Contextualized Teaching And Learning In Middle School EFL Classrooms

The final object in middle school English teaching and learning is to raise students' comprehensible ability in using English. The development of the comprehensible ability is based on the development of linguistic skills, linguistic knowledge, affect, learning strategies and the sense of culture. Teaching and learning English in authentic context is beneficial not only to students' learning enthusiasm and interest in English learning, but also to large qualities of comprehensible linguistic input and output as well as the development of sense of culture. As a result, it will facilitate students' active learning processes and communicating with others in an appropriate way. It will help teachers refresh their ideas on teaching and learning and achieve their goals as they have expected.When teaching English in middle school, a question often confronting us is that the application of linguistic rules does not always proceed from communicative purposes. That is to say, a learner's ability to make use of linguistic rules to speak and write grammatically correct sentences does not necessarily mean that he can use these sentences to achieve effective communication. Language for communication is invariably used in particular context. Therefore, the learner must not only learn the system to realize its various abstract rules in the correct form of sentences, but also learn to use appropriate utterances in various language contexts to achieve communication. A learner can hardly be said to master a language until he acquires knowledge of the abstract system, namely, the formal structure of the language on the one hand, and until he learns the appropriate uses, that is, the functions of the system in given contexts on the other hand.Contextualized teaching and learning is a conception of teaching and learning that helps teachers relate subject matter content to real world situations; and motivates students to make connections between knowledge and its applications to their lives asiamily members, citizens, and workers and engage in the hard work that learning requires.My thesis is based on the notion that contextualized learning "marks an educational philosophy and an educational strategy that centers on enabling students to find meaningfulness in their education" (Parnell, 1995, p. 2). Unfortunately, students often fail to find meaning in school, but the contextualized learning classroom offers a place for meaning and content to merge. Parnell (1995) points out that this educational stance provides opportunities for the "teacher to broaden students' perceptions so that meaning becomes visible and the purpose of learning immediately understandable" (p. 2). Then, as students engage in purposeful classroom learning experiences, they begin to see how content mirrors the world beyond school. In the contextualized teaching and learning classroom, learning experiences are based on the application of traditional expectations through five approaches: problem-based learning, cooperative learning, project-based learning, service learning, and work-based learning (Berns & Erickson, 2001).The present paper is divided into six chapters:Chapter 1 focuses on the need for the study and the organization of the thesis. It points out that the acquisition of a foreign language requires not only a knowledge of its system or its abstract rules by which a learner learns to understand, speak, read and write grammatically correct sentences in that language, but also a mastery of utterance which fit in appropriately in varied communicative context.Chapter 2 makes a general survey of context theory, focusing particularly on the views of Malinowski, Firth, and Halliday of the London School and provides a further division of context theory on the basis of the author's understanding. Context can be divided into linguistic and extra-linguistic. Linguistic context can be further split into lexical one and grammatical one, and extra-linguistic context into context of situation and context of culture.Chapter 3 introduces some findings about contextualized teaching and learning and analyzes the role of contextualized input and output in EFL teaching and learning processes. Negotiation of meaning, interaction, output, and affect are covered. Vygosky's zone of proximal Development and Swain's output hypothesis are also introduced in this chapter to prove the author's idea.Chapter 4 puts forward underlying support for contextualized teaching and learning, characteristics of CTL, and approaches for implementing CTL.Chapter 5 focuses on contextualizing and integrating language instructions, especially making a comparison between a top-down approach and bottom-up approach and giving some examples to show how to have English lessons.In Chapter 6, the author draws a conclusion: In order to make full use of context or make contextualized teaching and learning more efficient in EFL classrooms, teachers should bear the following in mind:(l) concentrating on meaning; (2) contextualizing the language items; (3) making use of the learner's existing shared knowledge; (4) introducing the target culture; (5) teaching the sociolinguistic rules associated with the target culture; (6) teaching the learner how to use contextual clues.(7) adopting interactive teaching approaches; (8) advocating formative assessment.In summary, contextualized teaching and learning draws upon the latest research on effective teaching and student learning, which is drawing more and more attention from middle school teachers and school authorities. It places responsibility on the student with the teacher serving as a significant contributor in the process. Engaging, active learning replaces passive, traditional methods through a variety of hands-on, collaborative, high-level approaches. These approaches will result in a motivational, invigorating educational experience for all students as they learn at a high level. In this way, students are better prepared for practical exams in China and better English leaning proficiency. They will better retain knowledge and skills and raise student academic and career-technical achievement. As a result, teachers will be moreconfident in their teaching and students are better prepared for their future leaning and working.