Design And Attainment Of Objectives In College English Listening And Speaking Instruction

As the College English Instruction Guide(2015) has put forward, the goal of College English course is to develop students’ integral competence, enhance their inter-cultural awareness and develop their social abilities. English listening and speaking, as two basic and required skills, play an important role in College English instruction. However, English listening and speaking competence has been a relative weakness for non-English major students although much improvement has been made in College English instruction. The low effective or ineffective instruction still exist in College English listening and speaking class.There are many factors influencing the effect of instruction. Objective is the critical factor. Bloom, an educational psychologist in the United States regards “effective instruction begins with clearly knowing what the instructional objective is.” Objectives are very important in instruction. They serve as not only an indication for students’ learning, but the guide for teachers to choose teaching content and method, design teaching activities and help the evaluating the effectiveness of instruction. We can say a teacher who understands why and how to use objectives will teach more effectively. Therefore, designing specific and clear objectives is not only expectation or outcome of students’ learning, but also a way to raise the effect of College English listening and speaking instruction.However, objectives still draw less attention in College English listening and speaking class. For example, teachers’ statements of objectives are not clear or specific. Teaching activities are not aligned with objectives. Some teachers even cannot identify objectives from teaching activities and tasks. Objectives in College English listening and speaking turn out to be an ornament in instructional design and practical instruction.Therefore, there is a need to explore how teachers view objectives and their knowledge of objectives in College English listening and speaking because the two parts directly influence teachers’ design of objective. In addition, since teachers’ implementation of objectives also affects the effectiveness of instruction and the effect of students’ learning, to explore how they promote the attainment of objectives is especially important.There is a profound significance to conduct the research from the perspective of objectives. The research is an investigation on College English listening and speaking instruction, from teachers’ attitude and view on objectives, the current situation of their objective design and the attainment of the objectives on the basis of Bloom’s taxonomy and Anderson’s Revised Taxonomy. Theoretically, the investigation can enrich the connotation of objectives by exploring teachers’ view and attitudes toward objectives for English instruction and extend the range of related research in English listening and speaking. Practically, the research can arouse teachers’ awareness of objectives and arouse teachers rethink their teaching in College English listening and speaking. In addition, the research can provide a clue and reference for administrators and school leaders to make better teaching policies so as to gain higher effect of English listening and speaking teaching and learning and develop students’ English competence at last.In the research, qualitative with quantitative methods are combined, with the use of questionnaire, text analysis and class observation to explore English listening and speaking instruction through answering three questions as following: 1) What is the College English teachers’ view on classroom instructional objective? 2) What is the current situation of teachers’ designing of objectives? 3) How are these objectives achieved during the process of classroom instruction?The thesis includes five chapters in total. The first chapter makes a brief introduction about the background of the research including a brief overview of the previous research, the purpose and significance of the study as well as the framework of the paper. Chapter two is the literature review, which reviews the related concept to objectives and college English listening and speaking including definition of objectives, its function in effective instruction, and some important theories about objectives. The previous study related to objectives is also summarized in this chapter. Chapter three introduces the research methods and how the research data has been collected and analyzed. Chapter four analyzes the result and data collected based on the questions raised in the research. Chapter five summarizes the result and findings in the research and emphasized the significance of the research on the effective instruction by the design and attainment of the objectives. And limitations of the research and process in the thesis will be discussed to provide some suggestions for further studies.The research finding shows that most of the English teachers admit the importance and the function of the objectives in English listening and speaking classroom. But they are lack of much knowledge about objectives. Language knowledge and skills are emphasized when designing objectives. Remembering, understanding and applying language knowledge are the focus of teachers. Their objectives are not sated clearly, especially in speaking instruction. By classroom observation, it is found that a great discrepancy exists in the students’ classroom participation and motivation although their teaching content are basically aligned with objectives. And students do not think highly of their attainment of the objectives, especially the speaking objectives.Based on the finding of the research, suggestions are given as following: strengthen the study and training of teachers in service and improve their professional knowledge; create an environment of teachers’ development to facilitate teachers’ self-reflection so as to improve the English listening and speaking instruction.