Application Of ESA Teaching Model To English Teaching In Preparatory Class Of University

Preparatory class of university mainly enrolls junior middle school graduates.Preparatory courses are designed to help students form a learning method which adapts tocollege courses and reserve some relevant knowledge. English course aims to develop thestudents’ confidence and ability in English listening, speaking, reading and writing.English teaching in preparatory class keeps the traditional teaching model, which regardsimparting knowledge as the main task and puts teacher in a dominant place, therebyignores student-centeredness. Consequently, it seriously restrains the students’ interests inlearning English and makes it hard to improve their English listening, speaking, readingand writing proficiency.In1990s, Jeremy Harmer, the internationally famous expert in English teaching,proposes ESA teaching model and emphasizes that they are three indispensable elementscalled Engage, Study and Active in English teaching,. According to the different order andcombination of three elements, teachers can create three different kinds of teaching models:ESA Straight Arrows sequence, ESA Boomerang sequence and ESA Patchwork sequenceand flexibly apply to classroom teaching. In this paper, the author applies this theory to theteaching practice and makes the English teaching from boring to interesting, so as tostimulate students’ interests in learning.This thesis just discusses the effect of ESA teaching model on English teaching inpreparatory class of university, based on the overview of the related theories and researchesof ESA teaching model. Two research questions are listed below:The1stquestion is whether ESA teaching model can improve preparatory classstudents’ interest in English learning;The2ndquestion is whether ESA teaching model is effective on respective teaching oflistening, speaking, reading and writing.The research is carried out in Training College of Bohai University. The subjects ofthe research are the students from two preparatory classes of this college. One is set as theexperimental class applying ESA teaching model and the other is set as the control classadopting traditional teaching model. In the whole process of the teaching experiment, theauthor utilizes such research instruments as questionnaires, tests and interviews to makesquantitative analysis and qualitative analysis according to the results.The research results show that: ESA teaching model can enhance the students’ interests in English learning to some extent, and it also does have remarkable positiveeffects on improving the English proficiency of listening, reading and writing. But theinfluence on spoken English is not obvious. So it can be concluded that ESA teachingmodel is a feasible teaching model which can be brought into English teaching inpreparatory classes of University.