3.4 Data collection and results
3.4.1 Verbal communication between the teacher and students in terms of quantity
Analyzing from the proportion of these four kinds of interaction, we can see that classroom interaction focuses on interaction between the teacher and the whole class and that between the teacher and the student individual while interaction between students is infrequent. There is no interaction between the teacher and student groups.
As shown in Table 2, the frequency of interaction between the teacher and boys is close to that between the teacher and girls. The results of Table 3 display no distinct gender difference in class.
Table 4 shows that only nine students raise hands to answer questions voluntarily and nobody is willing to ask questions in class.
3.4.2 Verbal communication between the teacher and students in terms of quality
Seemingly, the total number of interaction is not small, but the duration is rather short. Each time interaction occurs, the teacher or students only mechanically read vocabularies or texts, translate sentences or practise grammatical structures with little real purposes. These are not real interaction.
3.4.3 Teacher’s nonverbal communication in class
Nonverbal cues are important parts of the communication system used for interactions. Many studies have established the importance of nonverbal communication in teaching. For example, Keith et al. determined that the nonverbal component of a classroom communication was more important than the verbal component (Smith, 1979: 633). Nonverbal signs happen as soon as the teacher enters the classroom, and cause psychological changes of students. In this part, the author designs a survey to examine the teacher’s nonverbal communications in class. The following chart shows party of the results.
We can find that all the students like the teacher smiling in class rather than bearing a serious expression. 80 students in 106 feel that their teacher smiles a lot in class and no one thinks that their teacher always pulls a long face, which indicates that the teacher does well in this respect.
The students express their appreciation to the teacher’s eye contact with them, and highlight that nothing is more annoying than teacher’s glaring at them. Nearly 77.4% of the 106 students praise their teacher’s eye contact with them.
The proximity of a teacher is also worth taking into account. As many as 100 students are satisfied with their teacher’s proximity between them while only six students resent that the teacher either is too close to or too far from them.
In the upshot, when asked whether the teacher’s suitable nonverbal cues will promote the students to listen more attentively and participate more actively, 76 students give the affirmative answer. In contrast, more than half are not sure whether the teacher’s disagreeable behavior will stifle their enthusiasm in class.
4. Discussion
Through the observation, questionnaire and interview, the three questions raised at the beginning of the third section can be summarized.
4.1 Discussion addressing the first question
Firstly, the teacher and students have limited time to interact with each other in class, and there is an imbalance among the patterns of interaction. Secondly, hardly anyone has bothered to raise hand to reply voluntarily so that the whole class often falls into silence after the teacher asks a question. Several reasons for the problems can be found:
There are too many students in a class. So individual student experiences a less intense contact with the teacher and receive fewer work and social contacts (Blatchford et al, 2002: 116). This is exactly true that only a quarter of the students had verbal communication with the teacher in observation
The exam-oriented education also causes a drawback that teachers and students attach no significance to those non-testing points. Because there is no oral test in the senior high school entrance examination there is no need to carry out much interaction which seems time consuming. This is also proved right as the teacher and four of five students admit that they think in this way in the interview.
In the observation, the teacher in some cases did arrange the discussion within a group but only having interaction with one student as the representative. The teacher attaches little weight to interaction with student groups.
However, foreign researches indicate that the interaction between the teacher and student groups will perform positive effects on the cultivation of students’ innovation and cooperation and the behavior of the whole class (Hall & Walsh, 2002: 188). So unawareness of the value of interaction between teacher and student groups may also cause restricted classroom interaction.
4.2 Discussion addressing the second question
As far as the author is concerned, the quality of classroom interaction should outweigh the quantity of it.
Unfortunately, the classroom teaching remains at pseudo-communication level according to the transcripts of classroom interaction and the model of foreign language teaching (Rivers, 1972). Rather than being a simple exercise to rehearse linguistic skills, authentic interactions would have the learners involved in action using language that potentially offers them opportunities to transform their reality (Haley & Austin, 2006: 18).
The problem can be reduced to two issues:
Teachers may not have the edge on students in terms of the basic language skills. In this view, it is not difficult to understand why there is a lack of authentic interaction in class.
Negotiation refers to interactional modification made by learners and their teachers to deal with communication problems. It is an essential part of interaction. However, the teacher has problems in conducting negotiation so the class is lack of meaningful interaction.
Example. (T= Teacher; S= Student)
T: Okay, we have finished listening to the tape, and what is the main idea of this paragraph?
S: It tells the boy’s idea about water and electricity.
T: Okay, very good. The boy tells us some differences and also similarities. (Turning on the PPT to show the answer)
In this fragment, the teacher was guiding the students to summarize the main idea of the paragraph. The student gave an ambiguous reply. Then the teacher praised the student and went on to project the answer in a short time without any negotiation with students. If the teacher could exploit the details of the text by asking questions such as in what way is water different from electricity? when the student provided the equivocal answer, then the negotiation might be successful.
4.3 Discussion addressing the third question
The teacher investigated behaves well in most cases. But in the questionnaire, the teacher is said to sometimes glare at her students or cross her arms in front of them, which has repercussions on students and interaction.
Much has been discussed about the significance of teachers’ nonverbal communication. And students, as well, need to understand the effects of their body movements and facial expressions make. In the classroom observation, some students looked back and forth and some just angled their heads to one side. These body language signals their true feelings that they are not interested in the lesson or their minds wander, making the classroom climate not that satisfactory.
.
5. Suggestion
5.1 Accepting a variety of answers
To alleviate students’ anxiety in class, it is wise for teachers not to let students feel that they must come up with the right answer every time a question is raised; there is not always one right answer and different answers and voices are welcome (Bailey & Nunan, 1996: 162). This strategy has proved effective in relieving students’ anxiety in classes and promoting students to interact with the teacher dynamically.
5.2 Establishing unthreatening classroom climate
Language learning needs to position the learner in a communicative mode that creates the energy and enthusiasm to generate interactive sentence (Alatis, 1993: 163). However, there is often a vacuity of enthusiasm in class so that students are reluctant to involve in interaction.
Teachers must gradually attenuate feelings of psychological distance, intensify humanistic care to students, and should be clear that they be tolerant of errors students make (Rivers, 2000: 9). If this kind of unthreatening relationship is established, the atmosphere of classes can be more active.
For students, all that they can do is to dismiss their misgivings. A good language learner should have a strong drive to communicate or learn from communication without fearing to make mistakes because it is mistakes that make a true learner.
5.3 Encouraging more panel discussions or group work
Encouraging more panel discussions or group work is a good way either enabling the teacher to reach every student or providing students with more chances to participate in interaction. On the one hand, both panel discussions and group work are cooperative activities, so a good sense of team spirit among students can be cultivated. On the other hand, they are more able to experiment and use the language than they are in a whole-class arrangement (Harmer, 2000: 21).
6. Conclusion
Given the importance of classroom interaction in language teaching, the thesis holds an inquiry to know about the real situation of classroom interaction in junior high schools.
To get rid of these problems, teachers should enhance their awareness of the importance of classroom interaction and try to create an unthreatening atmosphere. They had better step out of the limelight and to guide, but not to conduct students.
However, this study has been assessed in a restricted way. The sampling scope is relatively small and unable to give a complete picture of classroom interaction in junior high schools in the city. Classroom interaction in each grade has its distinctive characteristics, so a wide range of researches is required to arrive at a deeper understanding of this issue.
Reference
Alatis, James. (1993). Strategic Interaction and Language Acquisition: Theory, Practice and Research. Washington, D.C: Georgetown University Press.
Blatchford, P., Viv Moriarty, Suzanne Edmonds & Clare Martin. (2002). “Relationships between Class Size and Teaching: A Multimethod Analysis of English Infant Schools”. American Educational Research Journal. Vol.39.
Haley, Marjorie. and Theresa, Austin. (2006). Content-Based Second Language Teaching and Learning: An Interactive Approach. Beijing: World Publishing Corporation.
Harmer, J. (2000). How to Teach English. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
Hodge, Lewis. (1971). “Interpersonal Classroom Communication through Eye Contact”. Theory into Practice, Vol.10, 262-265.
Huang, Yuanshen & Zhu, Zhongyi. (2007). English Book 5. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.
Rivers, Wilga. (2000). Interactive Language Teaching. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, People Education Press & Cambridge University Press.
Smith, Howard. (1979). “Nonverbal Communication in Teaching”. Review of Educational Research, Vol.49, 631-645.
Bailey, Kathleen & Nunan, David. (1996). Voices from the Language Classroom: Qualitative Research in Second Language Education. London: Cambridge University Press.
Wu, Xiaoyan. (2006). A New Concept of Foreign Language Teaching Methodology. Zhejiang: Zhejiang University Press.
陈奎熹. 教育社会学研究（M）. 台北: 师大书苑有限公司, 1992。
程晓樵. 课堂互动中的机会均等（M）. 南京: 江苏教育出版社, 2003。
于浩. 中学英语课堂师生互动探究（D）.长春: 东北师范大学, 2006。
邹为诚, 刘蕴秋, 熊淑慧. “语言体验”的教育学理论研究（J）.中国外语, 2009(6):61-65。
Appendix
问卷调查
您好! 为了更好地了解上海初中英语课堂师生互动的情况和特点，特设置此份调查问卷。真诚地希望您能认真地填写，以保证我们研究结果的科学性。我们保证您填写的各项信息仅供研究参考之用，决不会以其他任何形式泄露出去。非常感谢您的合作！（本次问卷共两页）
年级：_________ 性别：_________
在你的英语课堂上，你的老师……?
衣着大方得体吗？________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
面带微笑吗？________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
会较长时间地注视你们或环顾四周吗？_______
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
4．会长时间地怒视你们吗？__________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
5．声音抑扬顿挫，富有节奏感吗？ __________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
6．站立、行走或走路的姿势懒散吗？____________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
7．在你们发言时，会与你们有眼神交流吗？_______
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
在你们发言时，身体会前倾吗？_________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
9．在你们发言时，会边听边做其他事情吗？____________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
10.在学生发言时，会左顾右盼吗？____________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
11.在你们发言或发言完毕时，老师会点点头，示意赞许吗？__________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
12.在你们分组交流时，会走到你们身边倾听吗？_________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
13.会背对着你们说话吗？_____
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
14.会双臂交叉抱在胸前或双手插在腰部吗？______
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
15.会用不同的手势来提醒你们应该做什么吗？（比如：竖起大拇指表示表扬同学；把手掌心向外靠在耳朵后表示让发言的同学大点声等等）_____________
A. 经常 B. 偶尔 C. 从不
16. 你喜欢老师上课时的哪些行为举止？（可多选）_____________
A. 微笑 B. 表情严肃 C. 目光温和、环视四周
D. 怒视大家 E. 声音抑扬顿挫，富有感染力
F. 站姿端庄、不懒散 G. 与同学有眼神交流
H. 同学发言时身体前倾 I. 同学发言时，边听边作其他的事
J. 同学发言时背对着他 K. 同学发言完毕，点头微笑以示赞许
L. 分组交流时走到同学身边倾听 M. 双臂交叉抱在胸前或双手插在腰部
N. 竖起大拇指表示表扬同学
17. 你不喜欢老师上课时的哪些行为举止？（可多选）_____________
A. 微笑 B. 表情严肃 C. 目光温和、环视四周
D. 怒视大家 E. 声音抑扬顿挫，富有感染力
F. 站姿端庄、不懒散 G. 与同学有眼神交流
H. 同学发言时身体前倾 I. 同学发言时，边听边作其他的事
J. 同学发言时背对着他 K. 同学发言完毕，点头微笑以示赞许
L. 分组交流时走到同学身边倾听 M. 双臂交叉抱在胸前或双手插在腰部
N. 竖起大拇指表示表扬同学
18.你会因为老师上课时得体的举止（优雅的站姿，善意的微笑，会意的眼神等）而更愿意认真听讲，积极参与到课堂的互动当中吗？_____________
A. 是 B. 不是 C. 说不清
19.你会因为老师上课的举止令你讨厌（懒散的姿势，死板的表情，凶恶的眼神等）而不愿认真听讲，不参加课堂活动，甚至课上做别的事情呢？_____________
A. 是 B. 不是 C. 说不清
本次问卷到此结束，感谢您的配合！
by
tedwula (student)
