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1、交际法在中学英语课堂的应用The Application of Communicative Approach to English Class of Middle SchoolAbstractCommunicative approach appeared in the 1950s，it has been studied in China for almost 30 years. As a young teaching approach, it is widely accepted by many middle school English teachers. It is also a good
2、 teaching approach with many advantages. For example, it emphasizes the central position of students, and advocates that English is learnt to use, it emphasizes the communicative function of the language. Communicative approach helps the students to learn concisely and lively. Communicative approach
3、 in the class of middle school is adapted in accordance with the students psychological features. However, it still needs improvement. This paper analyzes the disadvantages of communicative approach. For example, it puts emphasis on fluency but neglects accuracy; it stresses the communicative abilit
4、y but neglects grammar, and the testing system is improper. This paper aims at rectifying these shortcomings in theory and practice. Firstly, we should get rid of some misunderstanding. Secondly, when it is adapted in practice, teachers need to design good introductions in the class and stimulate st
5、udents interests. Thirdly, teachers should create a harmonious atmosphere, and build up a good relationship between teacher and the students.Key words:Communicative approach; communicative ability; middle school English class; stimulation摘要交际教学法在中国的发展仅三十年的历史。这种年轻的教学法在中国中学英语课堂得以广泛地吸收和采纳。它有诸多优点诸如他以按学生
6、需要取材，教学过程交际化以求学用合一，学得精学得快为核心，它还根据儿童的特点教学。它要求英语学习的学以致用。但是交际教学法仍有许多不足之处有待我们改进。交际教学法有诸多缺点。诸如它重流畅性轻准确性，重交际轻语法，不适宜的考试制度等等。针对以上不足之处，本文提出了一定的见解。我们从应做到消除一些理论上的误解. 在实践上教师应设计适合学生的引入的同时要创造和谐的学习英语的环境，组织学生进行交流。同时学生也应该充分发挥自己学习的主动性在英语课堂中多交流多应用英语。关键词:交际教学；交际能力；中学英语课堂; 刺激IntroductionCommunicative approach appeared i
7、n the 1950s，and it has been widely adopted and achieved a lot such as the improvements of listening ability, communicating ability and reading ability. However, it still has some disadvantages. The fluency of language certainly is important, but its accuracy shouldnt be neglected. Whether grammar te
8、aching should be emphasized in teaching remains a problem. Communicative approach must be applied to English class according to Chinese educational situation. Especially in middle schools，communicative approach should be carefully researched. How do we use the existing theory? How do we correct the
9、current mistakes on communicative approach? How do we improve middle school students comprehensive ability? All these questions will be provided with answers. Communicative ApproachIn order to answer the question of what is communicative approach, we must firstly try to define what communicative com
10、petence is. According to Littlewood, an English linguist, a persons communicative competence can be summarized as four broad domains of skill.A. Four SkillsFirstly, the learner must attain as high a degree as possible of linguistic competence.Secondly, the learner must distinguish between the forms
11、that he has mastered as part of his linguistic competence, and the communicative functions that they perform.Thirdly, the learner must develop skills and strategies for using language to communicate meaning as effectively as possible in concrete situations.Fourthly, the learner must become aware of
12、the social meaning of language forms. (Littlewood w.6)B. Two Versions of Communicative ApproachThere are two versions of communicative approach, one is the strong version of communicative approach, and the other is weak version.Strong version of communicative approach advances the claims that langua
13、ge is acquired through communication. It is not necessary for the students to pay special attention to English learning; they would pick up the grammatical principals during the communicative procedure. Within this version, one uses English to learn it. The weak version of communicative approach str
14、esses the importance of providing learners with opportunities to use their English for communicative purpose, and characteristically attempt to integrate such activities into a wider program of language teaching. According to what has been described, we get the information that one learns English to
15、 use it, namely only if one learns English well firstly, and can he have the ability to communicate with others. However, such description separates the English learning from approach. In China, most junior English teachers adapt weak version of communicative approach. During the language teaching p
16、rocedure, most of the teachers remain apply the old teaching method into practice, and they only stress on language structure. The author of the dissertation believes that one should use English to learn it, which should be supported in middle school English teaching. (Stern. 43-50).Features of Comm
17、unicative ApproachIn order to understand communicative approach better, we should carefully study its features. Here we analyze eight features in detail.Firstly, focus on meaning. In the communicative approach, the meaning seems much more important. When you are communicating with the students, you
18、not only have to emphasize the fluency, but also have to emphasize its meaning.Secondly, one should learn to communicate. It means that one learns English to use it. Most people think that one should use English to learn it, which is a wrong idea. In the English class of middle school, the purpose o
19、f learning English is to help the students communicate in English.Thirdly, any device which helps the learners is accepted, but it should be varied according to the age interests. In the English class of middle school, the atmosphere is significant. Therefore, some devices such as photos, media play
20、er, and computer software should be provided to induce the students interests.Fourthly, comprehensive pronunciation is sought. When we adapt communicative approach, the fluency is emphasized. Meanwhile, its pronunciation should also be sought.Fifthly, translations may be used where students need or
21、benefit from them. According to the feature of the middle school students, the teacher should translate some difficult sentences for them, then they can recite them to use naturally.Sixthly, reading and writing can start from the first day, if desired. Reading and writing are two important factors i
22、n the English class. In the communicative approach, reading and writing are also conducive to communicating.Seventhly, fluency and acceptable language is the primary goal, and accuracy is judged by the context. It is known that fluency is the goal of communicative approach. When we use English we sh
23、ould not just focus on how to choose a correct word, actually, we should speak with fluency. Then, the accuracy is also required according to the context.Eighthly, students are expected to interact with other people through pair work and group work, or in their writings. In order to improve the stud
24、ents communicative ability, the teacher should create an atmosphere suit to communicate. There are various ways, for example, through pair working, group dialogue or writing.(Wang Liuxian,50).Existing Problems in the TeachersBeliefs and Practice of Communicative Approach Though there are some advant
25、ages of communicative approach, there are still some problems needed to be noted.A. Problems in the Teachers BeliefsFirst, well discuss the problems existing in the teachers beliefs in the following paragraphs.1. Taking Communicative Approach as a MethodCommunicative approach is an approach or an id
26、ea rather than a communicative method. However, many English teachers of middle school regard it as a teaching method. As a result, they wrongly believe that communicative approach is to demand the students do some exercise or have dialogues by themselves once and again. As a matter of fact, communi
27、cative approaches not only state the aim of learning and teaching in detail, but also illustrate the definition of acquiring communicative ability. As different teachers have different ways in teaching, communicative approach does not provide any regulations to restrict teachers mind, but encourage
28、them to teach English by using teaching approach2. Stressing Language StructuresMany English teachers in middle school think that communicative approach only stresses the use of language. They neglect the choosing of vocabulary and grammar teaching. In this case, the students feel that they havent a
29、chieved anything. So grammar is important in all kind of language. If the grammatical teaching is neglected, the language will be illogic when communicating with others. In such a case, many people believe that some grammatical point should be firstly introduced, and then applied in the course of co
30、mmunication. Nevertheless, this kind of teaching is defined as structural teaching of language; therefore it is wrong to separate grammatical teaching from communicative ability.3. Misunderstanding of Communicative Approach As we know, to learn English one must command four skills. They are listenin
31、g, speaking, teaching, and writing. Many English teachers of middle school define listening and speaking as communicative ability. They believe that the students abilities will improve on condition that they have better skill in listening and speaking. As a matter of fact, reading and writing should
32、 be two significant factors involved in communicative capability. As we are reading, we communicate with the author; as we are writing, we are communicating with those who read our works. Therefore when the teachers use Communicative Approach, they should better explore to what degree the students c
33、ommand the four skills, instead of putting emphasis on listening and speaking.B. Some Practical ProblemsIf we want to solve the problems in the root, some practical problems need to be rectified.1. Some Differences Between Reality and Theory Communicative approach aims at drilling the students commu
34、nicative ability. Language and communicating approach can be mastered through communicating. But communication does not refer to exchanges between teachers and students in the classroom, but indicates that students should use English to communicate with others in their daily life. They should commun
35、icate with others in the dormitory, in the shopping center, English club etc. Therefore, it needs a natural context so that the students feel that they live in an English speaking country. However, among the Chinese students, a few of them often speak Chinese instead of English. It is only in the En
36、glish course that they are forced to express their idea by speaking English, as soon as the English class is over, they think and talk in Chinese. Being lack of English speaking atmosphere, they can not deeply understand what communicative approach is.2. The Teachers ProblemsIt was nearly 30 years a
37、go that Communicative Approach appeared in China. So it is a relatively new approach, which needs further improvement. Many middle school teachers do not really understand what Communicative Approach is. As a matter of fact, Communicative Approach is a special teaching approach which is different fr
38、om the traditional teaching method. The middle school teachers, especially the English teachers should engage themselves in Communicative Approach research. First of all, they have to prepare the lessons carefully and completely so that they can perform wonderfully in the class. Meanwhile, they play
39、 roles of leaders and organizers. Teachers should make effort to guide and organize the students. They should have to command some skills in case of the incidents in the classroom. Usually, students would ask some strange questions that no one would predict. Facing such questions, what can the teach
40、ers do? Teachers should be calm and solve the problems. Before the ending of the class, the teachers should conclude and comment on such questions. Actually, a teacher must be versatile, they must know all kinds of knowledge and abilities such as profound knowledge and well reaction. Lastly, they mu
41、st be well command of the target language. However, the English ability of our Chinese teacher are not very optimism, especially in the rural areas, most of the middle school English teachers are badly lack of communication skill when teaching. They can not deal with some incidents in the class, whi
42、ch do not make them a good organizer. Very few middle school English teachers are capable of taking well advantage of communicative approach. These three points hinder the development of the application of communicative approach in middle school English teaching.3. The Students ProblemsIn china, man
43、y students are familiar with the traditional teaching model, they are passive in language learning, and they are accustomed to such a situation: the teacher expresses grammatical points, then the important language points are written down on the blackboard, meanwhile the students mechanically take n
44、otes. If teachers adapt the communicative approach, some important points are not very clear for them; in contrast, the students are confused. In this case, the students can not accept this approach. But as all we know, the purpose of communicative approach is to improve the students ability to comm
45、unicate in English, and the students differ in their interests, some of them like communicative approach for they have learnt something, but those who can not find anything deserve taking notes feel that is a waste of time. Traditional teaching methods stress on the teaching of phonetics, grammar, v
46、ocabulary, which lead to a teacher-centered teaching model. In this way, the students become passive in studying English. But actually, education is an active action, it is completed on condition that the learners must be active, and attempting new things and create great achievements.Students aged
47、from thirteen to eighteen feature as strong ability in intimation; strong desire to learn new things; good memory; better psychological quality, they like to show themselves, and create new things to prove their ability. All of these are advantages for them to study English. However, they are badly
48、lack of the ability to understand some internal meaning or structure of foreign language; they are less concentrated; not interested in repeated even mechanical teaching. If the teacher force the students to recite phonetics, or grammar, their advantages are just neglected. Many students lag behind
49、others because they can not recite what the teacher asked for. Even more badly, they are tired of learning English and give it up at last. Therefore, middle school English teachers should focus on students psychology, to help them to set up their love for English. So they should change their teaching method through listening speaking, singing, playing, performing, reading and writing. These ways are conducive to fluent English communicating.4. Fluency or AccuracySome
