An Empirical Research On Application Of Task-based Language Teaching To News English Listening In Vocational Colleges

At present, the traditional English listening teaching method and the artificial teaching texts in most of the vocational colleges are still widely used. As for the method, it adopts the following kind of teaching model: teacher plays the tape, students listen to the tape and do the exercises, then the teacher checks the answers, finally if necessary the teacher plays the tape again. In a word, the whole teaching procedure is single and goes in one-direction, lacks of interaction and communication. Compared with the traditional one, task-based language teaching approach is a relatively active and popular English teaching method in the latest 20 years, it is multi-dimensional and interactive, it is characterized by"learning by doing, learning by using", emphasizes the interaction, communication and negotiation, it is a logical development of Communicative Language Approach. Meanwhile, many schools still use the traditional teaching texts, which are relatively more out-of- date; some even are far from students'real life. Under this teaching model and this teaching material, there is no any learning interest and motivation. Students'listening level is generally low and it is hard to improve. Exploring a certain new teaching method and adopting new teaching material is becoming more and more necessary. Taking the news into English listening class and as a new learning material is an attempt. Compared with other artificial listening textbooks or other printed listening materials, the recourses of the News English can be obtained through various channels and aspects, which can provide students with rich materials for their listening both in and out of class. There are many experts and scholars who have applied the task-based approach into various courses and several teaching stages. Many experts and scholars advocate introducing the task-based approach into the higher educational field. However, application in vocational colleges is few; utilization in news listening teaching is even rare.Due to the fact that there is no effective teaching model in improving the listening ability in vocational colleges, it is necessary to explore and study the listening teaching mode. Therefore, the researcher tries to explore a new listening teaching way and use the new teaching material- news English that are suitable to the vocational colleges by means of applying the theory and the teaching model of the task-based approach into the real teaching class.The research adopts the following methods, such as Questionnaire Investigation Method, Test Method and students'journals, tries to investigate the effectiveness of the task-based approach compared with the traditional one. The subjects are 95 sophomore students in two different classes of Hebei Professional College of Political Science and Law, of whom 48 students are from the Practical English and they belong to experimental class while 47 students are from the Legal English and belong to the control one. The experiment lasts one whole term, 16 weeks. A comparative analysis is made before and after the experiment, the data collected are dealt with quantitatively and qualitatively by doing the independent samples test in order to answer how effective the task-based language teaching is in improving learners'various ability compared with the traditional one. Specifically, to make sure whether the task-based language teaching can activate students'news English listening learning interest, confidence, motivation and so on, to see whether the TBA is conductive to help HVC learners'autonomous learning, self-exploration, communicative collaboration, negotiation and interaction, to check what other exact beneficial language skills can learners receive from the teaching of news English listening in TBA. And finally to explore whether TBA can help HVC learners build up the social and cross-cultural awareness and widen their horizon.Before the experiment, the result depending on the independent samples test is two tailed, P﹥0.05, indicates that the two classes are equal in listening competence. Instead, the result of the post-data is two tailed, P﹤0.05. It shows that the experimental class achieves much more distinctive improvement in news English listening competence than the control one.The results of the experiment shows that both the listening ability and learning motivation of the experimental students have been clearly improved by introducing the task-based language teaching method into the listening teaching and by doing a series of multi-leveled and various task-based practices. They have got the interest and confidence for this course, and they are willing to do extra self-exploration, autonomous learning, communicative collaboration, interaction, negotiation in and out-of class, they all think their other language skills such as reading, writing, speaking are improved greatly and clearly, they have formed the social and cross-cultural awareness, after the experiment students in the EC are likely to think about problems and events in the view of a certain culture, and usually stand on the social level, which is much more important for being a social man in the future after they graduate from the college.