A Survey Of Contextualized English Vocabulary Instruction In Rural Junior Middle School

Vocabulary, as the foundation of language, is a vital part of second language leaning. However, in present English teaching in China, it is easily found that most students are afraid of learning English vocabulary. Although students have tried their best to learn vocabulary, the result is far from being satisfactory. How to change this situation becomes the starting point of this thesis.The theory of context was proposed by Malinowski in1923, and further illustrated by some scholars such as Firth, Halliday, Lyons, Hymes; so far, the theory of context has become an important topic of modern linguistics. With the publishment of Relevance:communication and cognition and the presentation of cognitive context by Sperber and Wilson, the research on context shifted from static study to dynamic one. Traditional context includes linguistic context, situational context and cultural context while dynamic cognitive context claims that the three contexts mentioned above must be internalized in the process of learning. The subject of learning must motivate cognitive context to understand the meaning. Context plays an important role in vocabulary teaching and learning. To understand the meaning of a word must rely on context, which indicates that vocabulary teaching and learning should be combined with various contexts. It not only helps students to understand and memorize the meaning of words, masters the usage of vocabulary, but also helps students to use vocabulary appropriately. Yet, in junior middle school, what is the current situation in English vocabulary teaching and learning? How do teachers and students teach or learn vocabulary in context? What are the reasons for the situation of vocabulary learning and teaching in context? In order to investigate these questions, the author of this thesis starts this study.There are five chapters in this thesis. In the first chapter, the background and significance of the study will be introduced. In Chapter Two the author will review two main concepts:context and vocabulary teaching. The methodology of study will be set in chapter three. A total of150students and6teachers in Huangdian Junior Middle School in Zhejiang Province have been selected as the participants. Questionnaire and interview are also adopted to explore the usage of context in vocabulary teaching and learning. In Chapter Four, the author will analyze the data and find out that although teachers and students have a little awareness of context, the application of context theory is far from being satisfactory. The teachers’ understanding of context is one-sided and they teach vocabulary in an isolated way. And students learn and memorize words by rote and often use word inappropriately. In view of this phenomenon, combining the theory of context and cognitive linguistics, the author will explore the principles of contextualized teaching (leaner-centered, relevance, cultural principle, cognitive principle, authenticity of context) and put forward some suggestions for vocabulary teaching and learning. In the fifth chapter, the author will summarize the thesis and indicate the limitation in this study.