A Research On The Effects Of Sustained Silent Reading On English Reading And Autonomous Learning Ability Of Senior High School Students

Reading plays an extremely important part in English learning and teaching.It is one of the most effective ways to increase students’ English input.A great deal of high-quality reading can not only expand students’ horizons,it can also enhance their ability of understanding and prompt their interest in learning English.Moreover,it can lay a good foundation for them to adapt to the fast-paced development of modern society.A good English reading method can not only bring all kinds of benefits to students’ English learning,but also give a hand to the cultivation of students’ independent learning talents in the future.However,compared with many studies on the current situation of English reading in senior high school in China,it can be seen that most of the English reading teaching in China still focuses on the grammar explanation of reading materials,sentence analysis,difficult sentences interpretation and understanding of the textbooks.The teaching mode is still mostly in the stage of the teacher-centered or does as many test questions as possible.These practices ignore the students’ subjective initiative,which seriously hinder the enthusiasm and creativity of students in English learning,and can not cultivate the ability of senior high school students to learn English independently.These studies also show that the current reading situation is not optimistic.It is difficult for Chinese senior high school students to meet the requirements of the new curriculum standards in terms of quantity,breadth and depth.Based on the above factors,this thesis introduces sustained silent reading which derived from Krashen’s input theory.It is equipped with a student growth portfolio that can make records and urge students to read regularly.It can not only assist students to complete the requests for senior high school English reading,but also enable students to choose their favorite reading materials and then read in a relaxing and comfortable environment.By applying sustained silent reading,the author devotes herself to finding a useful way to cultivate the English autonomous learning ability of the students’ gradually.The research aims to answer the following three questions:1.In terms of English reading and English autonomous learning ability,what is the current situation in Haihu Middle School of Xining?2.What effects can sustained silent reading bring to senior high school students’ English reading ability?3.What effects can sustained silent reading bring to senior high school students’ English autonomous learning ability?This research combines quantitative research with qualitative research.The quantitative research used the methods of pre-test and post-test plus the comparison of the post-test results between the experimental class and control class.The usage of the questionnaire performed as quantitative research,too.The interviews for both teachers and students also gave qualitative data.The subjects of this research are 91 students in two parallel classes of senior two in Haihu Middle School of Xining.One of which is an experimental class and the other is a control class.In the teaching experiment,the experimental class adopts the combination of sustained silent reading and traditional reading teaching mode,while the control class still adopts the combination of reading training and traditional reading teaching mode.Three months later,the two classes were given a post-reading-test which is the same in the degree of difficulty.It aims at collecting data after the implementation of sustained silent reading.SPSS22.0 software is used to analyze the test results.The analyses include the pre-test and the post-test.It also gives an analysis between the pre-test and the post-test.On the one hand,the comparison with the pre-test and the post-test can embody the changes after using sustained silent reading.On the other hand,it can show the differences by using different teaching mode.Meanwhile,the results of the questionnaire are also analyzed to see the change of the autonomous learning ability between the experimental class and control class both before and after doing sustained silent reading.In the qualitative study,8 students were interviewed in the pre-test and post-test,including students’ self-learning attitude and consciousness,English reading strategies,reading methods and reading interest.In the latter questionnaire,students’ attitudes towards sustained silent reading,the effects of this reading method and the further applying of this method are added up to the former questionnaire.Reading cards,reading reports and other learning materials of the whole experiment are recorded in a growth portfolio.It is doing in the form of one person,one bag,which serves as a formative assessment material.It supplies dynamic,flexible and diverse materials for teachers’ teaching and students’ learning.It is an effective means of implementing the trinity of teaching,learning and assessment.The use of the growth portfolio is convenient and flexible,which can provide continuous enlightenment for teachers and students,and make sustained silent reading more suitable for practical teaching activities.The experimental results show that(1)the amount of reading is expanded;their reading scores are positively correlated with their learning ability.The stronger the autonomous learning ability,the higher the reading scores;(2)after using sustained silent reading method,the students’ autonomous learning ability have been improved,especially their ability of making plan,learning motivation and efficiency,self-regulated learning habits have been improved.(3)The results of the interview show that the students’ consciousness and attitude of autonomous learning are more positive.Their interest in English reading is stronger.Teachers also agree that it is an effective method to stimulate students’ learning motivation,cultivate students’ interest in learning and cultivate students’ good reading habits.Because of the limitation of the experimental time,the process of this research was somewhat hasty.Another deficiency is that the way the author set up students’ growth portfolio is kind of time-consuming and inconvenient to find a certain material in practice.Although there are still some defects in this research,the experiment also provides a lot of enlightenment for teaching and learning,which is the inheritance and development of sustained silent reading.