Applying Games Teaching Approach To Improve Primary School Students' Interest In English

The changing world in which we live, the scientific and technological sharing among countries, the migration of people from one place to another, all create the need for the teaching and learning of a foreign language to and by the children of today. However, primary school English teaching methods are still under exploration. A common phenomenon is that pupils'interest in English is decreasing as their English level goes up. And pupils become more and more passive in English class. Teaching and Textbook Writing Syllabuses for Primary School English points out, "Interest is a good teacher for pupils to learn a foreign language. And it's an important task for primary school English teachers to arouse students'interest at present."This thesis aims to illustrate the improvement of games teaching approach on primary school students'interest in English. The writer proposes some suggestions on primary school students'interest activation and lists some important guidelines on classroom activities. In the mean time, it aims at drawing people's attention to the significance of interest activation in primary English classrooms. There are five chapters in this thesis. The first chapter is introduction. It mainly introduces the present situation of primary school English teaching in China and the existing problems. According to these problems, games teaching approach is introduced in order to improve primary school students'interest in English. The second chapter is literature review, which tells us psychological, pedagogical and foreign language learning studies on interest. The third chapter sets out the theoretical ideas. It begins with the definition of interest, the analysis of the relationship between interest and motivation. Concerning the limitations of pupil'psychological development, the application of games teaching approach in primary English teaching is presented. Principles and features of games teaching methods are given, together with a list of games, when and how to use games. The fourth chapter introduces the experiment, which was carried out in Grade 4, Zhongshanlu Primary School, Dalian. A brief survey with 5 questions on pupils'interest, together with the observations, questionnaires, interviews and the oral test was presented. The findings of the study suggested that games teaching approach did play a role in primary school students. The games actually aroused students'interest. The fifth chapter is conclusion. It emphasizes the importance of games in teaching primary English. And the process of teaching through games should be under control with teaching objectives to serve the teaching content. And it is necessary for the teachers to create new games with appropriate methods. Only in this way, substantial progress can be made in the improvement of pupils'interest.