A Study of English Teacher Classroom Discourse in Senior High School—From the Perspective of the Cognitive Effects of the Comprehensible Input Hypothesis

Abstract

Teacher classroom discourse, as an important medium for learners’ target language input, plays a significant role in promoting learners’ second language acquisition (Zhai Caixia, 2013). Theories related to second language acquisition reveal from different perspectives the unique role that teacher classroom discourse plays and the important functions it performs in the language acquisition process of learners. Based on the cognitive effects of Krashen’s Comprehensible Input Hypothesis and Long’s Interaction Hypothesis, this study has conducted the investigation of current situation of use in the authenticity, interactivity and normality of English teachers’ discourse in senior high school and analyzed the existing problems. The author has adopted the natural researching methodology, combined with classroom observation and recording, and randomly selected six English teachers from a senior high school in Yichang as research subjects, to probe the factors that influence teacher discourse and provide some teaching implications for better conducting English teaching in the future.