4.5.2 The Data about Forms of Questions 17

4.5.3 The Data about Types of Questions 18

4.5.4 The Data about Ways of Questioning 18

4.5.5 The Data about Strategies of Questioning 18

4.6  Data Analysis and Results from Questionnaires 18

4.6.1 The Data about Students’ Attitudes towards Teacher Questioning in Reading Classes 19

4.6.2 The Data about Forms of Questions 19

4.6.3 The Data about Types of Questions 19

4.6.4 The Data about Ways of Questioning 19

4.6.5 The Data about Strategies of Questioning 20

5. Conclusions 21

5.1 Major Findings and Implication 21

5.1.1 Major Findings 21

5.1.2 Implication 21

5.2 Limitations 22

5.3 Recommendations for Further Studies 22

Appendix 1 25

Appendix 2 27

1 Introduction

Aschner (1961) defines the teacher as “a professional question maker” (cited in Gall 1970:707). How to ask effective questions has been recently under hot discussion among teachers. In English reading class, teacher questioning has shown its importance in guiding students to read and stimulating interactions between teachers and students. Besides, effective questioning not only helps to arouse students’ consciousness of participation and better understand the reading materials, but also encourages students to think and solve the problems by themselves. Thus, the study of effective teacher questioning in reading class is significant in improving the quality of junior high school English teaching.

1.1 Background of the Study

There are three main reasons for effective questioning in English reading class to be chosen for the topic of the thesis.

Firstly, among four basic skills, reading plays an irreplaceable part in English language teaching. Junior high school textbook, Go for it, requires a reading class in every unit from Grade eight to Grade nine. Cultivating students’ reading ability is one of teachers’ goals in English teaching.

The second reason is based on the requirement from the Curriculum Standards of English for Junior High School in 2011. It points out that teachers are expected to develop students’ comprehending and applicative abilities. 

Requirements are the following:

(1) Students can infer and guess the meaning of new words from the context and word formation.

(2) Students can understand the logical relationship among each sentence in the paragraphs.

(3) Students can find out the topic sentences of each paragraph, understand the plot, and predict the development and possible ending of the context.

(4) Students can read materials of common theme.

(5) Students can extract information by using simple reading strategy in accordance with different reading purpose.

(6) Students can use dictionaries and other tools for English learning.

(7) In addition to teaching materials, students should achieve the extracurricular reading quantity beyond 150 thousand words.