjects for this paper.All the teachers' questions are analyzed from macro and micro perspectives.The macroscopic features' analysis includes: total number of teachers' questions,overall distribution of teachers' questions,comparison of frequencies of teachers' questions at different cognitive categories,and the relationship between cognitive processes and number of questions.The microscopic features' analysis includes: frequencies and ratios of the ten teachers' questions at the six cognitive categories,typical cases and discussion at the six cognitive categories.Afterwards,eight interviewees are interviewed for an in-depth explorations of the following perspectives: characteristics of effective teachers' questioning,main affecting factors,teachers' questioning types,application of the Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives,the relationship between teachers' questioning and students' cognition development,improvements of teachers' questioning skills.The main findings are as follows: effective teachers' questioning is thought-provoking,but teachers meet difficulties in real teaching.The proportion of teachers' questions associated with Remember(42.4%)and Understand(40%)are the most.The proportion of lower-order thinking questions(87.6%)is much more than higher-order thinking questions(12.4%).The typical case analysis found that students' answers are lack of diversity and authenticity,the number and difficulty of teachers' questioning are inappropriate,etc.Based on the above findings,suggestions are provided in the following aspects:Before class,it's better for teachers to set cultivating students' thinking as one of the reading teaching aims.They are encouraged to use the framework of the revision of Bloom's Taxonomy Table to design questioning.Teachers are advised to provide appropriate scaffolding if the higher-order questions are difficult for students.Moreover,reflecting and learning are important for teachers to improve their questioning ability.For further research,researchers can extend vertically and horizontally from multiple angles,so as to get more achievement of students' thinking cultivation through the research of EFL teachers' questioning.