The investigation of teacher directives in Chinese junior high ESL classes

Teachers’ instructional directives , an essential element of teacher talk, have the function of organizing teaching components, managing classroom activities and presenting L2 input. In view of the importance of directives in L2 teaching and learning and the relatively less investigation of directives within Chinese ESL classroom, the study observes and analyses natural English classes of 6 non-native teachers at a Chinese junior high. Data are collected through audio recordings of the interactions, classroom observation of the participants and interviews of the teachers. The aim is to demonstrate how instructional directives are given in Chinese junior high ESL classes (e.g. directly or indirectly, for the purpose of a command, request or proposal, with code-switching or not) and what factors (e.g. teacher differences in age, teaching experience and overseas educational backgrounds) will influence teachers’ use of directives. It is expected that the findings of the research will bring pedagogical implications for Chinese ESL teachers.

 

Yifan Zhang is currently doing her MA degree in Applied Linguistics (TESOL studies) in the School of Languages and Cultures at the University of Queensland. She gained her undergraduate degree at Nanjing Normal University in China and taught Chinese at colleges for almost 2 years.