Linguistic Input and Interaction in the Content Classroom

Abstract

This study investigates teacher talk to different audiences of listeners and attempts to formulate a general description of the linguistic register particular to the classroom speech of ESL teachers. It describes and quantifies various features of classroom conversational interaction and various characteristics of ESL teachers' input to second language learners. It then investigates the degree to which the properties of foreigner talk in this corpus are representative, by comparing them to the results of Long's (1980) investigation of patterns of input and interaction outside of classrooms. Findings are summarized and a few cautious statements concerning the implications for the ESL classroom are made.