Empirical Research On TBLT And PPP Integrated Approach To Practical English Writing Teaching In Higher Vocational Colleges

It is firmly believed that writing teaching plays a very important role in English teaching of higher vocational colleges. However, the students’current state of writing level is not optimistic. Being one of the traditional teaching approaches, PPP teaching consists of3different stages:presentation, practice and production. Because it highlights the form and accuracy of language use, its advantage cannot be denied. However, the implementing of PPP can not stimulate students’language learning enthusiasm effectively. In1980s, with the rise and development of Task-based Language Teaching (TBLT) approach, its advantage is apparent, because it pays attention to real language communication. But the implementation of TBLT is not always an easy task in English classroom because of students’weak language foundation in higher vocational colleges.In order to find a more suitable and effective approach for higher vocational college students in learning practical English writing, the purpose of the thesis is to study teaching effect of practical English writing by using the Integrated Approach combining the advantages of PPP and TBLT. Two questions are put forward to highlight the purpose of the study1) Can the Integrated Approach stimulate vocational college students’ language learning enthusiasm and induce their cooperative learning with their classmates?2) Is the Integrated Approach more effective for improving vocational college students’ written language proficiency?The study is both qualitative and quantitative. To begin with, two classes of Grade I from civil engineering department in Anhui Communications Vocational and Technical College have been randomly chosen. By comparing their English academic records of College Entrance Examination in July,2012, it is found that there is no significant difference in students’ overall English proficiency. The two classes are therefore defined as the Control Group and the Experiment Group respectively. The control group students receive the traditional PPP approach while the Integrated Approach is implemented in the classroom teaching of the experimental group. After one semester of the experiment, the data obtained through the questionnaires, interviews and the post-test are collected for both qualitative and quantitative analysis in order to answer the research questions with the help of the software SPSS.The results of the study show that the Integrated Approach indeed helps students improve their written language proficiency, especially in the following aspects: choosing proper words, organizing well-balanced paragraphs, presenting richer content and using sound format. Moreover, both collecting data and interviewees’ words reveal that students can benefit from the Integrated Approach a lot in that it can cultivate their cooperative spirit and arouse their learning interest without worrying about losing faces in class.The study probes into the necessity of using the Integrated Approach combining PPP and TBLT, and reveals detailed information about the effectiveness of adopting the new method in improving students’writing abilities through the empirical research. Meanwhile, the specific objectives of writing teaching can be fulfilled in a short period of time in terms of obtaining language points. What is more, the long term objectives can be achieved through continuous use of the Integrated Approach in the aspect of writing rich content of assigned writing tasks. In addition, the advanced writing ability can induce the great success in both fields of study and career due to students’good mastery of a wide variety of practical writing.The thesis is divided into five chapters. Chapter one is the introduction of the thesis. Chapter two is about literature review, which contains the relevant studies both at home and abroad. Chapter three mainly introduces the methodology and procedure of conducting experiment and means of data collection. Chapter Four deals with analysis and discussion on collecting data. Chapter five is the conclusion, which involves the presentation of research findings, limitations of the study and suggestions for future study.