A Corpus-based Study On The Organization Of English Teaching For Middle School

Teaching syllabus plays an important role in English teaching area. The classifications of syllabuses are mainly into synthetic and analytic syllabuses. Synthetic syllabuses emphasize particularly on the sequencing of teaching contents and the criteria of sequencing chiefly fall to "frequency" and "complexity". The investigation into syllabus organization is comparatively new in domestic English circles.Following a theoretical study on syllabus, a corpus-based study of organization of syllabus in middle school will be conducted, and it's mainly about the contrast of the sequencing of teaching contents in textbooks and the frequencies of contents in native language. Textbooks follow the guidance of syllabus and arrange teaching contents in a sequence exactly ruled by syllabus. Therefore, the study of syllabus organization can be fulfilled by the investigation into sequencing of contents in textbooks.The textbooks JEFC and SEFC are recognized by China Textbook Examination Committee, and they are in a countrywide use. Their syllabus pattern is within the scope of synthetic syllabuses. As to the corpora, CEC (spoken English corpus) and BROWN (written English corpus) are employed to execute the study. With theoretical support, an investigation into selected grammatical areas is carried out between CEC and BROWN with the help of LDC-Online and SPSS. And the sequencing of related grammatical areas in China authoritative textbooks (JEFC and SEFC) for middle school students is drawn out for the further comparison with the corpus results, in the hope of finding some characteristics of syllabus design for middle school students in China.The research results denote that sequencing of some teaching contents made by syllabus contradicts greatly the order suggested by corpus. The syllabuses are usually designed usually based on tradition and intuition rather than on empirical evidence.