An Exploratory Study On Oral English Teaching Mode Based On Input And Output Theories

Based on two very important theories in Second Language Acquisition--input and output theories, especially Krashen’s Input Hypothesis and Swain’s output theory, this thesis advances a combination of input and output integrating teaching mode which emphasizes the reinforcement of language input and the practice of output. This research is with the goal of resolving these problems:students’attitudes towards input, output and the new teaching mode, whether students’ability in oral English has improved under input-output teaching mode, whether students receive enough comprehensible input and produce more output guided by the new teaching mode, implications for teachers to ensure more efficient oral English teaching in college. The independent variable of this experiment is the students’oral English input and the dependent variables are their English speaking proficiency and oral communication ability. In the way of testing the students’oral English by PETS (Public English Test System) oral examination, the scores clearly represent their oral English level.Both quantitative and qualitative researches have been conducted in the forms of questionnaire, pretest, post-test and group interview.66college non-English majors are involved in the experiment for one semester. Adopting an experimental method of grouping, the subjects are divided into two groups, with34students in the experimental group and32in the control group. The main contents of the research include:1) a questionnaire on the general understanding of input and output for the experimental class and oral English tests for both groups before the experiment.2) During the experiment, the experimental class employs "New Horizon College English listening and speaking course" as the main textbook and "Family Album, U.S.A.""New Interchange" as the supporting learning materials to reinforce the students’oral practice in class. Meanwhile, teachers often carry out a variety of oral activities in class such as debate, speech, role-play, group discussion etc. In addition, students themselves make full use of their spare time to read magazines, listen to news and watch movies in English, they actively communicate with their classmates in English as well. In comparison, the textbook employed by the control group is only "New Horizon College English listening and speaking course" and the students are taught as usual without any additional exercises. After the experiment, the same questionnaire is used again for the experimental group, at the same time, oral tests are respectively given to the two groups once again, the results are compared with those of the pre-test and analyzed by quantitative method. There is also a group interview with the students in the experimental group and a qualitative analysis is obtained according to the results.The results of the research prove that input-output teaching mode is more effective and feasible than traditional teaching mode. We come to the conclusion that students’interest in oral English learning has been greatly enhanced and input-output teaching mode does improve students’language competence, especially their oral English proficiency. Implications gained for teachers are:they should enhance their communication with the students; they must conduct correct and comprehensible language input in class; they had better to lead the Student-Oriented Teaching Approach and to encourage the students to take part in all oral English classroom interactions; they ought to be aware of their own development and enrich themselves with teaching theories, linguistic knowledge and actively accumulate new teaching experience. Therefore, it is the teachers’ duty to create a free language environment, provide enough input with better quality and guide the students to produce more output so as to achieve more effective teaching result in oral English teaching.