The Application of Body Language in English Teaching

作者简介：杨濡菡,（1988-）女，汉族，四川江油人，硕士，单位：西华师范大学教育学专业， 研究方向：德育原理

Abstract:Teachers have to use many ways to arouse the students’ interests so that they may learn better, and body language used in English teaching is one of them. In this article, the function and application of body language are expounded and emphasized by means of exemplification and epagoge.

Key words: body language; expression ways; application

Due to the shackles of years of deep-rooted traditional teaching method of language for a long time, teachers in the pursuit of the teaching progress often neglect the use of body language. "Body Language is the main form of non-language communication and it means people can use the facial expressions and body movements to communicate meaning from one person to another." ［1］ It can enrich the content of English teaching and let students understand knowledge points exactly.

一、 The necessities of body language in English teaching

（一）To stimulate the interest

Albert Einstein says "interest is the best teacher". Firstly,teachers' attitudes are very important for teaching, it can provide students a relatively relaxed atmosphere of learning English, and then use of body language is accord with the students' cognitive process. it not only can cultivate students' attention, but also develop their nimble and accurate thinking ability. For example, teach "What are you doing? " you can design the following body language to the text content: let the students make writing, or dancing together with you, students do the body language with teacher, listen and do warm up in the activities to enter the study condition, then it has made the natural upholstery for the new class and stimulated students' study interest greatly。

（二） To enhance the study effect

In the process of teaching, body language can help the teachers achieve a higher goal. For instance, In digital teaching, if one teacher carries on the machinery drill constantly, the students feels dull, then the goal can not be achieved and study English interest will be reduced. The teachers can use the body language in the teaching as follows: at first, they can read number1-10 showing our hands at the same time. For example, "three" the teachers can stretch out three fingers. Then the students think it is interesting and imitate immediately, in addition, visual pattern of the body language can help students to understand and remember vocabulary easily. For example, like verb "sing, dance, "noun "bird, dog"; adjective " thin,fat; big, small" and so on. All this maybe taught by the proper movement directly. The psychology research tells us, the students working with the full brain can stimulate student's cerebral cortex and then the content is not easy to be forgotten. Therefore, teachers design some practices frequently with the body language to enhance the study effect.

二、Application of the Body Language

（一） Facial expressions

"Psychologists have pointed out people can make about 250,000 kinds of different face expressions." ［2］A smile is one of the important facial expressions. teachers must be smiling because in this way students may feel encouraged, on the contrary, they may feel puzzled and disappointed. For example, teachers should walk into the classroom with full of spirit and energy, and have a cordial greetings to the students .When students answer the questions correctly, teachers have to smile to him to encourage a thumbs-up, said: "Excellent!" or "Good!" The eyes are the windows of the soul. Fistly, the eyes of teachers should be sincere. and it not just stare at the naughty students, but also pay attention to good students. At last, the eyes of teachers should be vivid, cordial and confident. it can make the students have a sense of security,and shorten the distance of the feelings of the teachers and students.

（二） Gesture language

" Students use all gesture that not only train students using their hands but also accelerate with their cerebra development and noetic exertion." ［3］ The gestures can be broadly divided into emotional gestures, indicating gestures, and symbolic gestures from theirs meaning. Emotional gesture is to express the emotions of the teachers', like hands are folded on your chest that means I don’t know what to say in order to express this feeling; the indicating gesture is used to indicate the orientation of the people and things, and then the symbolic gestures are to express the abstraction. for example, the forefinger and middle finger are stretched out that means victory. In a word, the gesture is the most mutative action and be used in the most furthest.

（三） Posture language

Standing posture can help teachers' expressions and movements to play as well as the teaching content to elaborate,the teachers stood in front of the student straight, with a silent instructions and intangible dignity. Walking posture should be natural, decent and steady. some teachers who are walking towards the platform for the first time feel nervous or hesitant that will give students a primary impression of the teachers not to be trusted. Moreover, it is unnecessarily stand in front of the blackboard at the whole time. they may move from behind the lectern when want to be informed, move to the right or left when making a major point so that they can communicate with students very well .

The 45 minutes in classis very precious and should be cherished, during which the students should practice as much as possible. The teachers should use body language to enhance the teaching quality.

Works Cited

［1］ Richards, J.＆Platt, J.Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching＆Applied Linguistics. 2000（56）.

［2］ 刘健，龚少英. 非言语行为与课堂教学. 华中师范大学学报（哲社版）1994 .3.

［3］ Hu Chundiao. “The English Teaching and Learning Methods” ［M］.Higher Education Press,1990