A Study On Applying Genre-Based Teaching Approach In Senior High English Reading Instruction

Genre-based teaching approach is a pedagogy based on genre and genre analysis. Applied in classroom activities, it features developing teaching activities revolving around the schematic structure of a text. There has been considerable interest in the genre-based approach to the teaching of language since the mid-1980s. This approach has communicative purpose as its foundation and originates through the work of Halliday (1985), Swales (1990), and Bhatia (1993). It aims to improve students' reading abilities by first building them with the awareness of text genres so that students can form the habit of seeking text information following the structural framework and linguistic features closely associated with each genre.The early linguists abroad applied the insights of genre and genre analysis into the teaching of writing and achieved sound results, and thus formed the so-called "Swalesian schools", "New rhetoric schools" and "Australian schools" (Kay et al., 1998). With more achievement made in this field, the researchers and teachers begin to apply the approach in English teaching. In China, such practice tends to be limited to the context of tertiary education with the goal of improving writing. The study of using genre-based approach in the teaching of reading is very limited, and report on its employment at secondary school English level can be hardly located, let alone using qualitative and quantitative methods to prove its validity and feasibility in the senior high English reading classroom.Inspired by this genre approach, the writer decided to experiment with it when she did co-teaching with Ms Zhang Guixi in Senior Two English reading instruction at Liang Xiang Senior High School. The primary purpose of the study is to examine the validity and feasibility of using such an approach in improving senior high students' English reading comprehension. It aims to answer the following research questions: 1) Can genre-based teaching approach enhance students' reading ability, especially in the aspect of comprehension level? 2) Can such an approach lead to improvement in students' good reading habit forming and reading strategy using? 3) Can such an approach effectively cultivate students' awareness of genre? 4) How do the students feel about this genre-based teaching approach?The experiment lasted for one term with two Senior Two classes participated, each consisting of 44 and 46 students respectively as the experimental group and the control group.The experimental data show:1. Genre-based teaching approach has positive effects on improving senior high students' reading ability, enabling them to uplift the comprehension level quickly, especially in the aspects of main idea catching, inference making and judgment making.2. Such an approach is effective in stimulating students' reading interest, which in turn may result in students' increasing confidence, forming good reading habits, taking initiatives in reading and using various reading strategies.3. The approach can be a useful tool for enhancing senior high students' awareness of using genre analysis in reading.4. Students show positive attitudes towards genre-based teaching approach. It is found that most students think that such an approach is truly attributive to the improvement of their overall reading ability.These findings suggest that genre-based teaching can be applied to the teaching of reading at senior high level and improve students' performance and achievement in reading. Although this thesis is just a tentative work, the researcher hopes the data it has obtained will offer some useful references and insightful perspectives to those who are interested in further exploring the genre-based teaching approach.