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论中学英语教师课堂用语的有效性(一)
论中学英语教师课堂用语的有效性厦门外国语学校 吕妹仔
【Abstract】 In secondary schools, English teachers’ classroom language takes an important role in students’ language learning. There is plenty of room for improvement in teachers’ classroom performance, as most of them are suffering from language inadequacy. Ideal teachers are supposed to make good use of their voices to stimulate students to learn as well as have an adequate command of the language they are teaching. Great attention should be attached to the creativity and flexibility in teachers’ language. Besides, English teachers are expected to seize every chance to have natural communication with students in the target language. The quality of English teachers’ classroom language, to a large extent, determines how a lesson can progress and how effectively the students can learn the target language. It can be believed that a pleasant and effective classroom environment will be set up through English teachers’ efforts.
【Key Words】 classroom language; effectiveness; real communication; language learning；Input Hypothesis; classroom environment
【摘 要】 英语教师的课堂用语对学生的语言习得起着至关重要的作用。因为目前大多数教师存在着语言能力的不足，所以教师在课堂用语方面还有很大的空间以待提高。优秀的教师应当很好地利用他们的嗓音去调动学生的学习激情，应当在所教授的语言方面有扎实的功底。语言的创新和多样性应当为教师所重视。此外，英语教师应当在课堂上把握任何一次同学生用目标语言交流的机会。英语教师课堂用语的质量高低在很大程度上决定了一堂课的进展情况，决定了学生们能否有效地掌握目标语言。我们有理由相信，通过英语教师的努力，学生们将拥有一个愉悦且有效的课堂语言环境。
【关键词】 课堂用语; 有效性; 真实交流; 语言习得; 语言输入假说; 课堂环境
1. Introduction
As an English teacher in middle school, the author got to realize the significance of teachers’ outstanding classroom language, which urges the author to have discussion in this essay. Through this thesis, the author mean to give a brief analysis to the existent problems and more significantly, seek to find appropriate ways for improvement in English teaching of secondary schools in China. This essay might be, to some extent, helpful for middle school English teachers to improve the quality of their classroom language. From the point of students’ language learning, teachers are supposed to establish ideal models for students through fluent presentation. Apart from this, the communication between teachers and students is essential because of its emotional impact on students’ motivation to learn a second language. Ideal classroom environment will be set up provided English teachers use classroom language effectively.
2. Language inadequacy non- native speaker English teachers suffer from
As a fundamental quality of an English teacher, he must have an adequate command of the language he is teaching. If he suffers from hesitations and uncertainties in his control of the language that are recognized as such by his learners, if he makes errors or is inconsistent in his control of grammar, meaning or usage, then his grasp of the language is inadequate for his job and it becomes an impediment to the learning of his pupils (Strevens, 1977:31). According to the author’s observation and survey, most English teachers in middle schools of China are in an embarrassing situation, suffering from such language inadequacy, which urgently needs transformation.
The major drawbacks of English teachers’ classroom language are as follows:
Too much Chinese in class
Occasionally, mother tongue may still be useful in an English lesson, especially when it would take a long time to explain the meaning or use of a new word in English. However, too much Chinese should not be allowed, as it would undermine the language atmosphere.
By speaking too much Chinese in class, teachers fail to establish English as the main language of communication between their students and themselves. Because of cultural differences, mother tongue sometimes becomes an obstacle in learning a second language. That is why Chinese students speak and write a lot of Chinglish.
2.2 Monotony and boredom
In English class, mere repetition of an expression would bore students. Some teachers give the same feedback, like “good” to students’ answers every day, so that their students fail to learn that there are so many vivid expressions for appreciating something, such as “marvelous”, “fantastic”, “wonderful”, “cool” and “well done”. What’s worse, it will result in students’ loss of interest in English.
In most classrooms there is very little reason or opportunity for students or teachers to reveal themselves to each other: the relationship is a formal and formalized one for which conventionalities suffice. The teacher is there to teach; the students are there to learn what the teacher or the administration thinks they should learn. The usual greetings are exchanged, conventional questions are asked about materials presented aurally or graphically, and conventional answers arising from the material are expected. Common remarks that may be heard are: “Come to the point, Johnny. We’re not interested in your personal history’, “Don’t ask silly questions’; “That’s nothing to do with it. Didn’t you hear the questions?” As John Holt describes, students may employ mechanisms to defend themselves in class and protect their real selves from the humiliation and embarrassment. The emotional needs of individuals must be understood by teachers if the students are to achieve their maximum potential.
2.3 Non- real communication
The real communicative practice between teachers and students are rare. In order to improve students’ oral English, teachers simply ask them to recite a large number of dialogues, without helping them to apply the language in real contexts. Thus, students’ communicative ability is not improved virtually.
Interaction has always been the most neglected part of the language activities in which we engage in the classroom. This situation will not improve unless definite steps are taken to include substantial interaction activities in each lesson. Because “real” communication for our students takes place in the native language, it is not surprising that they need some stimulus to use the foreign language for natural purpose. Interaction does not take place in a void. It is not enough to put several people together; there must also be some situational element that naturally elicits an interchange. Interaction is a purposeful person-to-person affair in speech and in most kinds of writing. This interpersonal character of interaction explains why so much of foreign-language teaching and learning remains at the production or pseudo-communication level.
2.4 Errors
Non native-speaker teachers of English can hardly manage to teach natural English unless they themselves are persistent in learning. Mistakes made in the classroom by teachers would mislead students, especially when the teachers are their first guides to the new language.
3. Ideal classroom language
Though many people advocate that today’s English lessons in middle schools should be “student-centered”, teachers’ important role can never be overemphasized. Middle school students are in a critical period for language learning. They learn primarily through imitation. According to imitation theory, language is a special kind of behavior and to acquire a language is a matter of acquiring a targeted behavior. It follows that children are supposed to acquire their mother tongue through imitating the language they are exposed to (Skinner, 1968). It is nearly the same case with adolescence when they are trying to acquire a second language. English teachers are supposed to offer excellent models for their students. “Student-centered” should never be put in the way that teachers need to talk as little as possible and give the whole floor to students. On the contrary, the quality of English teachers’ classroom language, to a large degree, determines how a lesson can progress and how effectively the students can learn the target language.
Generally speaking, communication competence is taken to be the objective of language teaching. Communication requires interpersonal responsiveness, rather than the mere production of language, which is truthful, honest, accurate, stylistically pleasing, etc. Thus, teachers should be able to teach their students how to communicate in English, not just how to do grammar exercise or choose A B C or D as the correct answer. To do this, teachers should aim, not only to teach English in English, but also to exploit the genuine communicative situations that arise in the classroom for meaningful language practice. Such exploitation is also demanding on the flexibility of teachers’ classroom language. Gwynneth Thurburn wrote: “Children have to be won, to be made interested, and thrilled… Voice and speech of the teacher play an incalculable part (1939:167).”
3.1 The power of voice
The impact of one’s voice is magnificent. George Eliot said that she thought voices go deeper into us than other things. Walt Whitman wrote in Leaves of Grass “Whoever speaks to me in the right voice, him or her shall I follow (1947:93).”
Ideal English teachers usually use their voices skillfully to stimulate their students to learn. They work to control their volume, pitch, rate, pauses, vocal variety, pronunciation and articulation. They have strong flexible voices to show enthusiasm, to control, reprimand and praise, to be able to “boom” when necessary, and enjoy the feel and sounds of words. Those teachers become better models for their students. In the same way, students respond better to a “stroking” voice and enjoy more difficult stories when the teacher reads well.
3.2 The glamour of spoken word
3.2. 1 Teachers’ creativity in language
Krashen’s Input Hypothesis claims that human beings acquire language in only one way — by understanding messages, or by receiving comprehensible input (1985:2). Krashen devotes 15 pages to the (rather convincing) evidence supporting the IH, relying primarily on experimental data. Some glottodidactic corollaries of the IH are of great interest:
—“Give enough comprehensible input, the necessary grammar is covered in sufficient quantity.” (Krashen, 1985:5)
—Acquisition depends on comprehensible input, not on simple “exposure” to the language:
—A teacher’s “simplified talk”, often refused in the name of authenticity, may make input comprehensible;
—Speech will emerge after a sufficient quantity of input has built a solid “acquired competence”.
According to IH, it is evident that language learning can take place when the learner has enough access to input in the target language. This input may come in written or spoken form (Hu Zhuanglin, 2001:370). In the case of spoken input, English teachers take an irreplaceable role. Since they nearly organize an English class for their students each day, they enjoy the precious chance to influence their students.
Students are motivated by fun and it is the most important ingredient in a successful class. Some words in style like “cool”, “come on baby” will help English teachers a lot with class control and basic communications. It also shows students that the teacher is trying to learn their language, give and take, mutual respect.
Excellent English teachers bring something new to class each time without repeating what they said last time. They teach students alternative ways of saying the same thing. For example, if they say, “Open the door please” this time, next time they would say “Would you please open the door” or “Do you mind opening the door for me?” In this way, psychologically students’ interests would be boomed and materially they would learn to use different expressions step by step. In a word, teachers’ creativity will lead to students’ proficiency in English. What matters in the class is the working relationship between the teacher and students. The creativity of the teacher, the involvement of the students and the language they both speak, the communication between them, are at the heart of learning.
3.2.2 Sympathetic communication
Spontaneous communication and free interaction are possible in any language only when teachers and their students have built up a warm, uninhibited, confident, sympathetic relationship and when such a relationship also exists among the students themselves. In the first lessons no such state of affair exists as yet. The teacher’s efforts from the beginning should be devoted to building up such relationships through enjoyable, successful experiences in using interesting and amusing segments of language in a multiplicity of ways so that students begin to feel that they can express real concerns through this new medium and that it is exhilarating to do so. This confident attitude, so essential to development of future speaking skill, is very fragile and can be stifled quite early by a situation where the teacher has the advantage of fluency and is inevitably right while the student is uncertain, groping, and for the most part wrong. Early interaction practice calls for self-restraint and tact on the part of the teacher. Much confident self-expression is possible even at a very early stage once the students understand the rules of the game — that you do the most you can with the little you have in some meaningful activities shared with others in the group, and that the teacher is there not to condemn but to give a helping hand, a gentle reminder.
3.2.3 Situations for “real” communication — “ try-out”
Wilga M. Rivers compares language to a vehicle of expression:
Language is a vehicle of meaning that we do not even realize we are using; in other words, a vehicle that is transporting a person’s message somewhere but is not itself the object of the trip. Before students can use such a vehicle for their purposes it must be constructed, and this construction requires a blueprint and various stages of production, with tryouts as the various sections and combinations are assembled — tryouts during which what has been assembled to date is used, if only momentarily, for its ultimate purpose. With our language vehicle this ultimate purpose is expression: people revealing themselves to, or disguising or hiding themselves from, other people. Expression involves all the problems of interpersonal relations. For this reason it is frequently less painful for teachers and students to continue working on the construction of the vehicle than to try it out for level of performance (1996: 98-105).
Construction is not, however, the use of the vehicle. It is only through such tryouts that the operation of the vehicle can be smoothly integrated; the faults corrected; and the user gain confidence in handling it. Therefore, in every lesson, teachers and students’ production of language must be regarded as preliminary to actually trying out what is being learned so that from the earliest stages all learning activities lead to some form of real communication rather than remaining at the level of pseudo communication through imposed utterances.
3.3 non-verbal languages
Non-verbal communication, that is, communication by means of movements and gestures is commonly used in daily life. People are communicating through their movements, posture and mannerisms everyday without realizing it.
The most successful trial lawyers are those who can look at a jury and a judge and pick up little cues that tip off what people are thinking. An observant lawyer may notice that the judge is compressing his lips into a thin line as the lawyer is speaking. That is a common sign people use when they disagree or are becoming annoyed. A smart lawyer will quickly try a new approach (Givens, 1996:74-78).
English teachers should make good use of such silent language, as it is supplementary to verbal language in classroom. Positive nonverbal feedback from teachers — in the form of making eye contact, paying attention when students speak and letting them know that they understand their strength and weakness — can make all the difference in the world in removing barriers to the learning process.
4. The way to improve classroom language
Teaching English through English
According to Jane Willis, teaching English through English basically means that teachers should speak and use English in the classroom as often as they possibly can, for example when organizing teaching activities or chatting to their students socially (1981:2). In the author’s understanding, English teachers should seize every chance to communicate with their students in the target language in classroom.
When teachers speak English, the children receive listening practice, which is a necessary and helpful step before students learn to understand English at normal speed. Common classroom language will impress students a lot and enhance their understanding and memorizing of certain expressions. Teachers’ fluency in presentation and organization will probably gain rewarding appreciation from their students.
Another reason for the emphasis of teachers’ language is that school environment created by a teacher is an ideal one for children to learn language. Vivas and Goredeckis had a study in 1980 examining comprehension and expression in Spanish in 58 preschool children ranging in age from 3 years 6 month to 6 years. There were three groups, each placed in a different experimental condition: (a) listening to stories read aloud systematically at home everyday for 60 days; (b) being read to in the school environment, by a special teacher, also for 60 days; and (c) not exposed to story reading. The children in the school situation showed better performance in receptive language (assessed by 2 tests) than children in the control group. The results stem from the specially motivating situation the story-reading teacher created and the social interaction stimulated by it (Vivas, 1996:89-216). Accordingly, in middle schools, English teachers are supposed to create motivating situations by putting students in a genial foreign language atmosphere.
4.2 Attitude teachers should hold toward errors
The structuralist linguists follow the behaviouristic view that to learn is to change old habits and build new habits. In their opinion errors occur when the learner fails to respond correctly to a particular stimulus in the second language, this is because the features of the second language differ from those of the native language and the learner tends to carry over features of the native language into the second language. In other words, the learner fails to change his old habits so as to acquire new habits of the second language. Since an error may serve as a negative stimulus, which reinforces “ bad habits”, it should not be allowed to occur (Hu Zhuanglin, 2001:374-375).
Probably influenced by this type of theory, some teachers are critical about their students’ performance. Corrections occur frequently during students’ performance, which, in the author’s opinion, is not an effective way to promote students’ learning.
Learning a language involves making constant hypotheses about the structure of the target language. The learner tests his own hypothesis against what the native speaker says. The errors he makes are actually his incorrect hypothesis about the new language. The post-structuralists, therefore, regard errors as evidence of the learning process. By making hypothesis about the targeted language, the learner arrives at a particular interlanguage. Then he modifies his hypothesis and goes towards the targeted language (ibid). Thus, teachers need not make corrections unless when necessary and it is better to put corrections after rather than during students’ presentation and they should studiously avoid grammar discussion unless absolutely necessary. When students are learning something new, praise and encouragement are needed. Teachers are supposed to enthusiastically praise any attempt to speak, regardless of errors. Therefore, teachers need such kind of classroom language: “That is OK. But…” “No bad. But pay attention to …” or “ I understand what he was trying to say when he said ‘…’, but we usually say it ‘…’”
4.3 Flexibility in Language
Catering to different needs, teachers are expected to use varied classroom language. For example:
(1) Class usually begins with greeting, though, teachers should not hasten to begin the new lesson. In Jane Willis’ opinion, a short, informal chat at the beginning of the lesson would help students to do well in English (1981:6). If it is the first lesson after a holiday, teachers can begin a chat like this: “ Well, did you have a good holiday?” After some students’ responses, they can try to develop the talking in this way: “Can you tell me more about that?” What’s more, if teachers find that something new has happened to a certain student, they can make some comments: Oh, you’ve got a new shirt on. It is very nice.
(2) Some words like “OK”, “Right”, “Now”, “Alright” can be used to introduce a new stage in the lesson. These words are sometimes called “marker” words because they mark places in classroom dialogue when something new is going to happen.
(3) Interruptions in lessons can be used for communicative language practice. If a student is late, teachers should seize this chance to make a real dialogue with the student by asking, “Did you miss the bus or forget the time?”
5. Conclusion
On the whole, English teachers’ classroom language carries great weight in the teaching process. English teachers in China are supposed to show the glamour of this music-like language to students and stimulate them to learn effectively by means of creating a pleasant classroom environment with colorful and appropriate classroom language. The author hopes that this essay will remind English teachers to improve their classroom language and serve as a good suggestion for their classroom performances.
References
⒈ Givens, David, What Body Language Can Tell You What Words Cannot [A]. English Book for English Majors, volume 5 [C]. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Publisher, 1996: 74-78.
⒉ Krashen, Stephen D., The Input Hypothesis: Issues and Implication, Language Learning [J]. England: Longman, 1985.
⒊ Rivers, WilgM. Language Teaching and Learning [A]. English Book for English Majors,
Volume 6 [C]. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Publisher. 1996:98-105.
⒋ Skinner, B.F. The Technology of Teaching [M]. New York: Appleton, 1968.
⒌ Strevens, O.Peter, New Orientation in the Teaching of English [M]. England: London publisher, 1977.
⒍ Thurburn, Gwynneth, Voice and Speech, An Introduction London Nisbet [M]. London: London Publisher, 1939:167.
⒎ Vivas, Eleowora, Effects of Story Reading on Language, Language Learning [J]. V46 No.2, 1996: 89-216.
⒏ Whitman, Walt, Leaves of Grass [M]. London: J.M.Dent.1947: 93.
⒐ Willis, Jane, Teaching English through English [M]. England: Longman House, 1981.
⒑ 胡壮鳞, ed., Linguistics. A Course Book [M]。北京: 北京大学出版社, 2001.
（该论文获得全国外国语学校第九届教育科研论文评审三等奖）
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