An Investigation On Professional Knowledge Of Student Teachers Of English In High Schools

With the rapid development of our economy and society and acceleration of theglobalization, English education in China is increasingly becoming highlight. Consequently,pre-service teachers’ professional knowledge and ability status of normal school Englishmajors in teachers colleges is drawing more and more people’s attention. Therefore, studieson professional ability training of student teachers of English practicing in high schoolswidely involve three aspects of professional knowledge study: their subject knowledge,pedagogical knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK). Likewise this research,mainly adopting the method of combining theory research and field survey, carries on a studyon the effect of regional high school English teaching practice on normal school pre-servicestudents’ professional knowledge.First of all, this study, by virtue of the platform of Zhangzhou Normal University YonganInnovative Experimental Plot for the cooperation of this survey, tried to define the concept,classification and characteristics of the professional knowledge on the part of student teachersof English practicing in high schools. In the mean time, this study, through introducingtheories on teacher knowledge development and the theory of constructivism and languagelearning, probed into models of professional knowledge acquisition on the part of studentteachers of English practicing in high schools, and tried to promote their development ofprofessional knowledge, especially faster development of their PCK. This study then, bymeans of questionnaire, made a survey on the current situation of professional knowledge ofthe student teachers of English practicing in high schools there, and did statistical analysis ofsurvey data. Through the investigation of student teachers of English practicing in highschools in Zhangzhou Normal University Yongan Innovative Experimental Plot, this studyfinds that at present the development is not balanced in theoretical and practical professionalknowledge of the student teachers of English practicing in high schools, and the studentteachers of English are especially lacking in pedagogical content knowledge. In thisconnection, this study puts forward three suggestions as follows:1) Student teachers of English should reinforce their theoretical learning of professionalknowledge at the early stage of the internship;2) At the same time, student teachers of English ought to strengthen the accumulation oftheir practical pedagogical content knowledge;3) Student teachers of English practicing in high school should integrate theaccumulation of practical knowledge into their daily educating and teaching practiceso as to make the form of education internship more effective.