An Empirical Study On Senior High School English Reading Teaching Based On Schema Theory

According to the New English Curriculum Standard for Senior High Schools, theteaching of English reading has occupied a prominent position among the four basic skills.The ability of reading is an important aspect for second language learners to improve theirlanguage learning levels. However, there still exists some problems in English readingteaching and learning in senior high school. Students’ reading comprehension skills arequite restricted by traditional teaching approach and teachers get adapted to concentrate onteaching single words, phrases, and grammatical points separately. Consequently, it can’tenhance the competence of students’ reading comprehension.In order to solve the problem, the author studies substantial existing theories andpedagogical approach of reading teaching. To explore schema-based systemic approach toEnglish reading teaching, it is used in senior high school.“Schema” refers to cognitiveframework stored in human brain. It consists of preexisting knowledge and experience.Schema theory is an explanation of how readers use preexisting knowledge and experienceto comprehend and learn from reading materials. It is generally recognized that readingcomprehension is an interactive process between the readers’ background knowledge andthe text. The application of schema theory in English reading can help students to stimulatetheir schemata, enrich their preexisting schemata and use schemata as well as consolidatingthem to comprehend passages.The author randomly chooses two classes as a control class and an experimental classwith approximate level of English proficiency. In the experimental class, Schema theory isadopted during the teaching. In the control class, traditional teaching method is utilized.Data collection includes pre-test, post-test, questionnaire and an interview as a qualitativedata complement. The research attempts to find answers to the following questions: Canthe English reading teaching based on schema theory in the senior high school promote thelearners’ positive attitude?; Can the reading teaching based on schema theory improvestudents’ reading proficiency?According to the results of the experiment which is analyzed by software SPSS11.5,the sig is.000which is lower than0.05(Qin Xiaoqing,2003) both in post-questionnaireand post-test of Independent Sample Test and Paired Sample Test. It means that theteaching method based on Schema theory can improve students’ proficiency and changetheir attitude towards English reading. The students of experimental class outperform control class after the experiment. The author concludes that it is both feasible andbeneficial to apply Schema theory in teaching English reading.