A Tentative Study Of Integration Of Universally Accepted Culture Into Primary School English Teaching

Schools serve as the main channel to conduct ideological and moral education on minors. Language teaching is of course responsible for the improvement of students’moral level. Language is media and carrier of culture, which makes culture teaching an important part in foreign language teaching. However, in real English teaching, much attention is paid to English target culture or the differences between target culture and native culture, so the similarity and universality in both cultures is inadvertently neglected.This study centers on a new concept, universally accepted culture, which refers to the culture approved by people in the whole world. And this research seeks to find out the significance of universally accepted culture in primary English teaching by undertaking an investigation into English textbooks, English teachers and pupils in primary school. At first the author analyzes the quantity and detailed contents of culture elements in the textbooks Fun with English3A-6B(published by Yilin Press of Phoenix Publishing&Media Group in2003), among which, contents of universally accepted culture are emphasized from their classification and frequency of appearance. Then, questionnaires are given to14teachers from different primary schools in different districts of Nanjing city and108Grade6pupils in Nanjing Fangcaoyuan Primary School. Through the analysis of culture elements in textbooks, and the questionnaires of teachers and pupils, some problems about textbooks’design and teachers’cultural treatment emerge and they are closely related with teaching syllabus, curriculum design, testing system, textbooks design and teachers’culture literacy. So this research will provide important enlightenments on how to design English textbooks and improve teachers’culture teaching.This study reveals that universally accepted culture teaching is necessary and significant in primary English teaching. Universally accepted culture is just suitable for pupils in primary school according to the features of young kids and primary education, and the task of Quality-oriented Education and moral education. If teachers make good use of the contents of universally accepted culture in the textbooks, then they can not only enrich and improve English teaching, but also enhance pupils’moral level to let them form good habits and personalities from childhood.