A Comparative Study On Teachers’ Feedback In EFL Classrooms Between Novice And Experienced Teachers In Junior Middle School

Teachers’ feedback,as an indispensable part of teachers’ talk,has been playing a vital role in classroom teaching.Effective teachers’ feedback,functioning as an important source of comprehensible language input,is not only a bridge between teachers and students,but also a key to stimulating students’ interests.In addition,English Curricular Standards in the Phase of Compulsory Education(2011)points out that positive emotional attitude is beneficial for promoting students’ autonomous learning and independent development.Therefore,teachers need to attach importance to their feedback strategies,keeping a close eye on students’ emotion so as to build an excellent teaching atmosphere.Currently a rich number of studies have been conducted on teachers’ feedback at home and abroad.In terms of comparative paradigm,most of the studies focus on the comparison between novice teachers and expert teachers.As is well known,an experienced teacher lies in the transition stage from a novice teacher to an expert teacher;however,only a smaller number of studies focus on the contrast between them.In view of this situation,it is necessary to do a research on comparing feedback between novice teachers and experienced teachers,which is theoretically and realistically significant.Based on the Comprehensive Input Hypothesis,Output Hypothesis and Interaction Hypothesis,the author selected six teachers(three experienced teachers and three novice teachers)as well as 220 students from Xi’an Foreign Language School to be the research participants.Through classroom observation,questionnaires and interview,this study attempts to answer the following three questions:(1)What are the cognitive statuses of the two types of teachers about teachers’ feedback?(2)What are the differences of feedback between novice and experienced teachers in term of type and frequency?(3)What are the influences of teachers’ feedback on students’ learning? To investigate the research questions,the collected data are analyzed by Excel and SPSS.It can be seen that novice teachers pay less attention to the vital importance of teachers’ feedback by comparison than the veterans do.It is also found that there is no significant difference between novice teachers’ and experienced teachers’ single feedback on the types of teachers feedback,while experienced teachers often use more various types of mixed feedback than novice teachers.When it comes to the frequency of single feedback,there is no significant difference between the positive feedback and repetition,however,as for mixed feedback,novice teachers use explicit correction more frequently than experienced teachers.There is no doubt that teachers’ feedback functions as a critical part in classroom teaching.Proper feedback is not only an objective evaluation of students,but also a power to arouse students’ enthusiasm,which encourages students to think independently.Based on the findings of the research,some implications on teachers’ feedback are put forward.First of all,novice teachers should attach importance to teachers’ feedback,especially the mixed feedback in class.In order to employ mixed feedback,they should try to be familiar with textbook ahead of time and make a proper lesson plan,which can save time for using complex feedback.In addition,novice teachers should summarize feedback-using-methods,learning humbly from experienced teachers so that the transition from novice teachers to experienced teachers can be accelerated.Moreover,in view of the vital importance of teachers’ feedback,all the teachers should keep a close eye on students’ attitudes,especially their preference.Therefore,teachers need to make a regular self-reflection on their class organization,thus employing efficient feedback strategies.