A Survey And Analysis Of English Vocabulary Teaching In Senior High Schools

Vocabulary is the foundation of language and its importance is self-evident. The survey to beundertaken is a general examination of the current situation of English vocabulary teaching in senior highschools from the following four aspects: the idea and timing of vocabulary teaching, the vocabularyteaching strategies, methods and contents. The survey of problems in English vocabulary teaching, somebetter vocabulary methods and suggestions for English vocabulary teaching is for helping the writer findproblems and supply relevant suggestions later. The aim of the survey is to find the problems, the causesand the Methodical solutions. The writer takes four schools in Xinxiang city as the targets of the study--theNO.1Middle School, the NO.2Middle School, the Railway Senior High School and the Henan NormanUniversity Affiliated Middle School. Through the survey the writer finds vocabulary teaching idea of theteachers is still traditional, and they emphasize the input of vocabulary knowledge but neglect the learningability and the initiatives of the students. Word-formation, extending and expanding from one word, andcombination of pronunciation, spelling shape and meaning are usually included in the vocabulary teachingstrategies and methodologies. But the teaching of word meaning is limited, and students' vocabularylearning strategies are not sufficiently and efficiently trained and utilized. Some words which are notfrequently used give students additional pressure to memorize, and the students' ability to mastervocabulary is too poor and the amount of productive vocabulary is small. Students cannot memorizevocabulary scientifically or effectively and they do not have a great interest in learning vocabulary. Becauseof the pressure of the National Entrance Examination and limited teaching time, students' ability oflanguage use and their initiatives in learning are neglected, thus reducing the efficiency to a restraineddegree. Then relevant ideas and suggestions are deduced from the problems reflected in the questionnairesfor teachers. Teachers reconstruct the textbook, choose and collect reading materials, help students reviewwords in time, and make use of multimedia aided teaching. In the end, the writer supplies the pedagogicalimplications from the following three aspects: to renew the idea of vocabulary teaching, to perfectvocabulary teaching contents and to better vocabulary teaching methods.