Contents

1。 Introduction 6

1。1 Background of the Study 6

1。1。1 Background of Classroom Questioning Study 6

1。1。2 Background of Motivation Study 6

1。2 Significance and Purpose of the Study 7

1。3 Overall Structure of the Thesis 8

2。 Literature Review 9

2。1 Classroom Questioning 9

2。1。1 Definition of Questioning 9

2。1。2 Types of Classroom Questioning 9

2。1。3 Questioning Strategies 10

2。1。4 Waiting time 10

2。2 Learning Motivation 10

2。2。1 Definition of Learning Motivation 10

2。2。2 Types of motivation 11

2。2。3 Previous Studies of Learning Motivation 12

2。3 Previous Study of the Influence of Classroom Questioning on Learning Motivation 13

3。 Methodology and Design 14

3。1 Research Questions 14

3。2 Participants 14

3。3 Instruments 14

3。4 Data Collection 14

4。 Results and Discussion 16

4。1 Types of Classroom Questioning 16

4。2 Questioning Strategies 19

4。3 Waiting Time 22

5。 Conclusions 25

5。1 Findings 25

5。2 Implications 25

5。2。1 Skills of Designing Questions 25

5。2。2 Skills of Modifying Questions 25

5。2。3 Increasing Waiting time 26

5。3 Limitations 26

References 27

1。 Introduction

1。1 Background of the Study

    As an international language, English has played an increasingly significant role in every field of our life, such as travel and commercial activity。 With the escalation of China’s economic and political status on the world stage and a closer relationship with other countries, English is given much attention especially in the educational field。 In fact, however, the quality of English teaching in middle school is unsatisfactory and worrying。 According to the statistics of a survey in the newspaper, numerous middle school students can’t communicate with each other appropriately in English after their graduation。 Therefore, various approaches are supposed to be adopted by the researchers and teachers to enhance the English learning of middle school students。

    1。1。1 Background of Classroom Questioning Study

 Since 1970s, the communicative language teaching has become increasingly popular in the field of teaching English as a foreign language。 A large amount of researchers have been focusing on in the use of teaching language in classroom, especially in the field of questioning (Brock, 1986; Ur, 2000; Lu & Hong, 2010)。 It is reported that classroom questioning is the most frequently adopted techniques as well as one of the dominant components in teacher talk。 Lu & Hong (2010) finds that classroom questioning is an activity through which teachers intentionally offer teaching stimuli and hints on knowledge learning, and what and how students should do。 Some discusses the types of classroom questioning (Luo, 1999)。 Others research the function of classroom questioning。 Rowe (1974) extends the focus on classroom questioning to the waiting time study and the training of teachers in questioning。 Perrott (1982) and Jacobsen et al。 (1999) study the classroom questioning and pided questioning strategies into four types: self-explaining, prompting, probing and redirecting questions。 However, up to now, few studies have mentioned that classroom questioning will stimulate the learning motivations。 Concrete and operable approaches are not given to develop student’s learning motivation。