The Application Of Schema Theory In College English Listening Teaching

Schema theory has been one of the prevailing theories in the field of language teaching in the past two decades or so. Schema is people's general knowledge of the world, namely one's"pre-existing knowledge"or"background knowledge". The theory of how a reader or a listener makes use of his schematic knowledge to achieve efficient comprehension during reading or listening is called schema theory.Based on previous researches, the paper discusses in detail the application of schema theory in the listening teaching through activating students'previous schemata stored in their minds or setting up new schemata before listening and points out the best way of applying schema theory to English listening teaching is to divide classroom listening teaching into three stages: pre-listening, while-listening and post-listening. In the pre-listening stage, the teacher organizes some warm-up activities such as discussing questions about the related topic or the key words in order to help students set up the new schemata and activate the previous schemata stored in students'minds. In the while-listening stage, the teacher reminds the students to utilize some techniques and strategies while listening so that they can comprehend and remember the listening materials quickly. In the post-listening stage, what students have learned is consolidated by exercises of combining listening with speaking and writing. The most outstanding features of this model are that it emphasizes the function of pre-existing knowledge in listening comprehension as well as the significance of pre-listening and post-listening, thereby making up for the insufficiency of the traditional listening teaching model and improving the listening teaching effects.Based on previous theoretic researches, the writer carried out a small-scale teaching experiment, aiming to verify the active role of schema theory and the"three-stage listening teaching model"in improving students'English listening comprehension. The subsidiary aim is to investigate the effect of background knowledge on listening material of different complexity in listening comprehension. The subjects are 60 first-year English majors from Xingtai Polytechnic College. The"three-stage listening teaching model"was applied in the experimental class while the traditional teaching model was applied in the control class during the eight week experiment. After the experiment, the two classes were given the same test and the scores were analyzed by SPSS statistical package. The experiment conclusions are that the"three-stage listening teaching model"based on the schema theory can improve students'English listening comprehension and the English listening teaching effects; the background knowledge produces a great impact on the performance of listening comprehension. In addition, the more complex the material is, the greater impact background knowledge produces.The paper consists of five chapters. Chapter one is the introduction to the purposes and significance of this paper. Chapter two is a brief literature review, including the concept, classification and development of schema as well as the process of listening comprehension and the function of schema in listening comprehension. Then, the writer further explores in detail how the"three-stage listening teaching model"is applied to English listening teaching, providing the theoretical framework for the thesis. A small-scale experiment is described in Chapter Three. In Chapter Four, the author reaches some conclusions through data analysis and discussion, and some advice are given to the teachers who are using or are going to use the"three-stage listening teaching model"in the listening teaching practice, followed by the direction of future research; Chapter Five provides the summary of the thesis.