The Application Of Web-assisted Cooperative Learning Model To College English Writing Teaching

English writing, as one of productive skills, occupies a very important position in English teaching. But the fact is,for a long time it is one of the most difficult skills to cultivate among college students and the weakest part in college English teaching.From the cooperative learning theory,with the help of the technology and resources of the Internet, the research explores 1)the model to apply the web-assisted cooperative learning in college English writing teaching, 2) whether the students under the web-assisted cooperative learning approach can make more progress in English writing than those using the traditional individual pen-and-paper writing model, 3) the possible problems and difficulties which exist when web-assisted cooperative learning is implemented in college English writing teaching, 4)the strategies and solutions that can be adopted to deal with these possible problems to enhance its effectiveness and ensure its success in the college English writing classroom setting.Under the theoretical guidance of cooperative learning and process writing, and the technological support of Internet, the author attempts to apply web-assisted cooperative learning to college English writing teaching, aiming to use an empirical study to prove that the web-assisted cooperative learning is more effective in promoting students'English writing competence than the traditional individual pen-and-paper writing model.In order to collect valid information and data and ensure the validity of the research results, this research adopts both qualitative and quantitative research methods. Sixty non-English majors from Grade 2009 College of Information Engineering of North-west A&F University are chosen as the subjects and divided into the experiment group and control group, among whom pre-test is used to prove no dramatic difference in both English level and English writing level exists at the beginning of the experiment. During the experiment which lasts for one semester, web-assisted cooperative learning is used in the experiment group and the traditional individual pen-and-paper writing model in the control group. After the experiment post-test, questionnaire, interview and other research tools are used among the experiment group to aid data collection.The research indicates that compared with traditional individual pen-and-paper writing model, using the web-assisted cooperative learning to college English writing teaching can enhance more interaction and cooperation among students, improve the students'initiative, enthusiasm and confidence in learning and writing English better, and promote greater improvement of writing skills in English. Therefore, it can be used in college English writing instruction. In addition, the research also finds out the existing problems when web-assisted cooperative learning is applied in college English writing teaching: how to manage cooperative learning group effectively, how to judge and make full use of the abundant Internet resources but not depend completely on them, etc. The subjects who are interviewed put forward their understanding and solutions to these problems.This study may shed light on other similar researches and serve as reference to college English teachers and students. But due to the limitation of experimental time, the chosen samples, objectivity of assessing students'writings and other conditions, the results of this paper have some restrictions.