A Study On English Teachers' Nonverbal Behavior In Junior High Schools In Multimedia Classroom

Teachers'classroom behavior is a significant method in teaching and interaction,which includes speeches and nonverbal behaviors.Birdwhistell,an American scholar,found that 65%of interaction messages came from nonverbal expressions^[1].Teachers'nonverbal behavior can assist teaching,improve classroom management and so on.Under the background of educational informatization,various multimedia devices are applied to create vitality English teaching.Teachers'gestures,expressions and other behaviors can highlight the key points of multimedia and help students to distribute their attention among multimedia and teachers.However,the frequent operation of multimedia affects nonverbal interaction,which weakens teachers'teaching management and the perception of students'learning.Thus,effective teaching will be achieved if teachers can make full use of nonverbal behavior and optimize multimedia teaching.This study is based on some related researches on symbolic interactionism.The author has selected 10 general English courses from a junior high school in Fujian Province and 10excellent English courses from the Internet as observing objects,focusing on comparative analysis about frequency distribution and teaching effect of teachers'facial,head,eye,gesture,body and spacial movements.And an investigation about cognition and usage of English teachers'nonverbal behavior has been conducted to teachers and students in the school.This thesis has adopted a quantitative and qualitative research?observation,questionnaire and interview?for one semester,trying to find out the current situation of English teachers'nonverbal behavior in multimedia classroom and put forward some effective measures to improve English teachers'nonverbal behavior and optimize multimedia teaching.The study shows that,junior students in above mention school pay close attention to English teachers'nonverbal behavior,while their teachers lack systematic knowledge and expectations for their classroom behavior.According to the statistics,English teachers'gestures and eye movements are most frequently used,facial and spatial behaviors are second,while head and body movements are used least.The overall frequency and teaching effects are lower than excellent courses from Internet.Also,teachers in the school have the characteristics of individual preference,negativity and randomness during usage.Moreover,multimedia environment restricts nonverbal behavior of English teachers.For example,the richness of multimedia teaching leads to the lack of teachers'behavior designing,multimedia operation reduces gesture and spatial movements,and the dim light of multimedia class hides teachers'nonverbal behavior.According to the situations above,this thesis reveals that teaching ideas,professional level,training and multimedia environment affect the use of nonverbal behavior.Thus,junior high school English teachers should realize the importance of nonverbal behavior,strengthen self practice,attend related training and use scientific researches to improve this skill.For relevant department,the procurement and arrangement of multimedia equipment should be improved to facilitate teaching.It is hoped that teachers can care about their nonverbal behavior and integrate their teaching charms with modern teaching,so as to improve teaching effect.