The Application Of Discourse-based Grammar Teaching To English Tense Teaching In Junior High School

As an important grammar item,English tense learning facilitates learners’ accurate use of language.However,most English tense teaching classes tend to be teacheroriented and present tense knowledge in isolation.As a result,students have difficulty in choosing and using English tenses in oral or written communication.In fact,as a grammatical means of composing discourse,English tense has a discourse function.Meanwhile,discourse provides a carrier for tense in grammar from the three dimensions:form,meaning,and use.Therefore,based on the relationship between discourse and tense,this study attempts to conduct English tense teaching from the discourse level,so that students can better understand and comprehend the function of English tense.Based on Systematic Functional Grammar theory and Three-dimensional Grammar theory,this study aims to explore the effects of discourse-based grammar teaching approach on junior high school students’ performances on and attitudes towards English tense learning.In this study,the students from two parallel classes in Grade Nine are chosen randomly as the research participants.And there are four kinds of English tense(past simple,present perfect,past continuous and past perfect)included in the experiment.In a 12-week experiment,the discourse-based grammar teaching approach was applied in the experimental class to teach English tense,and the four-stage grammar teaching method was conducted in the control class.Firstly,the pre-test was carried out to learn whether the students had the same level of tense comprehension in both EC and CC.And the questionnaire was given out to EC before the experiment to investigate the students’ attitudes towards English tense learning.After the 12-week experiment,the post-test was conducted to test whether there was an obvious difference in students’ tense achievements between the two classes.At the same time,the questionnaire was distributed to EC again to investigate the changes in students’ attitudes towards English tense learning.Finally,the data collected were analyzed by SPSS 27.0.By quantitative and qualitative analysis,it is found that the application of discourse-based grammar teaching approach has a better effect on the students’ English tense learning performances.Specifically,through the results of the test papers before and after the experiment,it can be seen that the application of discourse-based grammar teaching approach can enhance students’ comprehension of tense form and meaning.Meanwhile,through classroom observation,it is also found that students’ ability to use tense in meaning construction is also improved.In addition,the application of discourse-based grammar teaching approach also has a positive impact on students’ attitudes towards English tense learning.Through the results of questionnaire survey and interview,it can be seen that students’ attitudes towards English tense learning have changed after the experiment from the three dimensions: cognitive level,affective experience and behavioral tendency.From the perspective of cognitive level,students’ awareness of tense learning importance is improved while their recognition of learning difficulty is reduced;As far as affective experience,students’ interest,motivation and self-confidence in learning tense are raised.In terms of behavioral tendency,students’ attention and classroom engagement in English tense learning classes are also enhanced.Overall,students have a high degree of acceptance of discourse-based grammar teaching approach.This study offers certain reference for English tense teaching through discoursebased grammar teaching approach.Teachers need to design classroom activities from the perspective of communication,and integrate the concept of discourse throughout the teaching of tenses,so as to improve students’ ability to correctly use tenses in composing discourse.