A Comparative Study Of Classroom Introduction By Novice And Experienced Junior Middle School English Teacher

In 2018,the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China(CPC)and the State Council issued the Opinions on Comprehensively Deepening the Reform of the Teaching Force Development in the New Era(hereinafter as Opinions),which placed higher requirements on the comprehensive quality,professionalism and innovation capability of teachers,namely to take the comprehensive strengthening of the teaching force development as a major political task and fundamental livelihood project,so as to seize it in a practical manner.The Opinions explicitly suggest that teachers in primary and secondary schools are expected to conduct all-staff training,to facilitate lifelong learning and professional development of teachers,to transform teacher training methods,to advance the integration of information technology and teacher training,in addition to implementing hybrid training that involves a combination of online and offline training.Moreover,the content of teacher training should be improved,while high-quality teacher training should be undertaken,thereby enabling teachers to elaborately specialize in teaching and further enhance their teaching skill levels.The issuance of the Opinions has introduced the latest training avenues for the professional development of teachers at the compulsory education level,while also playing a role in boosting the teaching capabilities of teachers.Nevertheless,in accordance with personal education apprenticeships and educational internships,it has been revealed that there exists a certain difference in the teaching capabilities of English teachers in junior high schools of various teaching ages,whereas the teaching training for English teachers in junior high schools delivered by schools also suffers from a lack of relevance.As the first step in the teaching process,classroom lead-in demonstrates an aspect of the professional competence of teachers.Moreover,the effective and targeted classroom lead-in activities are not only capable of capturing the classroom learning attention of students and boosting their classroom participation,but also assisting teachers in accomplishing the corresponding teaching tasks in a smooth manner.As a consequence,classroom lead-in stands out as the starting point of classroom teaching,as well as an essential indicator of classroom teaching capabilities,which can be considered as an entry point for teaching research.By taking constructivist learning theory and teachers’ professional development theory as the theoretical basis,this study took English teachers of junior high schools in representative middle schools of urban areas in Wanzhou District as the research subjects,while taking the classroom lead-in situation of their English teachers in junior high schools as the starting point.In this context,this study exhibited the differences in classroom lead-in between novice teachers and experienced teachers of English in junior high schools,probed the reasons underlying the differences,while also proposing teacher development suggestions for novice teachers to develop into experienced teachers,and experienced teachers to achieve professionalism.This study commenced with the apprenticeship observation,from which the research hypotheses were formulated in light of the observed phenomena: 1.there exists differences in classroom lead-in between novice teachers and experienced teachers;2.novice teachers intentionally conduct classroom lead-in,while experienced teachers don’t pay much attention on the lead-in of content and strategy selection;3.experienced teachers are more flexible and spontaneous in classroom lead-in,while always taking the needs of students as the starting point.In accordance with the hypotheses,the research objectives were presented,followed by a targeted design of the survey questionnaire,interview questions,and classroom observation content in line with the research objectives.During the implementation of the research,novice teachers and experienced teachers of English in junior high schools in three schools in Wanzhou District of Chongqing were selected as the subjects of investigation,with classroom observations,questionnaires,and interviews conducted with both types of teachers and their students to examine their teaching activities in the classroom lead-in session.The study revealed that:(1)novice teachers and experienced teachers differed in classroom lead-in,such as: novice teachers preferred question and presentation method,while experienced teachers preferred direct lead-in and review;(2)novice teachers would intentionally perform classroom lead-in;(3)the classroom lead-in of experienced teachers was more flexible,which was manifested in more reasonable classroom lead-in time,more reasonable basis for lead-in.The reasons for the differences between the classroom lead-in of the two types of teachers lie in:(1)the deficiency of targeted training for novice teachers;(2)the lack of teaching supervision for experienced teachers;and(3)the differences in the development stages of teachers themselves.So,to help novice and experienced teachers’ teaching skills development in junior high school,this thesis will put forward corresponding suggestions from the school level and the individual level of teachers.