Appraisal of Attitude of Teachers’ Comments on Primary Students’ Reports: A Systemic Functional Linguistics Perspective

Abstract

This research discusses the appraisal attitude resources in teachers' comments on the students' reports. The attitude resources included affect, judgment, and appreciation (Martin & White, 2005). The data of this research was thirty teachers' comments. The phenomenological case study is implemented by interviewing three cohorts of teachers from different subject areas to accomplish the data analysis of this research. They are Mathematics, Language and Arts, and Mandarin teachers. The results from the analysis showed that all three teachers majorly use positive judgments in their writing with a total of sixty-nine, followed by appreciation resources with thirty-two. Lastly, the number of affects is only fifteen. The interview analysis further highlights that teachers praise students' learning approaches rather than their emotional states, which aligns with the limited occurrence of affect in the comments. The implication of this study values insights into the usage of the three attitude resources in teachers' comments, despite the limitation of the teachers' familiarity with the research terminology. The unstructured interview questions ensure flexibility for the subjects to respond.