A Study On The Status Quo Of English Teachers′affective Education In The County-level Junior Middle School

Basic education reform in 2001 requires that attention should be paid to the cultivation of students' positive affective attitude together with the development of students' language ability. To foster learners'affective attitude is one of the five major goals of English subjects. Affective education can mobilize students' learning enthusiasm, improve their learning efficiency and help students form good learning attitude. English affective education meets the spirit of the basic education curriculum reform. However, the research on English teachers′affective education in the county-level junior middle school is still rare. The study carries on a beneficial attempt in this respect.The theoretical support of English affective education in the study is as follows: philosophy, constructivism, humanistic psychology, second language acquisition theory and emotional education theory. The study investigates the present status of affective education in No. 1 junior middle school in Yima, by giving all the English teachers questionnaires and individual interviews. The findings extracted from the investigation are as follows: Most of the English teachers in this school have understood the spirit and the content of the new curriculum reform, the teachers know the affective attitude goals and have the consciousness of emotional education. On the other hand, affective attitude goals are not implemented effectively, partly because the teachers have little knowledge about affective education theory, and thus fail to find successful implementation strategies to make full use of affective factors. Under the pressure of the exam-oriented education, the phenomenon of valuing the knowledge but ignoring the affect still exists, and the teachers just instill knowledge.Based on the research results, the author proposes two suggestions targeting for county-level junior middle school. Firstly, educators should reflect on the exam-oriented education, use formative evaluation, and attach importance to the learning progresses of the students. Secondly, teachers should have profound knowledge of English affective education theories and methods. The study is of implication for English teaching in junior high school in China.