2。3 Effective reading 6

2。3。1 Purpose of reading 6

2。3。2 Process of reading 6

2。3。3 Role of questioning in reading 7

2。4 Conclusion 7

3 Methodology 9

3。1 Overview of the experiment 9

3。2 Characteristics of junior middle school students 9

3。3 Procedures 10

3。3。1 Classroom observation 10

3。3。2 Questionnaire 10

3。3。3 Personal interview 11

4 Findings 12

4。1 Data analysis of classroom observation 12

4。1。1 Analysis of the number and type of questioning 12

4。1。2 Analysis on the strategies of questioning 14

4。1。3 Analysis of the relations between feedback and voluntary answering 15

4。2 Data analysis of the questionnaire and interview 17

4。2。1 Analysis of the influence of teacher’s feedback 17

4。2。2 Analysis of teacher’s question-construction 18

5 Discussion 20

5。1 Implication of the research 20

5。2 Limitation of the current research 21

5。3 Conclusion 22

References 23

Appendix I 25

Appendix II 26

1 Introduction

1。1 Background of the research

In teacher’s classroom teaching activities, questions have been considered to be the most commonly used teaching method and the most important bilateral interaction between teacher and students。 It is not only an essential means for teacher to achieve teaching aims but also an effective way to promote classroom communication。 Therefore, it is regarded as the core of effective teaching。

Abundant researches have find out that questioning play a critical role in language learning。 The functions of questioning are generally listed as follows: it could become the foundation of communication between teacher and students; for teachers, they can input the information and get teaching feedback in time through questioning; for students, they can be well motivated to explore areas related to the questions。 Therefore, questioning is quite indispensable in English teaching for EFL learners, especially after the New English Curriculum Standards (NECS) was implemented (2011), which establishes the goal to mainly cultivate students’ active study and exploration spirit and emphasizes more on the process of language acquisition and ability development。 Then questions could be the catalyst in this process and help students to develop their thinking ability actively。

However, there are many inappropriate applications of questioning in real English teaching practices。 During the internship in Fengtan Middle School, the author has found that situations for classroom questioning often occurs as follows: most of the questions teacher put forward are low-level questions that rarely related to students’ own experiences or thinking levels。 And these low-level questions which contribute to the false activeness of class atmosphere are actually meaningless。 As a result, students are reluctant to raise their hands or even have no response since their interests and previous knowledge haven’t been activated。 A lot of questions in English teaching become a mere formality due to the unreasonable design and application。 Besides, questions in one single form surely would fail to raise students’ spirit for exploration。