A Case Study On The Characteristics Of Thinking Level Of Teacher Talk In Senior High English Class

Teacher talk, in general, refers to the speech a teacher makes in the classroom aiming to undertake the teaching tasks. Teacher talk plays a vital role in guiding the whole teaching process and it is also a crucial media for student knowledge impartation. In recent years, the research on teacher talk has attracted many scholars’attention. Most of teacher talk research mainly focus on two parts. One is about the discourse, pronunciation, syntax and vocabulary of teacher talk. Another one is about the interactional modifications, amount, feedback and questioning patterns of teacher talk. However, previous studies neglect an important function of teacher talk that students’ thinking can be cultivated and inspired by teacher talk.It may become a serious problem if teachers pay no attention to guide students’ thinking skills in class. Some experts, such as Wen Qiufang, and ZhouYan, have expressed their worries on this topic in their empirical studies. He Qixin and Yin Tongsheng also points out that language skill training tends to emphasize imitation and memory, but ignore students’ability to think. It is also advocated in new curriculum standard of senior high school that to improve students’ability to think and to express in English. Teachers are the guiders and organizers in class and their speech can lead students to think deeply and effectively. So it is very necessary and urgent to do the study on the thinking levels of teacher talk in order to improve its quality.This research is carried out based on the socio-culture theory and takes the following two questions as research questions:(1) What are characteristics of teacher talk in terms of thinking levels in senior high school EFL classroom teaching in China? (2) What are the reasons attributing to the differences of teacher talk in relation to thinking levels among senior high school EFL teachers? In order to reflect the real classroom English teaching, classroom observation, audio recording and interview worked as research methods for data collection. Marzano’s New Taxonomy of Educational Objectives is used as the measuring tool to divide the teacher talk into different thinking levels.Two results can be obtained from this study:(1) Different thinking levels are involved in teacher talk. But higher-thinking levels are neglected by all the teachers. A large quantity of teacher talk just engages students in some simple repetitive and mechanical thinking activities. (2) A teacher’s teaching belief and teaching practice are the main reasons attributing to the differences of teacher talk in relation to thinking levels among teachers.Two innovations of this thesis can be reflected in this study:(1)Its measuring tool, Marzano’s taxonomy, which provides a feasible measuring tool to divide teacher talk. (2) Its theoretical base is Vygotsky’s socio-culture theory, which possibly offers a new theoretic framework for the research of this field. This study hopes to help the English teachers realize that students’thinking can be cultivated and inspired by teacher talk and wishes this kind of idea can be applied in classroom one day.