A Study On The Factors Affecting Students' Silence In Middle School English Classroom

Classroom interactions refer to the oral interactions that occur between teachers and students, and those among students. Classroom interaction plays an important part in improving students' English proficiency. With the gradual deepening of the new curriculum, it requires that the previous single teaching model should be changed to explore a collaborative teaching model and emphasizes the important role of class formation, which requires active participation in classroom interaction between teachers and students. However, in the English classroom, many teachers find that only a small number of high- proficiency students raise their hands to speak. Even if teachers encourage or even ask other students to answer, they remain silent. This thesis is aimed to explore the factors underlining the phenomenon of classroom silence.This thesis is to investigate to what extent teacher traits, student traits and classroom surroundings influence students' silence in ELF classroom contexts through classroom observation, interview and questionnaire. It involves 120 students and 6 teachers. The research has yielded the following findings: for teachers, their style, teaching organization form, communication style and the relations between the teacher and the student are highly correlated. With respect to students, their language ability, character, and the longstanding passive learning habits are the reasons for their classroom silence. Regarding classroom surroundings, classroom atmosphere and class size affect studenes' paticipation in the classroom interaction. It is suggested that teachers should take a flexible approach to create a relaxed classroom environment, to create a harmonious teacher-student relationship; students should be aware of the neglective effect and enhance their self-confidence in learning .The research is of some implications for language teaching in middle schools of China.