Essay On Classroom Interaction

Preliminaries

The effects of classroom interaction on language learning have long been a focus of research for second and foreign language teachers and researchers (Allwright, 1984; Chaudron, 1988; Ellis, 1984; 1994; van Lier, 1988). They argue that language learning comes about as a consequence of the interplay of the factors created by the learners, the teacher, and the interaction among them (teacher-student, student-student). Allwright (1984) sees classroom interaction as "the fundamental fact of classroom pedagogy because everything that happens in the classroom happens through a process of live person-to-person interaction"(p. 156).

Classroom interaction is indeed a complicated phenomenon. Teachers ' perceptions of the nature of language learning, of classroom activities, and of norms for classroom participation often differ from those of their students, who have a wide variety of proficiency levels, linguistic background, culturally predisposed ways of learning, and individual motivations and objectives in studying the language. If ignored, these differences can cause misunderstandings and create a barrier to effective language learning and teaching during face to-face interaction within the classrooms (Johnson, 1995; Rivers, 1987). Several theorists have attempted to elucidate the human capability to acquire a second language and all the

In a spoken language classroom, risk taking is best manifested in active oral participation; it involves responding to teacher’s or other students’ questions, raising questions, and making comments. When language learners take risks in oral participation, they actively engage themselves in the negotiation of comprehensible input and the formulation of compressible output (Swain, 1985), both of which are essential in the language learning