Use Of Cognitive Strategies In The Teaching Of High School English Grammar Study

Grammar is the study of the rules by which words change their forms and are combined into sentences; it is also the base of communication and determines its fluency and accuracy. So grammar teaching is very important to language learning. However, the traditional method of grammar teaching overemphasizes teacher's explanation but attaches less importance to the cultivation of students' ability. Therefore, exploring a new way of grammar teaching is of great necessity.This paper aims at investigating an effective way to apply cognitive strategy to grammar teaching in high school. The research is based on schema theory, constructivist learning theory, information processing theory, meaningful learning and discovery learning theory. The research is designed according to the cognitive requirements mentioned in the new curriculum.The research is conducted between two classes taught by the author. They were divided into experimental class (in which cognitive strategy was adopted with emphasis on developing students' ability and interest.) and common class ( in which traditional approach was used.). The data of this research were collected through questionnaires and grammar test. The data were analyzed by SPSS.Two-year experiment reveals that, firstly, applying cognitive strategy to grammar teaching can help the students form an objective view on grammar learning and stimulate their interest; secondly, the students from the experimental class use the cognitive strategy better than those from common class in many ways, such as analyzing , summarizing, correcting and so on; thirdly, the data of the T test show that the applying of cognitive strategy to grammar teaching has a direct effect on the result of grammar test.At last, the article also discusses the instructions to grammar teaching given from this research.