Teacher Talk Analysis Of Chinese Immersion Program In America

Teacher talk refers to the language used by second language teachers in the classroom.It exerts influence on students’ second language acquisition.Therefore,it is very important to study teacher talk.From 2017 to 2018,the author applied to work as a Chinese teacher in a public school in Canyons School District,Utah.When teaching there,the author found that Chinese immersion teaching features in that teachers use 100% of the target language in the classroom.As for the students,they are supposed to learn not only Chinese language,but also mathematics and science in the Chinese classroom.Though facing such challenge,students in Chinese immersion program have better Chinese language acquisition and academic performance than nonimmersion program.This study takes Chinese immersion teachers in Canyons School District,Utah as the research object,collects the corpus of Chinese immersion teachers’ classroom teaching,transcribes them into texts,and combines classroom observation,relevant literature and teacher interviews to makes a quantitative analysis of Chinese immersion teacher talk from four aspects:the amount of teacher-student discourse,teacher questioning,teacher feedback and interactive adjustment.The results show that,in terms of the amount of teacher-student talk,the amount of Chinese immersion teachers talk is small,the amount of student talk is large,and students have the opportunity to output discourse.The classroom obviously reflects the characteristics of student-centered teaching.The amount of teacher talk in Chinese immersion language class is smaller than that in non-language class while the amount of student talk in Chinese immersion language class is larger than that in non-language class.In terms of the types of teacher questioning,Chinese immersion teachers tend to choose display questions.In terms of teacher questioning methods,chorus answering is the major questioning method.In terms of teacher feedback,Chinese immersion teachers tend to use discoursal feedback rather than evaluative feedback,which shows teacher focus more on the content and meaning of students’ answers rather than the form.In terms of interactive adjustment,Chinese immersion teachers mostly use confirmation verification,followed by comprehension verification,and finally clarification request.The research results of this paper will provide some enlightenment for international Chinese teaching.Teachers should control teachers talk and increase student talk,allocate questioning types according to students’ language level,choose various questioning methods,use discoursal feedback method,and appropriately use different discourse strategies.