| With the development of science and technology,various modalities are used at the same time to transfer information.Thus,people began to analyze the meaningful discourse composed of various modalities,which is called as Multimodal Discourse Analysis(MDA).In class,various modalities are used by teachers to transfer information.Therefore,people began to make MDA of teachers’ discourse in class.As for English teachers’ discourse in class,making MDA of it can enhance teachers’ awareness and ability to use various modalities in teaching,improve the quality of English teaching and ultimately motivate students’ interest in English learning and improve their ability to use English.However,the focus of the current researches on English teachers’ multimodal discourse was mainly on college and middle school teachers’ competition and demonstration classes.There is little research on primary school English teachers’ normal classes.Based on this,three excellent English teachers coming from Y primary school in a county of Hohhot are chosen as the subjects in this research.According to Visual Grammar proposed by Kress and Theo van Leeuwen(1996,2006)and the Synthetic Theoretical Framework of Multimodal Discourse Analysis proposed by Zhang(2009),the three teachers’ 6 teaching videos which are new and normal lessons are annotated and analyzed through classroom observation and the annotation tool,ELAN,so as to answer the following three questions:1.For the three excellent primary school English teachers,what are the main features of their multimodal discourse in the new lessons?2.For the three excellent primary school English teachers,what are the features of their multimodal discourse in different teaching stages?3.How do different modalities work together to construct representational,interactive and compositional meanings in the new lessons?The results show that: 1.In the new lessons,in terms of verbal modalities,the teachers mainly use pure language to explain knowledge,raise questions,give feedback,etc.and falling intonation is used more frequently than rising intonation;in terms of non-verbal modalities,gaze,gesture,proxemics and PPT are the main non-verbal modalities used in class.Among them,gaze is used to express the meaning of offer and demand.Gesture is used to better express the teachers’ meaning.Distance between the teachers and the students are changed by the teachers so as to have a better communication with the students.PPT is used to provide information.Besides,nodding,shaking the head,smiling and blackboard are used less frequently.2.In different teaching stages,the features of the three teachers’ multimodal discourse are as follows: in beginning stage,they mainly use proxemics,gaze,pure language and intonation to greet with the students and start the class;in lead-in stage,they mainly use proxemics,gaze,pure language,intonation,gesture and PPT to gradually step into the new lessons;in text comprehension stage,all the modalities are largely used to help teachers better explain the teaching content;in activities stage,the modalities are also largely used,especially nodding,shaking the head and smiling;in homework stage,they use proxemics,pure language,intonation,gaze,gesture,PPT and blackboard to show homework to the students.3.In the new lessons,various modalities work together to construct the three meanings.Among them,representational meaning is mainly realized by pure language,gesture,gaze and PPT;interactive meaning is mainly realized by pure language,gaze,distance and PPT;compositional meaning is mainly realized by PPT.Based on the research results,the author suggests that in the future teaching,teachers should firstly pay attention to the use of non-verbal modalities;then,they should use various modalities correctly and appropriately;finally,they should learn to use PPT,blackboard and other teaching tools to assist teaching. |
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