An Action Research On Strategies For Cultivating Cultural Confidence Among Junior High School Students Based On The English Textbook Of People’s Education Press

The English Curriculum Standards for Compulsory Education(2022)provides a new definition for course identification of English,and it requires students to learn about different cultures,compare cultural similarities and differences,draw on cultural essences,and gradually develop cross-cultural communication awareness and competence.Thus the students can learn to view the world objectively and rationally,develop an international perspective,cultivate a sense of home and country,and assert cultural confidence.Despite the fact that teaching the English language is no longer simply about instructing language knowledge through reading and practicing,culture is often taught in isolation rather than be integrated into the process of learning English.Under such circumstances,scholars at home and abroad have researched and analyzed the integration of cultural knowledge into the teaching of English,and scholars in China,in particular,have studied the situation of integrating Chinese culture into teaching English.However,to cultivate cultural confidence,it is necessary both to learn Chinese culture and to learn the best of Chinese and foreign cultures,in order to seek a common ground while setting aside differences,deepen recognition of national culture,and consciously promote Chinese culture.Using the textbook as important materials for teaching English in China,this study aims to address the following questions:(1)In what ways is Compulsory Education Textbook of English: Go for it! helpful to foster cultural confidence in junior high school students?(2)How can teachers use Compulsory Education Textbook of English: Go for it! to nurture junior high school students’ cultural confidence in their teachings?Based on Cortazzi & Jin’s three sources of cultural information and the definition of cultural knowledge in English Curriculum Standards for Compulsory Education(2022),the cultural knowledge in Compulsory Education Textbook of English: Go for it!is analyzed from thematic,distributional and attributional characteristics respectively.According to the characteristics of the arrangement of cultural knowledge in the textbook,a corresponding action research plan is designed to help teacher-researchers use the cultural knowledge in the textbook as materials to develop students’ cultural confidence in English teaching.The action research was conducted with 46 participants in a public junior high school in Qingdao,Shandong Province,and three rounds of action research were conducted using intercultural communication theory and constructivist theory as the basis for designing cultural teaching activities.Through textbook analysis,it found that the theme of cultural knowledge in Go for it! covers source culture,target culture,and international culture,with a wide range of materials selected that are close to life and permeate various teaching lessons.The frequency of appearance increases with the age of students.Through three rounds of action research,it found that teaching and learning about culture can enrich students’ cultural knowledge,foster cultural awareness and enhance cultural confidence.Teachers should be guided by teaching objectives,and design teaching activities based on the integration of cultural knowledge from textbooks.The culture-based teaching should contain the following three teaching procedures: first,building a context to learn about cultural knowledge of relevant topics;second,comparing Chinese and foreign cultures to understand culture differences,conducting cross-cultural communication through collaborative learning;third,digging deeper into cultural meaning,seeking a common ground while setting aside differences,enhancing national cultural identity and cultural confidence.At the same time,teachers should guide the participants to continue to accumulate English expressions related to Chinese culture outside the English lesson,reinforce their ability to tell Chinese stories in English through homework and assignments.Based on the summaries and reflections of the action research,suggestions are provided for the textbook writers to develop the cultural content in the textbook,and for teachers to cultivate cultural confidence into the English lessons,in relation to the English curriculum objectives of cultivating cultural confidence.