MINIMIZING TEACHER-TALKING TIME (TTT) IN EFL CLASSROOM THROUGH CONVERSATION QUESTIONS
Ismail Anas
State Polytechnic of Ujung Pandang
Abstract
The aim of this article is to give an overview about how to minimize the teacher-talking time in EFL classroom through conversation question. The conversation question is simply easy to use in English language classrooms in which the teacher can get the students angaged in the lesson. The teacher can minimize the talk-time in explaining and increase the student-talking time (STT). This teaching aid is simply flexible and usable for any kind of English subject. Therefore, it can be easily integrated with various approaches in reaching goals and objectives in EFL classrooms.
Key words: Teacher-talking time, conversation question, English language learning
A. INTRODUCTION
State Polytechnic of Ujung Pandang is is now expanding both in academic and non-academic matters. The institution is now focusing on the development of quality management system which has been administered to SAI global for ISO 9001:2008. In general, the quality management system requires several aspects such as the readiness of the lecturers and staffs, the punctuality, the filing system and management, and documentation. Particularly, the lecturers as the main factor in teaching success have to show good performance in all the way they teach. There are some important things that lecturers must be well-prepared before entering their classrooms such as lesson plan, syllabus, and teaching aids.
some others were unsuccessful. Some problems occured during the teaching and learning activities were fundamentally due to the lack of preparation, so the students were very difficult in grasping the lesson. Therefore, the lecturers must be ready and well-prepared.
R. J. Kizlik (2007) stated that from his teaching experience and from discussions and teaching many hundreds of teachers and thousands of teacher education students, there emerge common threads of understanding and skill that good teachers weave into an effective personal style of teaching. Assess your own knowledge and values in terms of your thoughts about the following points of a good teacher or lecturer:
are good at explaining things. Do you like to explain how something
works, or how something happened? Being comfortable with explaining content to students is an essential skill for teachers.
keep their cool. There will be times when you will be tempted to scream or
yell at your students, other teachers, parents, administrators, and so on. Good teachers are able to successfully resist this urge.
have a sense of humor. Research has consistently shown that good teachers have a sense of humor, and that they are able to use humor as part of their teaching methods. Humor, used properly, can be a powerful addition to any lesson.
like people, especially students in the age range in which they intend to teach. Most teachers choose an area of specialization such as elementary education, special education, secondary education, or higher education because they have a temperament for students in those age ranges. If you are not comfortable working with young children, don’t major in elementary education!
are inherently fair-minded. They are able to assess students on the basis of performance, not on the students’ personal qualities.
decision. Whether managing a classroom, leading students on a field trip, seamlessly shifting from one instructional procedure to another, assigning detentions, supervising an intern, or dealing with policy and curriculum issues in the school, there is no substitute for common sense.
have a command of the content they teach. For elementary school teachers,
that means having knowledge of a broad range of content in sufficient depth to convey the information in meaningful ways to the students. For secondary school teachers, it usually means having an in-depth command of one or two specific content areas such as mathematics or biology.
set high expectations for their students and hold the students to those
expectations. If you are thinking about becoming a teacher, you should set high expectations for yourself, and demand excellence not only of yourself, but your students as well.
are detail oriented. If you are a disorganized person in your private life, you will find that teaching will probably be uncomfortable for you. At the very least, teachers must be organized in their professional and teaching duties. If you’re not organized and are not detail oriented, teaching may not be the best choice of a profession for you.
are good managers of time. Time is one of the most precious resources a teacher has. Good teachers have learned to use this resource wisely.
can lead or follow, as the situation demands. Sometimes, teachers must be
members of committees, groups, councils, and task forces. Having the temperament to function in these capacities is extremely important. At other times, teachers assume leadership roles. Be sure you are comfortable being a leader or a follower, because sooner or later, you will be called on to function in those roles.
don’t take things for granted. This applies to everything, from selecting a
know the rules, be aware of prerequisites and meet deadlines. In one sense, you don’t learn to teach by getting a degree and becoming certified. You learn to teach in much the same way you learned to drive — by driving. You learn to teach by teaching, by making mistakes, learning from them and improving. The purpose of a teacher education program is to get you as ready as possible to learn how to teach by subjecting you to a variety of methods and experiences that have a basis in tradition and research.
Based on the pre-research conducted on the beginning of the odd semester for 2010/2011 academic year indicated that most students experienced a very monotonous English language learning in their classrooms. The interview involved five random classes with 130 respondents. There were 93% of the total respondents argued that English language learning seemed to be monotonous which applied one way learning method. In this kind of teaching method, the students experienced a real lecture where the lecturers spent more time in talking and explaining the materials. Based on the Communicative Language Teaching theory, the learning must involve the students as part of the learning, so they must be involved in any kind of learning activities.
This is not to say that the lecturers talked too much in the classroom, but it should be proportional. Basically, lecturers have to talk to deliver the material to students, but during the lesson which minimized the students-talking time. It has to be understood that learning English is to learn Language and culture, so the students have to spend more time in practicing and experiencing the language. The students experienced less practice and more theories, so it seemed to be difficult to accelerate the knowledge transfer.
Teacher-Talking Time in English Language Teaching through Conversation Question”.
B. TEACHER-TALKING TIME
b. 1. Definition of Teacher-Talking Time
Teacher talk is used in class when teachers are conducting instructions, cultivating their intellectual ability and managing classroom activities (Feng Qican, 1999: 23). Teachers adopt the target language to promote their communication with learners. In this way, learners practice the language by responding to what their teacher says. Besides, teachers use the language to encourage the communication between learners and themselves. Therefore we can say teacher talk is a kind of communication-based or interaction-based talk.
Teacher talk is particularly important to language teaching.(Cook, 2000:144). According to pedagogical theory, the language that teachers use in classrooms determines to a larger degree whether a class will succeed or not. Many scholars found teacher talk makes up around 70% of classroom language (Cook, 2000; Chaudron, 1988; Zhao Xiaohong, 1998).Teachers pass on knowledge and skills, organize teaching activities and help students practice through teacher talk. In English classrooms, teachers’ language is not only the object of the course, but also the medium to achievethe teaching objective. Both the organization of the classroom and the goal of teaching are achieved through teacher talk.
In relation to English learning classrooms, the teacher-talking time is dealing with the time that the teachers spent during the lesson in explaining, elaborating, and overviewing the materials. The duration of the teacher talk is different among the teachers.
b. 2. The role of teacher-talk in foreign language learning
implementing teaching plans and achieving teaching goals, teacher talk plays a vital important role in language learning. Quite a few researches have discussed the relationship between teacher talk and language learning.
As Nunan (1991) points out: “Teacher talk is of crucial importance, not only for the organization of the classroom but also for the processes of acquisition. It is important for the organization and management of the classroom because it is through language that teachers either succeed or fail in implementing their teaching plans. In terms of acquisition, teacher talk is important because it is probably the major source of comprehensible target language input the learner is likely to receive.” The amount and type of teacher talk is even regarded as a decisive factor of success or failure in classroom teaching. (Hakansson, cited from Zhou Xing & Zhou Yun, 2002).
C. ENGLISH TEACHING
Most teachers readily agree that the students should receive as much opportunity to speak as is possible when learning English as a foreign language. This idea is especially true in the EFL classroom, where students don’t live in an English-speaking country. In such cases, the students may only have the chance to practice English as a conversational tool during the sixty or ninety minutes of the lesson. But whatever the situation, the more students apeak in English, the better English speakers they become.
First of all, teacher-talk is useful when the following conditions are met. These conditions all relate to verbal factors.
1. It is broken into sense groups 2. It is simplified but not unnatural
3. It is more redundant than 'ordinary speech' and words and structures are naturally repeated or 're-cycled' at regular intervals
4. It is broken into 'short paragraph' segments to encourage or invite students to interrupt, comment and ask questions.
6. The teacher gets regular feedback through questions - especially 'open questions' or 'two-step questions' (closed question + follow-up as below T: Do you like English food?
S: No.
T: Oh? Why?
T: Do you ever get angry? S: Yes.
T: When was the last time you got angry? And why did you get angry?
7. Teacher uses other devices to get feedback such as -physical response (Touch your left ear)
- using 'parallels to get examples from the class
( I don't like overcooked vegetables. And I never eat rare meat. Tell the person next to you about a kind of food you don't like or never eat.)
8. Variety of elicitation & explanation techniques are used, including -use of context
-enactment -illustration
9. There is also a variety of correction techniques, including both covert and overt types
It is between 95% and 85% comprehensible
C.1. The balance between Teacher-Talking Time (TTT) and the Student-Talking Time (STT).
Cotter, H. States that a balance EFL classroom should meet the standard in which the students should speak for 70% of the lesson, and the teachers should speak for 30%. Otherwise, some lectuters require longer explanation on the part of the lecture. Or other lessons may only require a minimal amount of explanation, and 90% or more may be devoted to conversational activities. But this 70/30 figure works well as a goal in most classroom situation. Consider the following positive and negative examles as well:
1. Positive
- The teacher gives compliment to students
- The teacher provides feedback, correction, and possible guidance - The teacher parents information or give instructions
- The teacher becomes a role model in the classroom 2. Negative
- Giving too much anectodes and not connect to the lesson
- Teacher speaks very fast, tone of voice or intonation, and pronunciation - The teacher gives much correction
- Too many target language
- The teacher uses many unfamiliar vocabularies. D. CONVERSATION QUESTION
d.1. Definition of conversation question
The EFL conversation questions can be used in a variety of ways to aid you in the classroom. They are useful for conversation classes, especially when you find yourself being the only person taking part in the conversation. These TESL conversation questions are in grid form, making them easier to use. You might want to attach them to card or laminate them to make them more durable.
expanding the ideas. The learners can develop the topic by exploring the questions and having feedback from it.
d.2. Types of conversation question
There are several types of conversation questions as follows: 1. Open questions
These are useful in getting another person to speak. They often begin with the words: What, Why, When, Who Sometimes they are statements: “tell me about”, “give me examples of”. They can provide you with a good deal of information. 2. Closed questions
These are questions that require a yes or no answer and are useful for checking facts. They should be used with care - too many closed questions can cause frustration and shut down conversation.
3. Specific questions
These are used to determine facts. For example “How much did you spend on that”
4. Probing questions
These check for more detail or clarification. Probing questions allow you to explore specific areas. However be careful because they can easily make people feel they are being interrogated.
5. Hypothetical questions
These pose a theoretical situation in the future. For example, “What would you do if…?’ These can be used to get others to think of new situations. They can also be used in interviews to find out how people might cope with new situations. 6. Reflective questions
These are used to gain acceptance of your view – they are not useful in providing honest views and opinions. If you say to someone ‘you will be able to cope, won’t you?’ they may not like to disagree.
d.3. How to use the conversation question in the classrooms
There are several ways in using the conversation question in the classrooms as follows:
1. Print out the questions and let students work in pairs asking the questions alternately.
2. Divide the questions into 2 pages, give half the questions to one student and half to another and let them work in pairs asking each other the questions. Students should be encouraged not to look at the other student's paper.
3. In a small class, the teacher may want to use the questions to get a conversation going about a given topic. In this case, the students aren't given a copy of the questions.
The following is the example of conversation question model that can be used by teacher in EFL classroom.
A model of conversation question
Topic : Holiday
Level : Intermediate
Grammar point : Past Tense
Type :Printable
Holiday
Everyone is simply interested in spending time for leisure. It is very enjoyable for people who need more resfreshing time after work. Now discuss these following questions with your partner.
Do you like hoilday? Why?
When was the last holiday you had? Was it interesting? Why?
Who did you go for a hoilday with? Did they enjoy it? What did you do during the holiday?
What were the interesting things you saw during the holiday? Why?
What about the uninteresting things? How did you travel in your holiday? Did you enjoy you holiday?
Was the weather good during your holiday?
Do you want to plan to go there again someday? Why?
Now my last question, what’s your impression about your last holiday?
The model above is set for a particular topic which is usable for several times. It is affordable and effective. The teacher can just change the topic and reorganize the content based on the lesson target and objectives.
E. The relation between the Teacher-Talking Time and the conversation question
A large amount of TTT necessarily limits the amount of STT (student talking time). For example, in a 60 minute class, if the teacher is talking for a total of 45 minutes, that leaves only fifteen minutes left for the students. If there are ten in the class, they’ll get only 90 seconds each to speak. Many activities, however, do not need to be teacher led – pair work (PW) or group work (PW) can be used instead. A practice activity might be set up in T/class mode, demonstrated in open pairs (students doing the activity in front of the class), and done in closed pairs (all the students working at the same time).
F. CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION a) Conclusion
Based on the overview and discussion above, the writer makes conclusion as follows:
1. The conversation question is useful in helping the teacher to minimize the teacher-talking time and maximizing the student-talking time. It can be organized by teacher based on the need and objectives.
2. The conversation question is an easy use method in minimizing the teacher-talking time (TTT) because it is very simple to use, affordable, flexible, durable, and attractive.
3. The conversation question is fundamentally addressed for speaking activity in which the students have to spend more time in producing words. It will stimulate the student to organize their idea, develop the idea, and attract the students to speak more.
b) Suggestion
For further studies on this field, there are some suggestions for the next researchers and writers as follows:
1. The next research should examine the problems in reducing or minimizing Teacher Talking Time (TTT) in EFL classrooms
2. The next research should study some methodologies in ELT to increase the Student Talking Time (STT)
3. The application of discussion questions should be updated to fit the students’ needs and expectation
4. The next researchers should study the creative ways in designing and constructing the discussion questions.
G. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Allwright, D. & Bailey, K. 1991. Focus on the Language Classroom. New York:Cambridge University Press
Barnes, D.1969.Language in the secondary classroom. In D. Barnes et al. (eds.)Language, the Learner and the School. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Brock, C. 1986. The effect of referential questions on ESL classroom discourse. TESOL Quarterly, 20:47 一59.
Brophy, J. 1981.Teacher praise: A functional analysis. Review of Educational Research,51.
Chaudron, C. 1988. Second Language Classrooms: Research on Teaching and Learning.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Cotter, H. 2010. Teaacher Talk Time & Student-Talk Time. http://hubpages.com/
hub/talktime. (accessed on 29th of December, 2010).
Harmer, J. 2000. How to Teach English. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching andResearch Press.
Xiao Y. 2006. Teacher Talk and EFL in University Classroom. School of Foreign Language and Literature. Yang-Tze Normal University. China.
_______.2006. Teacher-Talking Time (TTT).
