Effective questioning and scaffolding in proficiency-oriented CFL classes

Wu Yu 吴瑜

University of Rhode Island, Assistant Professor of Chinese

论文摘要Paper AbstractHelping students to move up to the next level of language proficiency depends on a lot of factors--curriculum design, instruction, assessment, and learners’ individual differences. This paper focuses on teachers’ questioning and scaffolding talk, the instructional language that teachers use in CFL classrooms to initiate, model, provide feedback, and lead students to meet their proficiency goals.

Specifically, this paper will examine 5 teachers’ classroom questions and scaffolding language in intermediate-level immersion CFL classes. First, transcriptions of five 50-minute recorded classroom interaction between teachers and students will be coded and analyzed. Then, teachers’ questions and the subsequent students’ production will be rated based on fluency, accuracy, and complexity. Analysis of the above data sources aims to identify effective questioning episodes that provide scaffolding for learners and push them to produce target structures in the proficiency-oriented communicative tasks.

In conclusion, teachers’ questioning and scaffolding usually reflects curriculum goals, functions as constant assessment of students’ progress, and most importantly, guides and challenges students to move up to the next level (or sub-level) of proficiency. The results of this study will provide suggestions for CFL teachers regarding how to best implement questioning and scaffolding techniques that link curriculum, instruction, and assessment.

 发言人简介Presenter's BioYu WU is an Assistant Professor of Chinese in the University of Rhode Island. Her research interests include second language acquisition, language assessment, teaching Chinese as a foreign language pedagogy, and development of proficiency-based curriculum.