A Comparative Study Of Classroom Instructions Between Novice And Expert English Teachers In Junior High Schools

Teacher’s instructions are one of the important types of teacher talk used by teachers to ask student to do things in class.Effective instructions are conducive to students’ quick understanding and reaction.Much research has been conducted on classroom instructions at home and abroad,but a comparative study of novice and expert teachers’ classroom instructions is still of great value.Thus,based on speech act theory and input hypothesis,this study focuses on the following three research questions:(1)What are the differences between novice teachers and expert teachers in the features of instructions?(2)What are novice teachers and expert teachers’ perceptions of classroom instructions?(3)What are the problems of novice teachers’ and expert teachers’ instructions?To answer the above questions,three expert teachers and three novice teachers and their students from X junior high school in Hangzhou are chosen as the participants.And the classroom observation is conducted by recording and analyzing six teachers’ instructions.After that,the teachers are interviewed to explore their perceptions of classroom instructions.At the same time,through a questionnaire,the students’ attitudes towards teachers’ instructions are investigated.After a semester of study,the research results are showed as follows:(1)In terms of linguistic forms,novice teachers address more VP(verb phrase)and elliptical sentences to establish authority from the perspective of direct instructions.As for indirect instructions,expert teachers give instructions in the form of feasibility and the form of suggestory formulae more frequently.At lexical level,expert teachers apply higher-level cognitive instructions more frequently than novice teachers.In terms of functions,novice teachers give fewer requests and suggestions,while much more commands and classroom regulating instructions which show teacher’s authority than expert teachers.(2)All teachers attach great importance to classroom instructions,but lack theoretical knowledge about instructions and do not have a comprehensive understanding of effective instructions.Meanwhile,both novice teachers and expert teachers have reflective awareness which embodies their professionalism,while novice teachers spend more time on reflecting and more systematically.(3)Both novice and expert teachers have their own problems.Novice teachers lack high-cognitive demanding instructions and their instructions are sometimes complex and illogical.Besides,the strategy of repetition is applied too frequently and the use of getting feedback is inadequate.For expert teachers,the forms of their instructions are not diverse enough and they lack systematic reflection.In addition,both novice and expert teachers lack theoretical knowledge of teacher’s instructions.This study provides a reference for teachers,especially novice teachers,to analyze and reflect on their own instructions,so as to help improve the effectiveness of classroom instructions.