A Study Of Teachers’ Feedback And Its Effects On Classroom Interaction In Junior High School

The study of teacher feedback is of great significance in the field of second language acquisition,which exerts profound influence on English teaching.On the one hand,teacher feedback is considered as the primary source of teachers’ organization and students being able to acquire comprehensible input.On the other hand,teacher-student verbal interaction and meaningful negotiation can be achieved through teacher feedback.In addition,the quality and quantity of teacher feedback directly affect the teaching effects,students’ language acquisition as well as effective classroom interaction,so it is essential for the study of teacher feedback.Indeed,many statistics focus on the types and distributions of teacher feedback,while studies on the effects of teacher feedback on junior high school classroom interaction are relatively rare.In terms of the theoretical and practical significance,this research aims to provide reference value for further research on English teaching and help teachers accomplish self-reflection.This thesis focuses on the investigation of the effects of feedback on classroom interaction,mainly dealing with three research questions:(1)What are the types of teacher feedback distributed in junior high school English classroom?(2)What are the attitudes of teachers and students towards teacher feedback reflected in English classroom teaching respectively?(3)What are the effects of different types of teacher feedback on classroom interaction?The purpose of this study is to give favorable support for English classroom teaching.Under such circumstances,the real situation of classroom interaction in a junior high school in Xinxiang is observed by means of classroom observations,questionnaires as well as interviews.This paper will investigate the types and distributions of teacher feedback with the aim of improving teachers’ verbal feedback behavior and achieve students’ participation in an English classroom.It also puts forward suggestions on how to construct an interactive and harmonious classroom.Combined with statistics,analysis and discussion of the data,the following results are obtained:(1)Presently,the application of teacher feedback in junior high school is still dominated by single feedback,and other mixed comments like clarification request and praise,guidance and self-correction,elaboration and so forth are less involved according to the investigation of the four teachers.Generally speaking,the types of feedback adopted by experienced teachers are more diverse,while some teachers who lack teaching experience adopt singular types of feedback.Compared with negative feedback,positive feedback is used frequently in English teaching,mainly in the form of simple praise,praise and repetition,encouragement and other forms of feedback.On the other hand,error correction is proven to be manifestly beneficial to the accuracy of language learning.(2)Teachers’ attitudes towards feedback are inconsistent with those of students.Regularly,teachers choose simple praise and repetition as basic feedback forms,while students desire teachers’ more diversified forms of feedback like praise and elaboration,praise and repetition,praise and elicitation and so forth.It suggests that students are prepared to participate in the activities with teachers’ guidance and inspiration.In the view of error-correcting feedback,teachers believe that implicit expression can be regarded as an appropriate way to reduce errors,while some students express their expectation of teachers’ error correction at suitable times and their desire to obtain correct language forms.(3)The effects of teacher feedback on classroom interaction is mainly manifested in two aspects: On the one hand,teacher feedback,as an important factor in classroom interaction,affects the fluency and accuracy of students’ language expression and the authenticity of communication.Therefore,different types of feedback have different effects on classroom interaction.Only effective feedback can inspire students’ language acquisition and language output so as to achieve a favorable classroom interaction.On the other hand,teacher feedback exerts a certain implicit effect on classroom interaction,in terms of emotion and attitude,which indirectly affects students’ classroom behavior and students’ initiative and enthusiasm to participate in the classroom.This statement is somewhat lopsided in that all kinds of teacher feedback can promote classroom interaction.In the aspect of positive feedback,single feedback can help improve students’ enthusiasm and relieve students’ tension,but the results are far beyond what the author expected.From the data,it is clear that positive feedback which includes elaboration,guidance and inspiration can enhance students’ classroom participation.It is also a type of feedback which is popular with students.The study also shows that diversified feedback can prolong turn-taking and provide students with more opportunities to communicate.Nevertheless,the improper utilization of error correction in classroom activities can interrupt the flow of teacher-student interaction.Moreover,no response may discourage students’ enthusiasm and affect their language acquisition.Therefore,it is imperative that teachers should constantly reflect on the methods of feedback in order to stimulate students’ thinking ability.