英语论文网

on whose answer the teacher generally does not know. For instance, in this text “What is your understanding of the sentence ‘This was the last straw.’?” As for this, the answer is not that unique. Thus, the responder has enough space to show his reflection, imagination, creative ability, and the like.
2.3 Question Directing
Question directing refers to which student the teacher ought to ask. Some questions are better to be replied by the whole class; some by the superior ones; some by the inferior, etc. Different situations have different strategies which depend on teachers. It is general believed that questions should be answered by those qualified students. This is not equal to the way of only asking those so-called good students whose performances always among the first one third of the whole class. As for some simple referential questions, inferior students also can qualify and teachers should encourage them 本英语毕业论文由英语论文网 www.51lunwen.org整理提供to answer. If they just be called to answer “Yes”, or “No”, their passion of participation would be fading gradually. Thus, in order to provide each student opportunity to learn English well, teachers ought to design question directing according to questions as well as students’ characteristics.
2.4 Wait-time
Wait-time is the length the teacher waits after the question is given and before a student is called to answer. In other words, it is the length of the pause before which a student is called upon to answer question, i.e. the period of time between a question is given out and it is required to answer. This length plays an important role in the process of obtaining knowledge for students. Every teacher has his/her own teaching habit. It is generally said that a teacher with a fast tempo tends to give a too short wait-time and one with the habit of giving lessons at a slow pace often leaves a too long wait-time. And neither of them is accepted. The former makes students have the feeling of the anxiety and pressure; on the contrary, the latter is time-and-energy-consuming. Wait-time should vary due to different cases. The study of Linguistics professor Rowe(1996) shows that the wait-time given by teachers is always not more than 1s. This too-short-reflection-time results in the simple or no answers from students whose confidence will fade gradually in this ask-answer process. And he discovers that if the teacher lasts it to 3s to 5s, students will offer more correct information after carefully reflecting, discussing and the like.④ While, from the research of Freiberg in 900 tapes of teachers’ wait-time, he concludes that there are 10 positive effects of teachers’ wait-time of 5 to 8 seconds for students to respond during questioning:
1. The length of student response increased.
2. Student-initiated and appropriate responses increased.
3. Students’ failure to respond to questions reduced.
4. Students’ confidence in responding increased.
5. Students’ speculative responses increased.
6. Student-student interaction increased and teacher-focused increased.
7. Students’ evidence to support statements increased.
8. The number of students’ questions increased.
9. Participation of students who were identified as slower by the teacher increased.
10. The variety of students’ responses to teacher questions increased.
&nbs