A COMPARISON STUDY OF THE APPLICATION OF FACILITATOR TALK TECHNIQUES BY NON-NATIVE TEACHERS

The primary purpose of this study was to raise teachers’ awareness of their roles in hindering or facilitating learners’ contribution by their use of language. The researchers tried to investigate whether these techniques are applied in two different levels of elementary and intermediate in EFL classrooms. To that end, naturally occurring classroom talk was recorded from four classrooms in Gap Foreign Language Institutes in Gorgan, two intermediate and two elementary levels. Then the transcriptions were analyzed considering Clifton’s (2006) observations and viewpoints on facilitator talk. The result indicated the typical chain of turns in observed classes consisted of IRF cycle featuring prolonged sequences of teacher’s turns which allows them to dedicate a high proportion of the classroom talk to themselves. Classroom interactions lacked most features of facilitative interaction and contained some recurring techniques (backchannelling, co-authoring narratives) that might be observed in teacher-centered classes alike.