The Effect Of Cultural Factor On English Reading Comprehension In Senior High School

Language is the carrier of culture, and culture has restriction function to language. English reading teaching is a very important part in english teaching of senior high school, so both students and teachers pay much attention to it. In recent years, the English culture teaching is mentioned in English reading teaching by more and more researchers. The English Curriculum Standard issued in2003also referred to cultivating the students’ cross-cultural communication abilities, and enhancing students’ cultural awareness. However, most English teachers still think the language knowledge should be the key point in English reading teaching, and neglect the culture teaching. Therefore, many students still can’t understand or misunderstand the meaning of the reading passages even though they got the meaning of each word and sentence. As an English teacher of senior high school, the author thinks it’s his duty to help students to solve this problem.This thesis mainly aims to a question: Does the English cultural background knowledge affect the English reading comprehension? In this thesis, the author uses questionnaire, interview, and reading comprehension test to confirm his research hypothesis. The experiment lasts four months. The subjects in this experiment are chosen from senior one in Yi Jun Senior High School in Tong chuan City, Shaanxi Province. The number of the subject is80, and they are divided into two equal groups. One is control group, and another one is experimental group. Before experiment, there is not significant difference among all students in the English learning level, but during the experiment, the author applies different reading teaching methods to teach the two groups. The students of control group are taught in traditional reading teaching ways, while the students of experimental group are given English cultural background knowledge before English reading. The author attempts to justify the teaching of English background knowledge in English reading teaching can improve students’ ability in English reading comprehension.At the same time, the author also makes an interview with the English teachers in his school. In the interview, the author wants to know the English teachers’ opinions about the research question. And the English teachers should put the English cultural background knowledge into English reading teaching to improve the students’English reading comprehension ability.This thesis consists of five chapters. In chapter one the author analyzes the research background and research purpose, states the importance of English cultural background knowledge teaching in English reading teaching of senior high school. Chapter two is literature review. It mainly concentrates on the definition of culture and language, and the relationship between them. In this chapter, the author also illustrates the definition and purpose of reading as well as reading models. Chapter three is the experiment process. In this chapter, the author collects the data from experiment, and analyzes the data. According to the data analysis, the English cultural background knowledge teaching in the English reading teaching indeed can improve the students’ability of English reading comprehension. Chapter four is the result of the experiment and discussion. In this chapter, the author mainly analyzes the result of experiment, and states the effect of the culture teaching on both students and English teachers. In the last chapter the author concludes the research, states the limitation in this experiment and gives some suggestions to further research in this field.