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TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

A Necessity of Increasing Students’ L2 Usage at Cecyte Cancun III: brief analysis of

teacher talk time and student talk time in fourth semester tourism students.

María Laudelina Dìaz Navarro.

Cecyte Cancún III.

Marìa Laudelina Dìaz Navarro, Language Department, Cecyte III.

Marìa L. Dìaz N., Language Department, Cecyte III, 20 de Noviembre Av., Reg.203.

Contact: marialaudelina08@hotmail.com
TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

In a foreign language class, the active use of the target language (hereafter denoted

as L2) needs to be considered as a fundamental part of the process of language acquisition

and language learning, but at CECyTE Cancun III, the way time is utilized in the classrooms

for the teaching-learning of English occasionally affects the quality of the process. On one

hand, in the classroom the talking time of the teachers is extensive due to the need of

constant clarifications which may have a positive effect on the students´ learning or

opposed results on them since far from contributing to augment their time to practice L2,

some of them decide just to listen to the teacher.

On the other hand, one may think that it is compensated with the opportunities to

practice the verbal communication outside the classroom, but these are very limited for the

students, in spite of living in a city where tourism is the main economic activity since most

of them do not count on the means to get in touch with native people unless they are

attending their internship at the Hotel Zone of the city; also, the majority of them lack

initiative (or the means) to devote time to speak the foreign language with their classmates

or contact other people over the internet.

Due to the facts already explained, the current paper is intended to briefly show

the author`s viewpoint about how the relation teacher talk and learner talk can become a

productive relation or a barrier, especially in tourism students at the Scientific and

Technological High School Cecyte Cancun III, since the more teachers take their turn at

speaking (supposedly in order to encourage the students to do so), the students´ abilities

for oral communication can be affected as they do not make any effort for such purpose

and their learning of the Foreign Language (FL) does not progress.
TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

Key words: talk time, barrier, interaction, discourse, display.

As stated above, the aim of this study was to investigate the amount of teacher talk

time (TTT) and that of the student (Student Talk Time, hereafter STT) as well as up to what

extent the TTT is effective or not in some specific moments of a lesson if one considers that

sometimes quantity is thought of as an indicator of advance, rather than concentrating in

quality.

But before continuing, it is necessary to state what TTT and STT refer to. Teacher

talk time (TTT) refers to how much the teacher talks during a given lesson and this may vary

according to the part of the lesson in which the teacher intervenes, for instance, it is

supposed that the teacher speaks more when he/she explains something. Notwithstanding,

a teacher may speak less than the pupils since they need more opportunities to practice

what they are learning.

On this regard, Bailey K. and Nunan D. (1996: 38) stated:

(…) since classroom time is so limited, the value of any activity is partially determined

by the offsetting value of the activities the teacher could do instead.

Sometimes the teacher´s desire to promote students´ involvement and reward

relevant contributions creates a sense of tension for the teacher: How far should

one allow the students to determine the topics and the amount of time spent on

each?
TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

Doubtlessly, from the authors words, it can be inferred how deciding upon time

devoted to the activities and how to use time can become an arduous task for the teacher

and even more if it is still hard for the students to achieve oral communication. It is one of

the reasons that keeps the teacher using a great amount of the classroom talking time.

In those cases, far from being a motivator of our students´ talk, most of us just limit

the students´ talking opportunities or if we let them talk, we are so attentive to their

mistakes that we become or act as judges of what they try to say or we just echo their

answers over and over; then, a reflection on the following questions should be made before

interrupting a learner´s intention to speak:

1-Who starts talking in our classrooms most of the times?

2-What are the most common topics for our talks? Do the learners really

care/understand about them?

3-Who is the one that interrogates more frequent?

4-Who decides when to stop the talk?

5-Are we as teachers good listeners?

It is also necessary to point out that the present study is a diary study since I

observed the interaction that takes place among my tourism fourth semester students and

I during a month in order to verify how the lesson time is used, i.e., who speaks the most

and if it is a necessary intervention.


TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

According to Bailey and Ochsner (1983:189) a diary study is:

A diary study in second language learning, acquisition or teaching is an account of a

second language experience as recorded in a first-person journal. The diarist may be

a language teacher or a language learner -but the central characteristic of the diary

studies is that they are introspective: The diarist studies his own teaching or

learning.

A reflective analysis of my teaching will allow me to determine if my TTT is always

necessary or know when it is not. Beyond any doubts, there need be teacher talking time in

our classrooms and that can benefit our students when we give demonstrations, convey meaning

and tell anecdotes. Still, the point with uncooperative teacher talk is that it can outflow in many

ways, often unconsciously.

When added up, these outflows can diminish the quality of the learning experience, giving

students less space to train the language in the classroom. And it is something that may happen to

both, the expert teacher or the novice. It can be said to be a tendency of language teachers, i.e.

most of us can get into the habit of abusing of talking too much in lessons, particularly in the

following ways:

a- In the process of scaffolding (reformulating, modelling, etc.)

b- When making a quick correction.

c- Feeding back a message (rather than the words that were wrongly used)

d- Giving extra time for the students to think over and answer the questions.

e- When the teacher echoes questions, etc.


TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

Taking into account the necessity of creating a teaching-learning environment in my context

in which my students have a greater talking time, as a general guideline for all the activities, I have

been seeking to attain a 15-35% teacher talk time in spite of the language level and knowledge of

the pupils. Nevertheless, there are some factors that still affect the accomplishment of

implementing this task. That is why for the present study I chose a class in where I noticed I always

exceed this guideline.

The students in this class are peculiarly different from others due to the combination of their

ages, levels and personalities. They are fourth semester tourism students and most of them come

from dysfunctional families with lots of problems and their studies are not a priority for their

parents; they have a medium to low economic status which does not let them obtain the necessary

technological resources for practicing the language out of the classroom (computers, internet, or a

Cd player). All this together does not arise the students´ interest toward learning the target

language.

Thus, the students from this class are not highly excited toward English so that on numerous

occasions during their lesson time, I have to stop classroom activities to instruct them to behave

themselves or to speak using L2. Consequently, I frequently use an estimate of 35-65% of teacher

talk time in this particular class as shown in table I:


TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

Criteria % of TTT

Expected amount of time I spend talking as a general 15-35%

guideline in class.

Real amount of time I spend talking in the studied 35-65%

class.

Table 1: Amount of time devoted to TTT.

Now, it is important to point out that student talk time should be around 80% or even a little

more if possible during the course of the lesson because it will be a good proof of their interest in

learning the language and the role of the teacher should be that of promoting qualitative thought

on them; however, we constantly use time for activities such as choral drills or other exercises that

though necessary for learning and strengthening language skills, may provoke a switch off the

students´ brains.

The following transcript is an example of my interaction with some fourth semester tourism

students, group D who were taken as sample for the current work.

Details about the lesson:

At: CECyTE Cancun III.

Classroom: 102

Group: 4th Semester Tourism.

Lesson duration: 2:00-2:50 pm.

Date: March 4th, 2016.


TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

Level: low

Objective: Use the vocabulary learnt to refer to cities in Europe, their people and customs.

Materials: pictures, a power point presentation and a recording.

Lesson 4.

Unit 2. Famous cities around the world.

Topic: Famous cities in Europe.

It is worth to mention that a great number of these students come to school by walking a

long distance under the sun or rain and as noticed from the data above, English lessons are at 2

o´clock; consequently, I have to take several minutes of the time encouraging them to speak as they

get to school tired and unwilling.

Transcript:

1-) T1 Great! You mentioned your favorite cities in Mexico. Now, what famous cities around

the world do you know, William? Let´s say, uh, in Europe.

2-) M1 Europe? Well, uh… (England).

3-) T1 Uh, ok, William. But listen. There are cities and countries, right? Mexico is a country

and Cancun is a city in Mexico; the United States is a country and New York is a city.

4-) M1 Ok, ok, ok. Sorry teacher. Uh, (Mansester), no teacher?

5-) T1 Good! Right! Manchester. It´s Manchester. Let´s see any other? Maybe the capital,

William?
TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

6- M1 Oh, I (tink) is Londres?

7-) T1 I think you are right. It is London, but what do you know about it? Some places in

London, maybe a famous building or any other place, William?

8-) M1 Uh, umm… the watch the Big (Ben) is very tall.

9-) T1 Oh, ok. Oh! Look at my hand (LH), William. I am wearing a watch. This is my watch,

right? And in London, we have a very famous clock, ok? The Big Ben is a very famous clock. Ok,

William, now, referring to customs, um, what do you think people from London eat, drink or do?

10 M1 They drink tea… uh, …((laugh)) …they eat tacos teacher?

11-) T1 ((laugh)) Oh, tacos? Ok, William. Well, Mexican tacos are very famous all over, but

Londoners like to eat (look at this, William, look at this picture). They like to eat this.

12-) M1 They eat fish and sabritas…

13-) T1 Yes. That´s right. They like fish and chips. So that they eat fish and chips. Great,

William! But they don´t like junk food very much. What about you, Stephanie? Do you like junk food?

14-) F1 Yes. I am (?) hamburgers and (fries).

15-) T1 Oh, Stephanie, you like hamburgers and fries, right? You like hamburgers and fries.

Are they healthy, Stephanie?

16-) F1 Are they (healthy)?

17-) T1 Ok. Yes, Stephanie. I am asking if they are healthy.

16-) F1 No, teacher. And you, teacher? Do you like junk (food)?
TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

17-) T1 Junk food. Uh, well, I also like hamburgers and fries, but I prefer spaghetti ((laugh))

18-) F1 Ok, ok teacher, tomorrow I am will cook spaghetti in the (laboratory).

19-) T1 So that tomorrow you are… you will cook spaghetti in the laboratory. Great,

Stephanie! Spaghetti! Wow! Yummy! Listen, do you know a country in Europe where spaghetti is

very famous, Stephanie?

20-) F1 Yes, teacher. Italy

21-) T1 Great! Yes! Very good, Stephanie. Thank you. Thank you, William. Thank you (RH)

very much. Ok, now, let´s continue. Let´s see you, Carlos… let´s talk about Italy now. Carlos, are you

ready? Let´s see, umm… Carlos, are you listening? Are you paying attention? Thank you. Listen…

The transcription conventions used in the above transcript are the following:

(()): for nonlinguistic occurrence like laugh.

(): parentheses indicate that the word/phrase was not clearly understood.

LH: left hand is being used to show something to the students.

RH: right hand pointing the two students who spoke.

M1: a male student is talking.

F1: a female student is taking.

T: teacher is talking.

… : pauses or interruption.
TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

A categorization of some utterance types that represent the TTT and STT is shown in tables

II and III respectively:

Feature of Teacher Talk Example of utterances Tally

Scaffolding Oh, ok. Oh! Look at my hand

(LH), William. I am wearing a

watch. This is my watch, right?

And in London, we have a very

famous clock, ok?

Display question Now, what famous cities around

the world do you know, William?

Referential question What about you, Stephanie? Do

you like junk food?

Praise Great!

Courtesy Thank you.

Clarifying There are cities and countries,

right?

Content feedback Mexico is a country and Cancun

is a city in Mexico; the United


TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

States is a country and New York

is a city.

Behavior Carlos, are you ready? Let´s see,

umm… Carlos, are you listening?

Are you paying attention?

Table II: Samples of teacher´s utterance types.

Feature of Student Talk Example of utterances

Lost time Europe? Well, uh… (England).

Repetition of teacher´s utterance F1 Are they (healthy)?

Display response (and a repetition of teacher´s F1 No, teacher.

question)

Courtesy (apologies) M1 Ok, ok, ok. Sorry teacher

Repetition of teacher´s question F1 And you, teacher? Do you like junk (food)?

Table III: Samples of students´ utterance types.

The above tables show samples of the interaction between the teacher and two of the

students while answering some questions. Taking into consideration the characteristics of the

group, (especially of the two students in the sample who are very shy), the teacher talk time can be

considered as necessary, for instance, when clarification about the use of the words clock/watch
TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

was required; something similar happens when I exemplified the difference between cities and

countries as the main objective of the lesson is to use vocabulary related to famous cities, their

people, customs, and habits and if the students continued wrongly using the term country instead

of city, then it would be hard for them to identify one or the other in further situations.

Also, in terms of interaction, there were some differences between my interaction with the

male student and the female one. When the male student perceived that he was being corrected,

he immediately acted as if he already knew the difference between the words country and city

letting signals of ego arise, whereas the female student reacted in a more understandable and

sympathetic way when I let her see that the correct way was “I like hamburgers and fries” instead

of “I am hamburgers and fries”; it is an example of how gender may influence the way interaction

can go on.

Then, it can be affirmed that the main difference in the interaction between the male

student and I and between the female student and I is that the interaction in the second case was

much more open and it gave more discursive possibilities.

Conclusions:

As presented in the transcript, there was some extended wait-time, i.e., some time given to

the students for thinking about what they were going to respond. It was given in a spontaneous way

and it was necessary for the interaction between the student and the teacher since this is a the way

of gaining the students´ confidence as their talking and participation as well as the acquisition and

learning of the linguistic elements are among the main objectives of the teaching-learning of English

as a foreign language.
TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

The clarifications and the wait-time in the teacher talk time were used in order to avoid

that the teacher became the center of the lesson and in order to arise the students´ interest on the

topic, thus, in talking.

This study of my classroom talk time provided me with important information to reflect

about the quantity and quality of my own teacher talk and gave me evidence to decide how I am

going to distribute and use the classroom time using the correct kind of questions or other to lead

the students´ talk successfully. So that I consider that we must seek for appropriate vias to promote

STT because when the students speak more, they trust their skills and get better prepare for the

real world where they will not have the teacher´s support.

References:

Bailey, K. and Nunan, D. (eds.) (1996) Voices from the Language Classroom: Qualitative

Research in Second Language Education. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Bailey, K. and R. Ochsner (1983). A Methodological Review of the Diary Studies: Windmill

tilting or Social Science? MA: Newbury House.

Nunan, D. (1989) Understanding Language Classrooms: A Guide for Teacher-initiated

Action. New York: Prentice Hall International.

Walsh, S (2002) 'Construction or Obstruction: Teacher Talk and Learner Involvement in the

EFL Classroom. Language Teaching Research. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Walsh, S. (2001). QTT vs TTT: Never Mind the Quality, Feel the Width. Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press.

Willis, J. (1996) A Framework for Task-Based Learning. London: Longman.


TTT AND STT AT CECYTE CANCUN III.

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