| The information technology not only boosts people's communication and life, but also supplies a new teaching mode for education--multimedia instruction. Multimedia instruction has many advantages. It can show vivid video and display images and plenty of information to learners. It is beneficial to create activated course environment and to improve teaching quality. Therefore it is widely used in teaching practice from primary school to college and university. More and more people and scholars show great interest to multimedia instruction. Scholars have done researches on the combination of multimedia equipments and instruction, the advantages of multimedia instruction and the existing problems of multimedia instruction and so on. Through their research, they discover that it increases learners' interest on study, and they also find that there exist certain problems. For examples:It lacks interaction between students and teachers.The courseware looks beautiful, but it lacks necessary contents without high quality.This thesis focuses on the application of multimedia in college English intensive reading (CEIR) from the perspective of constructivism.Before, there have had lots of researches on multimedia instruction from different perspectives at home and abroad. For example Yang Fan published The Research of Multimedia Instruction Environment Based on Campus Network that stresses campus network's ability of supporting multimedia instruction. In addition some scholars make researches on multimedia instruction from the perspective of teaching models or task-based approach. The thesis combines data and constructivism to exemplify whether multimedia courseware helps the teaching of college English intensive reading.The thesis is totally composed of five chapters. The first chapter is introduction that describes the significance of the study, research methodology and the organization of the thesis. First it briefly introduces the significance of the study or the reason for the study. Research methodology contains literature investigation method and method of quantitative analysis. Literature investigation method is widely used in the study. It plays an important role in preparation of the thesis. It helps to select the topic and search related materials such as previous study of such a topic, avoiding repetition research. Method of quantitative analysis is the major method used in the thesis. The study employs the method to analyze data, including data examination, data coding, data packet, data summaries and production forms. Through the software Spss, it is easy to obtain the table of descriptive analysis, tests of normality and nonparametric test. Lastly it lists the organization of this thesis.The second chapter is literature review which contains the conception of multimedia courseware and multimedia instruction, advantages and disadvantages of multimedia instruction, application of multimedia courseware in college English intensive reading, and previous study of multimedia instruction at home and abroad.The third chapter is theory of constructivism. This part mainly explains theory of constructivism, which becomes prevailing in America and Europe since the 1980s', The theory holds the view that learners construct their own knowledge by autonomous learning. In other words, it is not passive acceptance of knowledge but an active on of constructing meaning. The theory emphasizes the importance of learners, which helps to cultivate learners'ability of autonomy and creativity. Now many educational experts and scholars devote their energy to apply the theory to the teaching practice and promote educational reform. The introduction of constructivism in the thesis refers to different views on constructivism including Piaget, Vygotsky and Bruner, constructivist education values and constructivist teaching models. First, it describes the development of constructivism through introduction of different views on constructivism. Piaget belongs to cognitive constructivism school. He emphasizes the relationship between individual and environment and proposes schema, assimilation and accommodation. Vygotsky is the representative of social constructivism school. He develops zone of proximal development (ZPD). Bruner, influenced by Piaget, inherits and develops theory of Piaget. He puts forward discover learning. Second, it introduces constructivist education values, including five points:(1) constructivism steps out of the wrong region--egocentrism; (2) constructivism creates and establishes varieties of teaching models rather than follow changeless traditional instruction model; (3) constructivism values self evaluation of cognitive structure; (4) constructivism calls for communication and interaction in teaching practice; (5) constructivism promotes the research of learning circumstance, and the choice and establishment of it. Lastly, it introduces constructivist teaching models, including anchored instruction, problem-based learning, random access instruction, scaffolding instruction and cognitive apprenticeship instruction.The fourth chapter is an important part of the thesis. It analyzes data obtained through method of quantitative analysis including descriptive analysis and nonparametric test. Data can reflect what it tells us. Combined with constructivism theory, it can be deduced that it is better to adopt multimedia courseware in instruction than not. However multimedia courseware does not fully show its advantages in college English intensive reading; it has some problems that need solutions. Thus scholars and educational experts should reflect upon the usage of multimedia courseware in instruction. Therefore the thesis gives several suggestions on solutions of the problem:(1) it is requested to increase the investment of multimedia classroom and efficiently allocation of resources to satisfy teachers' demands of multimedia teaching; (2) as for teachers, they should attend training to improve their computer skills; (3) teachers could not highly access the functions of multimedia and be excessively dependent on multimedia; (4) it is necessary to establish the system of multimedia instruction supervision and evaluation to assure the high quality of courseware; (5) regular discussion group can be organized to explore best way of multimedia instruction, pose questions faced in teaching practice and seek for the resolutions together. The fifth chapter is the summary of the thesis. It briefly summarizes conclusions of the study, major findings of the study and suggestions for resolutions. At the same time it depicts limitations of the study and prospects for further study.All in all the significance of the thesis is to optimize classroom teaching and propose valuable suggestions for multimedia instruction through the study of multimedia courseware's application in college English intensive reading. |
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