Research On The Activity Design In The Preschool English Textbooks In Spain

In the international context of the new curriculum reform, many countries in the world attach great importance to the language learning and the diversification of the language development. In the1990s, the European Union proposed the MT+2(mother tongue plus two) language development framework, and pointed out the advantages and possibility to develop a variety of languages in the early childhood education. Unlike the situation in other countries as a fact course and the lack of the empowerment and protection of the administrative law, the preschool English education in Spain is put in the place of statutory curriculum. The Spanish government has paid more and more attention to the foreign language learning in the preschool education. In the mid1990s, the Spanish national laws on preschool education prescribed that English should be taught to the preschool children in the characteristic of experiment in the second cycle (3-6years old) of the preschool education; Since the beginning of the new century especially since2004, the Spanish national laws on preschool education and the preschool curriculum documents by the autonomous communities in the context of new curriculum reforms have all indicated that the necessity and importance to create a foreign language course, and English has become the first choice of the preschool foreign language courses in Spain for its universality in the international communication.Although the history of the preschool English education in Spain is not so long, it experiences three periods of gestation, experiment and development. It’s the gestation period of the preschool English education from the promulgation of the democratic constitution in1978to the empowerment to the preschool English education in the characteristic of experiment in the national law on preschool education in1996; It is the experimental period since1996the People’s Party began the eight-year reign till the year of2004when the Socialist Workers Party came to power again and promulgated a series of laws to improve the curriculum system of the preschool English education; It is the flourish period since the new curriculum reform in2004up to now; the preschool English education has developed extensively in the autonomous communities, the curriculum has become systematic and standardized gradually, the overall quality of the preschool English teachers has greatly improved, different kinds of systematic teaching materials and curriculum resources with various suitable design concepts for the children age characteristics are showing the diverse, colorful scene.The design of the preschool English textbooks in Spain is systematic, suitable and rich in characteristics, which caters for the age characteristics and embodies the life of the preschool children, pays more attention to the culture factors and be activity-based. Activities are the main components of the preschool English textbooks in Spain, the activity is the basic orientation of the teaching procedure design, as well as the basic unit of the preschool English textbooks; all kinds of colorful activities are the design features of the preschool English textbooks, and are also the outstanding features of the preschool English textbooks especially the preschool English textbooks in Spain which are quite different from those textbooks at other educational stages. In the teacher’s book, different functional activities are designed according to the capacity of the class; the pupil’s book is used as an activity material of some modules to some extend to match with the activity design in the teacher’s book together with other activity materials; the activity design in the pupil’s book is the important component of that in the teacher’s book, but it is only taken as a part of the teaching materials, not the whole. To take the phenomenology, hermeneutics as the methodology of the research, on the theoretical basis of the curriculum and instruction, textbooks research, linguistics, culture, developmental psychology, sociology, ecological ethics, aesthetics, through the specific research methods of literature analysis, content statistics, case analysis, questionnaire and interview, to choose the eight most used preschool English textbooks as the research cases, to make the activity design as the penetration point of the research, this thesis has interpreted the situation of the preschool English education’development in Spain systematically, excavated the principles of the activity design in the preschool English textbooks in Spain deeply, presented its configuration in whole, analyzed its values system profoundly, made a overall presentation of its inner, outer and the deep structure and took on the qualitative and quantitative analysis, tries to find the rules and features of the activity design and constructs the theoretical framework and pattern plate of evaluation for the preschool English activity design and preschool English textbooks analysis, so as to provide some references and inspirations for the preschool English activity design and the choice, use and construction of the preschool English textbooks in the context of preschool English education as fact courses in China.The principles of the activity design in the preschool English textbooks in Spain imply in multiple facets. The curriculum idea presents as the curriculum integration based on differentiation of the learning fields; the language activity target embodies the dual multi-dimensional structure; the content highlights the characteristics of content and language integrated learning (CLIL); Scaffolding Instruction is used as the teaching strategy based on the children’s zone of proximal development; the Total Physical Response is the most popular learning mode based on the children’s language learning characteristics. The preschool educational activity design should take into account the double-layer structure elements of the external and the internal structure. The external structure elements mainly include the activity objective, activity content, activity organization and activity evaluation; the internal structure elements briefly consist of the activity subjects, activity objects, activity environment, and activity rules. The activity design in the preschool English textbooks in Spain involves the common elements of the general preschool educational activity design, as well as including the special participation elements as the activity design case. The main special performance is presented as:text exists as the carrier of the educational activity design; the activity subject becomes the object of the activity design; themes are the unifiers of the activity design; pictures are the main components of the activity materials; the activity design puts forward the specification and constraint to the language used in the activity; the activity design takes on the selection and adaptation to the culture; the activity design uses a variety of performance techniques comprehensively.From the activity design in the sample preschool English textbooks in Spain,13417preschool English activities are cleaned out; based on the systematical analysis to the organizational variables such as the status and roles, manifestations, organization forms and activity areas of the preschool English education activities, and the functional variables such as language items, language skills, cognitive and developmental functions, as well as the structural variables such as activity materials, integration of the fields, linguistic expressions, the activities in the sample textbooks are sorted out and made out a detailed classification. The activity design in the preschool English textbooks in Spain shows a series of common and personal characteristics in the overall distribution, the longitudinal distribution of the activity types through the different age groups and the lateral distribution across the different textbooks. These features are mainly presented in two aspects:consistency and differences coexist; regularity and contingency are significant at the same time. The consistency mainly performances in the same activity types in different age groups and different textbooks, the similar proportion of each activity type in different textbooks as well as the analogous curriculum values orientation among different publishing houses or textbook compilers. The differences briefly manifest in the special activity types in the individual age group or individual textbook, the uneven numeral distribution of the activities in different age groups and different textbooks, the changes of the proportion of each type of activities in different age groups and different textbooks, the various textbook selecting criteria and references among different selectors (mainly refer to the teachers). The regularity mainly exists in the regular longitudinal distribution trends of the activity types through the different age groups, and the regular lateral distribution trends of the activity types across the different textbooks based on the order of selected rate. The contingency mainly means that the percentage changes of the activity types among different age groups don’t present the consistent trend, but show the uncertain bobbing phenomenon; the irregular variation of the percentage of the various types of activities which are arranged based on the selected rate also reveals some accidental factors affecting the selection of the textbooks.The activity design in the textbooks has a deep structure-the values system, which plays a central role in guiding the internal and external structure on the surface. The value system fully reflects the designer’s thinking, values, ethics and codes of conduct with main intention, the penetration of its role implies in language, ecological ethics, health, cultural, social, aesthetic and other development dimensions and shows some functional orientations. The linguistic development aspirations of the activity design in the preschool English textbooks in Spain are mainly reflected in:to cultivate the children’s interest in foreign language learning by the interesting games; to develop the children’s oral communicative competence by the main approach of the listening and speaking skills training; to promote the children’s overall perception to the language by the scenario creation; to create the proximal development zone for children’s language learning by the comprehensive utilization of various media. The ecological ethics concerned in the activity design in the preschool English textbooks in Spain is mainly reflected in:to understand the diversity of life through natural things cognition; to cultivate the children’s scientific inquiry spirit through the experiential learning; to take on the ecological ethics inspirations of man in harmony with nature through the permeability education. The cultural infiltration of the activity design in the preschool English textbooks in Spain is mainly reflected in:to feel the cultural traditions with the target language in the cultural infiltration; to develop the intercultural communicative competence in the cultural infiltration; to conduct the international understanding education of inspirations in the cultural infiltration; to develop the international civic awareness in the cultural infiltration. The health guidance of the activity design in the preschool English textbooks is mainly reflected in:to foster children’s good life and health habits with daily life activity content; to improve the children’s muscle movements and body coordination skills with the dynamic forms of activities; to develop the children’s good mood and emotion in the emotional awareness and empathy training. The social care of the activity design in the preschool English textbook in Spain is mainly reflected in:from the "substance self" to "social self"-the development of the individual self-awareness and self autonomy; from the "family" to "companion"-the development of the social interaction skills and the excitation of good social emotion; from the "identity" to "rules"-the social role identity and the formation of the behavioral ethics norms. The aesthetic implication of the activity design in the preschool English textbooks is mainly manifested in:the picture design reflects the beauty of colors; the dance movement shows the dynamic beauty; to feel the melodic beauty in the song and chant activities; to create beauty in the handmade experiences; to understand the harmonious beauty in the artistic conception of the activities. In total, as the planning programs of the preschool English activities at the special stage of foreign language learning, the activity design in the preschool English textbooks in Spain displays a series of characteristics which are quite different from those in other educational stages, other fields, other styles, and which mainly presents in four aspects:enlightenment, comprehensiveness, appropriateness and artistry.