Non-English Majors' Interest In Classroom Activities

The thesis presents a report of the project implemented to solve the problem that most of the non-English majors in the current medium-sized classes do not like doing small group work, which directly leads to ineffective learning results. It is hypothesized that non-English majors' interest in small group work is increased by group dynamics creation and better-designed small group tasks. This hypothesis is verified by a one-week group forming of a middle-class of 40 students in the Independent College, Guilin Electronics University, and a four-week classroom teaching/learning of elaborately designed small group activities.The thesis begins with a brief introduction to the background on which the research is based, followed by research questions and hypotheses, in Chapter One. Then the author outlines in Chapter Two the characteristics of TEFL and TEFL classroom in the current situation in China, and then shifts attention onto the focus of "Involving the Learners (Littlewood, 1992)" which mainly deals with conditions for learning.The focus of attention switches from "TEFL classroom", environment in which teaching-learning process takes place, to "atmosphere of the classroom (Hadfield, 1992)", morale to activate learners to participate and to interact with one another. Group learning strategies and cooperative learning and interaction are stressed over and over again in...