Examining Korean English Teachers’ Question-in-Interaction with Young Learners

Abstract

This study investigates how English teachers who are non-native speakers (NNS) produce their questioning practices according to different contexts of the classroom setting. Four female teachers working in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province participated in the data collection. For each teacher, four sessions of English lessons were recorded via audio or video and transcribed respectively by following the Jefferson system. Conversation analysis (CA), specifically sequential analysis, was used as the main method for data analysis in this study. The findings of the present study indicate that both NNS teachers and students alike make full use of sequential turns as resources for their talks, as well as the functions and forms of L2. The implications are significant in that teachers’ questions are not merely used as interrogation, but utilized to foster interactivity among teachers and students. More importantly, knowing the forms and functions of L2 should be juxtaposed with using them in actual interaction. Accordingly, this provides the stakeholders of teacher education curriculum with an emphasis that requires prospective teachers to improve awareness about how to produce teacher talk-ininteraction.