Application Of Lexical Chunk Approach To The Teaching Of English Writing In Senior High School

As the English writing ability of senior high students is very poor and other writing approaches are not effective in solving this problem, the author carried out an empirical study on applying lexical chunks to the teaching of English writing based on the former researches on the lexical chunks’ positive effects on the students’ English production. The purpose of it is to help students improve their ability of writing, arouse their interest and build up students’ confidence in writing.In order to testify the two hypotheses----the students in the Experimental Class can increase the grades of their compositions with the increasing number of chunks used in their compositions and they will develop their interest and positive attitude towards English writing after the instruction of lexical chunks, the author did the research through quantitative and qualitative methods after clearing up some concepts by an extensive review of the definition, classification and functions of chunks, as well as the studies of chunks both at home and abroad. The quantitative data were collected from an experimental study. A total of80students, aged from17to18, from two classes in No.95Middle School, a key middle school in Xiqing District of Tianjin were involved in the experiment with Class1as the Experimental Class and Class2as the Control Class. Three tests (pretest, midtest and posttest) were given before, in the middle of and after the experiment. All the data collected from the three tests were analyzed by SPSS17.0and the result shows that there is a significant difference between the two classes and between the Experimental Class before and after the study, which indicates that lexical chunk approach does help students of senior high school improve their writing ability with the increasing number of chunks used in their compositions.The qualitative data were achieved by a questionnaire among the subjects in the two classes before and after the experiment. The survey implies that the students become more interested in English writing and their writing confidence is built as well through the lexical chunk approach.The experiment testifies the effectiveness of lexical chunk approach in the teaching of English writing in senior high school.