Action Research On Fostering Students’ Divergent Thinking By Constructing Text Schema

Innovative thinking is the core competence in the era of knowledge economy when every country attaches great importance to cultivating innovative thinking of which divergent thinking is the core.Therefore,divergent thinking is regarded as the goal of the curriculum standard and the functional of the textbook.Although having made some achievements,the previous studies which were still regarded as division and fragmentation.Further studies need conducting to strengthen the combination between English reading teaching and the fostering of divergent thinking.After making a new definition of divergent thinking,making clear the relationship between schema theory and reading comprehension and analyzing the features of reading module in Englsih textbook in high school English,a hypothesis is put forward that it is an efficient way of diffusing information by extending units according to typical structure,in multiple directions or from various and continuously perspectives,with double codes indicating the extension logic.The research is conducted,following the method of action research,namely," problem---hypothesis--plan---action---reflection".Based on the research hypothesis,a schema is to be extend its units in the procedure of English reading teaching.some frameworks is provided to support the units’ extending,namely,the Mode of basic elements of news,the Basic order of thought,the Mode of concept relation and the Dimensions for divergent thinking by Guilford.Based on three features of divergent thinking,namely,fluency,unique and creative,some standards are put forward to evaluate the quality of unitsextension,namely,variety miscellaneous and new.The research scheme is to be carried out.In first period,extending schema units in order to enrich background in the task of warming up or pre-reading is helpful to predict the text.By comparing the results of schema figured out with or without information framework,we find that the support of the information framework makes students be able to produce variety,miscellaneous but obsolete information.In module two figuring out schema to trace the structure of the text is helpful to make students grasp the text as an integrity.By comparing the structure made with or without the help of information frame,we find that the text structures supported by the information frame are inclusive,integral and open.In module three figuring out schema in order to extend the schema units is helpful for students to produce more topics to discuss.In reading comprehension,it is suggested that the text is an open information platform.Discussing open problems set up in reading comprehension only makes students think passively,whereas letting students produce questions or topics according to the text is the effective way to cultivate divergent thinking,which can be complemented by the method of dialectical opposition,contradiction hypothesis,component vacancy,transposition,infiltration,leading cluster connection,making up plots and expanding details etc.the results show that with the help of framework students can produce various and creative topics.The result of the study indicates that the research hypothesis has certain effect that figuring out schema with the support of typical information frame is reliable recall background and strengthen the link between the input information and the configuration schema,but sometimes restrict students’ thinking and result in adverse effects of stereotype.Extending schema units in various directions is helpful to prefabricate structure,predict text boundaries,broaden the path of thinking,make better the text structure,analyze the text structure and thinking the logic,generate new information and encourage innovative thinking.Extending schema units successively is conducive to produce more information nodes,enhancing the activity of thinking.Visualizing the procedure of extending schema units is helpful to make the invisible logic to the visual icon.The research shows that the it is reasonable that configuring schema is conducive to generate multiple dimension relationship and to cultivate the psychological basis of divergent thinking.In the action research on diffusing one central into branches ofinformation,some teaching principles are drawn,namely:being in accordance with the nature of life,presenting the content in the form of schema,visualizing the process of diffusion and developing the teaching procedure by generating.Being in accordance with the nature of life means taking student’s life experience into account,guiding the procedure with clues common in daily life and discussing topic which are concerned about students’ daily life problems at present or in the future,attention should be paid to the change from what students can experienced directly to what they can understand.Organizing the contents in form of schema requires to predict the framework of the context,to store text information structurally and expand the text boundary in logic ways.while helping students get the general cognitive model,we should pay attention to avoid being stiff in thinking.Presentation with mindmap can figure out the schema structure,trace the track of mind and encourage divergent thinking,visualization can be strengthened both visual image thinking and logic in the knowledge.Developing the teaching procedure by generating requires equal interaction between teachers,whereas teacher’s role in educational should not be ignored.