Children's Language Acquisition And Primary English Teaching

As the importance of primary English teaching is gradually valued by the whole society in recent years, primary English, as a compulsory course, is making itself into the primary schools. With its further development, the existing problems are indicated and disclosed by researchers, and even some researcher discusses the feasibility or reversibility of the primary English course in China (Bao Tianren, 2004). In this study, the author focuses on the present investigation and analysis of the four primary English lessons in Province S and attempts to put forward the suggestions and measures for the development of primary English teaching in the selected areas of Province S.This study is a part of STEPSS (Standards for the English Teachers at Primary and Secondary Schools) project, which was launched in November 2005. From the perspective of children's language acquisition, the author analyzes the teaching design and classroom teaching of the four primary English lessons, as well as the interviews to the four teachers, respectively from a developed area, a middle-economic-level area, and an undeveloped area in Province S, aiming to describe the present situation of the four primary English lessons. According to the researcher's analysis, the primary English teaching of the four lessons is in the continuum from the traditional language teaching to the contemporary one, which is weak in the teaching design and classroom teaching. Finally the researcher proposes some suggestions on the classroom teaching and teacher training for the improvement of primary English teaching in those areas of Province S.This paper is divided into five chapters. Chapter One offers an overall introduction to this paper. It focuses on the main points by explicitly stating out the background and objectives of this dissertation and the significance of achieving these objectives. That is, from the perspective of children's language acquisition, it attempts to uncover the strength and weakness of the four lessons in line with those theories and then provide some suggestions and implications to the primary English teaching and learning in the selected areas.Chapter Two makes an overview of the theories related with Children's cognitive development and first/second language acquisition and expatiates the relationship between the primary English teaching and those theories. It first states out Piaget's Intellectual Development and Vygotsky's Social Cognitive Development, which advocate the students-centered teaching model, suggest that the teachers should provide authentic and meaningful tasks for the students to produce the language, and mention that the teachers should play as the assistants while the students cooperatively finish the tasks. Then the theories about first language acquisition are mentioned, mainly concerns about the importance that imitation, input and discourse attach to the children's language acquisition. Berko-Gleason (1982) views that in order for successful first language acquisition to take place, it is interaction, rather than exposure, is required. Therefore, for the second language learning, the teachers' input should be correct and meanwhile teachers should provide more opportunities for the students to use the language in group works or pair works. Finally, Krashen's Comprehensible Input Hypothesis and Swain's Comprehensible Output Hypothesis are discussed, which require that the teachers should design some meaningful activities and make sure that the students have enough time to output what they learnt in the class.Chapter Three introduces the research design and method. This paper is a qualitative research based on the description and analysis of the four audio-taped materials.Chapter Four is mainly concerned with the discussion and analysis of the data. This study mainly analyzes the teaching design and classroom teaching of the four primary English lessons, as well as the interviews to the four teachers. After the analysis, it reveals the present situation of the four primary English lessons and meanwhile unveils some limitations of the four lessons, for example, the students passively accept the knowledge in the teacher-centered classroom organization, the tasks are unreasonably designed with plenty of practice-drills, there lack of student(s)-student(s) interactions and application time, and the teachers are weak in the teaching and learning theories and do not deeply understand the New English Curriculum Standards.Chapter Five draws a conclusion on the basis of the above discussions. It puts forward the implications for the classroom teaching and teacher training and also mentions some limitations of this paper.