The Application To Communicative Approach In English Listening And Speaking Teaching In Votech Colleges

Higher Vocational Education has been developing in an unprecedented rapid step since the implement of the Law on Vocational Education in 1996. According to this document, the major task that the higher vocational education should assume is to foster personnel of skills and management in the frontline of social-economic construction. "Practicality and adequacy" is the teaching principle which the higher vocational education has been in persistent pursuit of. Communicative competence in foreign language is one of the necessary qualifications for professional technical personnel in the modern society. With China's entry into WTO and the implement of its open-door policy, communication is becoming more and more important. During the communication, English listening and speaking are one of the most important factors. However, in China's Votech Colleges (VC), traditionally our focus on the English teaching is always knowledge but not performance. Students can not transfer the knowledge to real life. Therefore, after many years' English study, they still experience difficulty in using English aurally and orally, most of the students are just like the deaf and the dumb.The English Syllabus in Votech Colleges does not define the requirements on students' listening and speaking ability. In addition, the present tests like CET3, CET4, CET6 and the terminal English tests bear little listening contents, especially the speaking contents, whereas set linguistic knowledge as the chief requirement and ignore students' ability of language use in practice. Consequently, the students can not even learn initiatively, let alone the realization of the teaching goal of higher vocational education. With the spreading of the Communicative Approach (CA) in China, today our focus is on communication. We emphasize that the student is the subject of learning; that the end of language learning is communicating in English or doing things in English; the impetus of learning is information exchanging. In view of the above mentioned facts, the thesis will probe into the issues of executing CA to improve the students' English listening and speaking in VC.Guided by the relevant CA theories and interaction theories, this thesis explores empirically whether it is feasible to apply CA in VC English teaching and learning. First, we looked back the characteristics, aims and the present situations of VC, then we presented such hypothesis as: CA can create a favorable socio-psychological atmosphere in the classroom; offer more time and opportunity to practice and communicate with the target language; the experimental class can achieve greater academic achievement than those in the control group do.This thesis is a report of an experimental study of CA in English listening and speaking in VC. Two natural classes with 51 people in each, one of which is the experimental group, and the other of which is the control group, majoring in international trade and electronic trade at the Economic and Trade Department in Changsha Aeronotical Vocational Technical College, where the author of this thesis works. A teacher-centered traditional method and CA pedagogy were respectively employed in the control group and the experimental group. In order to ensure the validity of the experiment, the author of this thesis carried out a comprehensive test a week before the experiment began, and the author also designed and issued two questionaires before and after the experiment. Luckily, the respond to the questionaire and the experiment data proved to be satisfactory to a certain extent.Communicative approach emphasizes the functional meanings and social communicative meanings of language. This study shows that executing CA in English listening and speaking teaching in VC can arouse the students' enthusiasm and foster their interest; develop their confidence and self-regulated study ability; maintain harmony and natural environment, thus it can improve the students' listening and speaking ability. But implementing CA has been greatly restricted owing to the concrete situations in China. Generally there are so many students in every class and it exists some problems in management and organization. At the same time the teacher can not correct the students' errors immediately in class and the teaching method is always the same. So as time goes by, the students will lose their freshness and interest in English. Although there are some defects in implementing CA, it is an advisable teaching method. If we can make good use of it, it can heighten the effect and develop the students' communicative competence, especially their listening and speaking ability.It's hoped that the study of this thesis will provide insight into English listening and speaking teaching in VC and give the teachers more options in both how they develop and how they assess their students' listening and speaking ability.