An Empirical Study On Application Of Scaffolding Theory To The Teaching Of College English Writing

With development of international communication and cooperation, English has been regarded as an international language, and more attention is given to the cultivation of English writing proficiency. For college students, English is a required subject. What is more, the cultivation of writing ability is indispensable for their English learning. However, for a long time, the improvement of students'writing ability has always been a challenge for college teachers in China.To solve the problem mentioned above, the present empirical study attempts to apply the scaffolding theory to the teaching of college English writing, making comparisons with the traditional English writing teaching approaches. Thus to answer the two research questions:(1) Is instructional scaffolding writing teaching more effective than the traditional approaches to English writing teaching at college for non-English majors? (2) If the scaffolding theory works when it is applied to the teaching of college English writing, on which aspect(s) can it improve students'writing ability?Having constructivism and Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development as theoretical foundations of the scaffolding theory, the study lasted 12 weeks. Research subjects are non-English major freshmen of two classes in an ordinary college in Hunan province. The experimental class students are taught by instructional scaffolding writing, while the traditional English writing teaching method is used in the control class. The two classes have the writing lessons under similar physical conditions, i.e. the same writing teacher, the same teaching schedule, and also the same learning hours and environment.The measurement tools in the study are a mini-questionnaire and English writing tests. The mini-questionnaire was designed by the author to acquire the participant students'basic background information, attitudes and learning needs toward English writing and self-description of their writing ability before the study. As the major measurement tool, English writing pieces were collected, including pre-writing test, post-writing test, and two empirical writing tests in the course of the study. The data were analyzed by Excel and SPSS 16.0. The pre-writing test scores show that the two comparison groups are similar in English writing ability before the study.After the twelve-week study, the results proved that the instructional scaffolding writing teaching method is comparatively more effective than the traditional approaches to the teaching of English writing at college for non-English majors, though much progress was not made as we expected on the participant students in English writing, especially on students from the experimental class. Since the scaffolding theory works when it is applied to the teaching of college English writing, it can improve students'writing ability on the aspects of Content, Organization and Discourse. Meanwhile, the results show that the instructional scaffolding writing teaching is also more effective on the categories of Vocabulary, Syntax, and Mechanics in the experimental class than that of the traditional English writing teaching approaches used in the control class.The results and findings in this study may have some pedagogical implications for the teaching of college English writing. However, due to limited knowledge of the author and other factors, the stability of the instructional scaffolding writing teaching research on college students in their English learning needs to be studied further.