A Study Of English Teacher's Talk In Senior High School From The Perspective Of Interpersonal Function

Teacher's Talk(TT)refers to the language used by teachers in classroom which guides or organizes teachers' teaching in class.TT is not only one of the approaches of language input for learners,but also regarded as a teaching medium in language classroom.In the context of classroom,TT mainly reflects the interaction between teachers and students,and TT can instruct teachers' teaching.At present,the studies of TT focus more on the language features.However,the study of the interpersonal function of TT is ignored in the context of classroom.The theory of interpersonal function of Halliday's Systemic Functional Linguistics(SFL)is applied in this thesis.The interpersonal function of TT is analyzed from two perspectives of mood and modality,which reveals the interpersonal function of teacher-student discourse interaction in senior high school English classrooms.The purpose is to improve both the quality of TT and English teaching in high schools and the relationship between teachers and students so as to establish an equal and harmonious atmosphere in the classroom.In this thesis,the data analysis is based on the naturalistic enquiry.Three English teachers from the middle school attached to Sichuan Normal University are chosen as the research objects.Recording pen is used to respectively record two teachers' TT in their reading class,and one teacher's TT in her vocabulary class without any interference and control.Then the recording materials are transferred into written forms so as to do further analysis.According to Halliday's theory of interpersonal function,this thesis is mainly concerned with the analysis of TT in high school English classroom from two aspects of mood and modality system.In the mood system,the subject personal pronouns and the interrogatives are further researched.In the modality system,the ways of modal expressions are listed,which indicate that teachers act as different roles in classroom such as a negotiator,an assistant and a guider.At the same time,this thesis explores the equal and harmonious relationship between teachers and learners,which teachers are trying to build up.The study in this thesis results in the following:From the perspective of mood system,the usage of subject personal pronouns is a suggestion of the teacher's belief of pursuing an equal relationship with the learners.From the perspective of the theory of interpersonal function,the purpose of using lots of interrogatives in the context of English classroom is to give instructions to and guide students,and to organize classroom better,which reveals that teachers are trying their best to build an equal and harmonious atmosphere in the classroom.From the perspective of modality system,teachers play different roles such as negotiators,helpers and guides,which contributed to promoting the establishment of an equal and harmonious relationship between teachers and students.Therefore,in the classroom,the high frequency appearance of teachers' short praise,the guidance of WH-interrogatives and students' positive feedback are very beneficial for students to understand the topic and develop students' creative ability,and to improve students' communicative competence,which play an important part in establishing a harmonious and friendly relationship between teachers and students.