A record and Analysis of the Classroom Observation of English Teaching in a Junior Middle School

According to the outline requirements of new curriculum， It is very crucial and necessary for the Junior high School Students to master certain English listening and speaking skills， which not only contributes their future job-hunting also works on paying a solid basic for some of them to study aboard. In recent years， both English teachers and English learners focused on Junior high School Students’ Spoken English Skill greatly， which mainly based on the topics of checking the Ss’ competence of problem-solving existed in our daily life. The record and analysis of class observation about English teaching happened in Class Three， Grade Nine of Ping liang Rail way middle school. They are 44 students who took part in the English teaching activity. It was divided into three parts. In part one， both students and the teachers were introduced， besides the whole record of class observation of English teaching was stated in details. In part two， both analysis of relevant English teaching features about the course and some relevant teaching theories with the course the author observed were introduced； In part three， some reflective and suggestions were demonstrated.

Part one

1. Analysis of the Students’ learning situation

The students the author observed in Grade Three， will face the challenge of Entrance Examination of High School the next year. Most of students are 16 years old or so and are able to use some basic language knowledge and skills. Therefore， the students can have a good interaction with a foreign English teacher in class.

2. Introduction of the teachers

Both of the two teachers are experienced in English teaching. Grade 3. English is Thomas Simon Armstrong’s native language； Gao Nan has immigrated to America for 15 years， travelled over 20 countries and taught English in Shandong University.

3. Introduction of teaching contents， teaching activities

3.1 Teaching Key： To learn to express ideas about students’familiar topics in English

3.2 Teaching difficulties： To speak complete and exact English sentences with less grammar mistakes

3.3 Teaching times： 2 hours and 15 minutes for two lessons

4. A real record observation of the teaching process

4.1 First hour of teaching process：

First， Thomas Simon Armstrong wrote food， drink and fruit in the middle of the blackboard； then listed his own favorite food， drink and fruit； thirdly， the teacher began to encourage students to raise their hands to speak out what their favorite food， drink and fruits are in English， but they were asked not to speak unless they had a new beloved food， drink and fruits. Students can hold continuous supplements one by one. The details were showed as the follows：

Teaching task： discussing favorite food， drink， fruits and judging the information to be true or 1 in an individual way.

Summary： The teacher showed the whole information about England students discussed in class in a table as the follows.

Shape and population1. England is much smaller than China；

2. The population of England is 65，000，000.

4.2 Teaching task： Ask students to discuss favorite food， drink， fruits and relevant information about China in the same way above.（10 minutes ready） Each volunteer had better give a complete introduction.

Make a summary on the information about China.

Shape and populationChina is much bigger than England；

2.The population of China is 1，400，000，000.

4.3 Ending part： Miss Gao nan gave a short end with the different cultures between England and China as a topic

That’s why people have different ideas and habits in different countries. Someday， when you study aboard， you can experience that. Now I have travelled for more than 20 countries and I made many good friends.

Part two

Analysis of relevant theories-Input theory

The comprehensible input is an important aspect of language acquisition and it is the basic condition. On the basis of this， Krashen stresses the method of “i+1”. That means if the students’ language level is i， and they are exposed to large amount of language input including “i+1”. The “i+1” does not need to be provided intentionally， and it only needs comprehensible input and it is sufficient， so this input will be provided automatically. When there is a large number of language input， learners can achieve the language output.（Xue ting，2012：17）.

Part three

1. Teaching reflection based on the analysis of Thomas Simon Armstrong’s teaching features

Analysis of teacher’s belief

According to Thomas Simon Armstrong’s course， it is not difficult to find a detail during his teaching. He required students to finish certain task in certain time. He told students how many minutes they had， even he told students how many seconds were left. It showed he is very precise. What’s more， it was the first time for Thomas Simon Armstrong to teach the students who paid less attention to spoken English. The students can finish his big teaching task finally with his success leading. It reflected Thomas Simon Armstrong was confident to both his students and himself.

Analysis teaching methods

a. Effective leading in students’ performance

Only the right key can open the exact lock. When students trust their teachers and enjoyed sharing every idea with their teachers， they will be more reluctant to be more active in class. Thomas Simon Armstrong’ class turned out the fact. So he was very easy to lead in students’ performances step by step successfully. Students focused on the teacher’s demands seriously.

b. Setting a good example for students

Thomas Simon Armstrong set a good example for students before he gave a new teaching task to students. A new idea is added， which based that student do as the teacher does. For an example： after the teacher wrote down three sentences about his own information and told true information and 1 ones， he asked students to write different but true information about themselves.

c. Communicative Teaching

Thomas Simon Armstrong’s course showed communicative teaching is very effective. The teaching method stimulated students’ desire to express their ideas in English. This teaching method still worked well in improving students’ ability of language application. Thus language is used as a communicative tool， which meets the demand of new curriculum.

2. Suggestions to English teaching in Junior High School

As we have known that English teaching in Junior High schools is a special one. During this period， the more factors would influence the result of teaching and learning. From the prospective of characteristics of students， they become much more different from their characters in Primary school.

Transitivity， students become more familiar about the junior middle school life. Some of them will be stressed out because of their school work， so they don’t obey the rules as Grade Seven. From the above factors the teachers can’t be strict with the students in Grade Nine as Grade Seven and Grade Eight. About English teaching， we still have more words and phrases stored in mind. Teachers should pay more attention on the classroom teaching. That is to say the teacher do much more preparation work before teaching new contents to make the English class more interesting and more effective. Except the knowledge which should be mastered as the syllabus required， teachers need to add more useful language points to enlarge students’ knowledge level.

【作者簡介】陳劍英，平涼職業技術學院。