Application Of Length Approach In College English Writing

College students have long been poor at English writing when it comes to English learning. Since the implementation of the nationwide CET Band4&6, their overall performance in English, concerning their English proficiency and test scores, has improved a lot, nonetheless, their writing ability is still left behind and far from satisfactory. Meanwhile, they are afraid of English writing and lack any interest in it, consequently resulting in great concern and deep reflection among college English teachers and scholars. Length Approach, proposed by Professor Wang Chu-ming (2000), sheds much light on college English teaching. He believes that students should be encouraged to write as much as possible without word limitation and fewer composition rules first, then to have their essays perfected later; that students should be allowed to become aware of their own shortcomings in writing; and that students, by adopting the Length Approach in English writing, are able to widen their thoughts, unleash their innovation ability and enhance their confidence and sense of fulfillment in English learning so as to mobilize students’enthusiasm and initiative. Wang’s experiment shows favorable effect in English writing teaching and learning. The writer of this thesis, very intrigued in this approach, attempts to adopt it among non-English majors in Xi’an University of Arts and Science. By questionnaires, interviews as well as the qualitative and quantitative analysis, a case study is conducted in order to find that by the Length Approach whether the students’writing ability can be improved, their attitudes towards English writing can be changed and whether they can alleviate their anxiety.Base on the previous research, the present study, targeted at sixty-nine freshmen from Xi’an University of Arts and Science, aims to prove the effect of the length approach among non-English major students on their writing. This case study focuses on two problems:one is whether the Length Approach has noticeable effect on improving students’writing, the other is whether the Length Approach can relieve students’anxiety over writing.This study is based on Krashen’s Input Hypothesis and Affective Filter Hypothesis (1985), Swain’s Comprehensible Output Hypothesis(1985), and the quantitative and qualitative research methods, a teaching experiment was conducted on the Grade2011freshmen from two classes, majoring in Chinese Language and Literature from Xi’an University of Arts and Science for the purpose of verifying the effectiveness of the Length Approach.The statistical analysis software---SPSS16.0, is adopted to compare and analyze the scores of their writing tests before and after, and their anxiety levels. The findings are as follows:1. The test results indicate that the students’total points in the experimental class are higher than those in the controlled class.2. The results from the two questionnaires also reveal that the adoption of the Length Approach is helpful in arousing students’interest in writing, reducing their anxiety over English writing and strengthening their confidence in English writing and even English learning. What’s more, most students agreed with the percentage scoring system involved in the Length Approach.It can be concluded that the Length Approach can be applied in college English teaching and favorable effect can be harvested as well. This study is merely an attempt in the Length Approach. Due to the shortage of time, other uncontrolled factors and the limited knowledge of the present researcher, this study as well as its conclusions has some limitations. Several aspects such as the lasting time of the experiment, the sample size and the research design all await further investigation.