The Research On Teaching Of English Newspapers And Periodicals

In recent years, using English newspapers and periodicals in the classroom has attracted more and more people's attention. As one of the most effective ways of mastering modern English, English newspapers and periodicals have some advantages. They have new and plentiful contents, strong timeliness, various subjects and styles; meantime they are interesting and readable.Using them as teaching materials in reading classes can be an effective supplement for traditional textbooks, as they enhance the students' enthusiasm, enrich teaching resources, widen teaching possibilities, and develop the students' interest in English. Therefore, English newspapers and periodicals reading has been the focus of English teaching of reading. By investigating long and practical teaching activities, there exits some questions in the English newspapers and periodicals reading courses, such as out-of-date textbook, old and one fold teaching method, students'passive involvement and so on. The effect of classroom can't be ideal.Therefore, based on reading theory, schema theory and task-based instruction, as well as Krashen's input hypothesis, the rationale of using English newspapers and periodicals as reading materials in the classroom, this thesis explores teaching activities using English newspapers and periodicals in a reading course, and presents the hypothesis about more effective ways of improving teaching efficiency. According to the hypothesis, the author designs an experiment. The participants involved in this experiment are English majors, at East College. Status in quo of classroom, reading strategies and barriers are investigated through questionnaires and face-to-face interviews. Student-centered activities are designed using 21st Century in order to involve students in the classroom activities, and then effectively improve their reading ability, writing and oral levels effectively. The teaching methods in this thesis are proved to be with reliability and validity through the results of experiment.In addition, in discussion chapter, through text-based research and interviews of some foreign teachers, the author partially got to know the real usage of English newspaper and periodical in ESL classrooms abroad, and hopes this information and comparison can be useful to the teaching of English newspapers and periodicals in China.