A Study On Classroom Silence Of English Postgraduates

The classroom is a special environment for interaction between students and teachers.The teacher asks questions,guides the students,and the students actively communicate and express their opinions after thinking about the questions,which is a process of positive interaction.However,classroom silence has become a common phenomenon in English teaching.In China,more teachers tend to use the communicative approach in English teaching,but the effects are not as positive as expected.In fact,currently class teaching is still dominated by teachers,students may behave in a silent,passive manner and less motivated to participate in class interaction,resulting in a depressing classroom atmosphere,which directly affects teaching effectiveness as well as student development.As advanced English learners,English postgraduates should have a higher proficiency of English and language self-confidence than other students.Unfortunately there is students’ silence in the classroom among English postgraduates.Why does this phenomenon exist even for advanced learners majoring in English? Is this silence in the classroom an isolated phenomenon or is it widespread in all of those classrooms? Therefore,it is necessary to study the situation and influencing factors of classroom silence of English postgraduates.However,the current research on classroom silence mainly focuses on primary and secondary school classrooms or undergraduate English classrooms,but less on the classrooms of English majors,especially for English postgraduates.Therefore,this study tries to investigate the situation of classroom silence among graduate students majoring in English,analyze the influencing factors,and give corresponding suggestions of countermeasures to solve the problem in order to provide some help for English teaching and learning.The specific research questions are as follows: 1.What is the situation of classroom silence of English postgraduates? 2.What are the factors that influence classroom silence of English postgraduates?In this study,English postgraduates in a university were selected as the research subjects,and the research methods of classroom observation,questionnaire survey and interview were used to conduct the study.Firstly,a semester classroom observation in two courses with a participatory approach were conducted.Information was collected and analyzed on the common classroom silence phenomenon in English postgraduates’ classrooms.Subsequently,an electronic questionnaire was distributed to 88 English postgraduates in university,and data from82 subjects were successfully collected.In addition,three subjects were randomly selected for a 10-minute semi-structured interview.Finally,the integrated and filtered data and information from classroom observation,questionnaire survey and interview were analyzed by SPSSAU software to explore the influencing factors that contribute to students’ classroom silence.The results show that there is a common silence in English postgraduates’ classroom to some extent.Most students were used to keeping silent in the classroom and there is less effective classroom interaction between teachers and students,resulting in a depressing classroom atmosphere.The data analysis of this study revealed that student-related factors and cultural factors are the main influencing factors of students’ classroom silence,while teacher-related factors and environmental factors also have a negative impact on students’ classroom silence.To cope with the negative impact of classroom silence on teaching and learning,this thesis proposed corresponding countermeasures based on the research results and analysis of the influencing factors: creating a harmonious classroom atmosphere;improving students’ English oral proficiency;focusing on students’ personality and psychological state;improving the traditional education culture.This study may help teachers have a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of the influencing factors of the silence in English majors’ classroom among graduate students,and furthermore,this study might be helpful for students to understand classroom silence correctly,cultivate their awareness of active learning,make them realize the importance of improving their English communicative competence and actively participate in class interaction so as to improve their learning effectiveness.At the same time,teachers are suggested to improve their teaching mode and teaching strategies to break the silence and enliven the classroom atmosphere,so as to achieve the purpose of mutual promotion of teaching and learning between teachers and students.