An Experimental Study Of The Effects Of Cooperative Learning On Senior Students' English Writing

The theory of cooperative learning has been widely applied to teaching and proves effective and practical. It requires that teaching should be students-centered and group activities should be the basic teaching form. The method of cooperative learning can develop students'initiative and motivation to meet their needs of personal potential ability. The core of cooperative learning is making students accomplish a mutual goal via group work. However, in China, our instruction does not attach much importance to English writing. Based on the real current situation of English writing in school, the author has applied the cooperative learning strategy to English writing in two classes in Liaohe Oil Field the Third Senior School from September 2009 to January 2010. The experimental study of the effects of cooperative learning on senior students'English writing aims at improving students'writing ability by applying the cooperative learning strategy to English writing.In this study, the author took two common classes as the subjects. Class Eight and Class Nine are equal level classes. Class Eight is the experimental class, with 56 students including 15 boy students and 41 girl students. Class Nine is the control class, with 58 students including 16 boy students and 42 girl students. In the experimental class, cooperative learning method was applied to English writing, while in the control class, the author still employed traditional teaching model to English writing. The paper presents some information concerning the experiment. According to the statistical results of observation, questionnaires, interviews and tests with a SPASS12.0 software managing and analyzing the data and t-test provided, it provides the results of the experiment, which shows the application of cooperative learning in students'English writing, have significant difference, compared with traditional teaching method.The result from the experiment shows that there is significant difference in the application of cooperative learning in students" English writing for the experimental class compared with the traditional teaching method for control class. In cooperative learning English writing class, students are the center. By cooperating with the teacher and peers, students have made great progress in writing interest, passion, skills and ability. They can accomplish their writing task perfectly in a relaxing writing environment. And students do benefit from cooperative leaning in English writing. They have much more chances to practice their English and have made a great deal of progress. They have learned how to collect and organize the writing material and improved their writing skills and writing ability obviously. They have grasped some standard of judging and evaluating a composition. They have developed their self-confidence and begun to be interested in English writing. Cooperative Learning in group model can improve the teaching efficiency in writing class. Cooperative learning in English writing helps to alleviate students' anxious feelings and motivates their writing enthusiasm and improves their writing ability. Thus, the application of cooperative learning has a significant effect on students'English writing. The cooperative learning method is playing a more effective part than traditional method in improving the students' writing competence and scores.