On Construction Of Contexts In College English Listening And Speaking Materials Development

According to College English Curriculum Requirements (2004: 1), the objectives of College English teaching are to improve students'comprehensive skills, especially listening and speaking abilities. Traditional listening and speaking materials emphasize on basic language skills. As contexts play an important role in language communication, context construction should be the focus of listening and speaking materials development. In this thesis the author tries to construct a context model for listening and speaking materials compilation, with a hope to provide a facilitating tool for a more effective and efficient ELT practice so as to meet the requirements of present College English teaching.In this thesis theories of contexts and factors relating to context construction will be reviewed first, then principles of materials development will be discussed, and after the relationship between context construction and materials development is analyzed, finally a context model will be constructed for listening and speaking materials compilation. In language communication, various aspects of contexts influence understanding, like co-texts, contextual situations, political and economic systems, historic and cultural backgrounds, cognitive levels of communicators, and so on. In addition, intercultural knowledge and learning strategies should be contextualized to achieve effects. Thus the process of listening and speaking materials development is the process of context construction. During this process, first of all, proper relationship needs to be constructed between listening and speaking. When language texts are composed, various contextual situations and proper cultural and cognitive contexts need to be constructed. Contextual preparations, like lexical and content related preparations, can facilitate students'comprehension of listening texts and participation in speaking activities as well. As context construction is a dynamic and socio-cognitive process, listening and speaking materials advocate interactive language learning, which requires students to actively engage in task-based activities. Thus activities should emphasize on learning rather than test so as to provide students with the opportunity to construct new knowledge, and promote autonomous, initiative and co-operative learning. In classroom teaching, how to deal with the relationship between listening and speaking activities plays an important role. In addition, teachers play an important role in organizing, shaping the activities, and participating in and assessing students'performance.To construct a context model, published listening and speaking materials are evaluated, activities are analyzed and modified based on classroom observation and surveys and interviews concerning context construction are carried out among students. The focus of the model is to develop micro-significance in ELT classroom teaching.