A Study Of The Application Of Multiple Intelligence Theory To Higher Vocational College Oral English Teaching

The multiple intelligence theory (MIT) was first put forward in1983by Americanpsychologist Dr. Howard. Gardner. This theory has received wide attention from all over theworld. It not only has changed the intelligence concept in people’s mind, but also has had greatsignificance in education; what’s more, it leads to a revolutionary way of thinking in theworldwide.Based on the Multiple Intelligence Theory, this paper introduces the meaning, thestructure and characteristics of MI theory, analyses the main problems of higher vocationalcollege oral English teaching, states MI theory’s guiding function for higher vocational collegeoral English teaching, discusses the guiding principles, puts forward some the strategies andmethods of applying MI theory into oral English teaching. In the study the research questionsto be given as follows:1) Whether diversified oral English classroom activities can arouse students’ Englishlearning interest?2) Whether MIT-based Higher Vocational College Oral English teaching can improvestudents’ oral English grades?In this research project the participants are the students of Construction Engineeringmajors in Hunan Urban Construction College. The two classes were divided into theexperimental class and the control class. The researcher applied MI theory to higher vocationalcollege oral English teaching in the experimental class, but choose the traditional teachingmethod in the control class. The researcher conducted the tests and questionnaires in the twoclasses. Both qualitative and quantitative research methods are adopted to test highervocational students’ oral English ability. After one term experiment, comparison about Englishlearning interest and oral English grades are given.The analysis of the statistics shows that, on one hand, compared with the control class,students’ English learning interest in the experimental class has been greatly aroused; on theother hand, students’ oral test scores in the experimental class are much higher than those in thecontrol class. Therefore, the MI theory can be applied to higher vocational oral English teaching，the climates of oral English class became more relax and active, the MI-based oralEnglish teaching method is generally accepted by most of students. The classroom activitiesbased on MIT can more effectively arouse the students’ English learning interest; the MI-basedEnglish classroom teaching can more effectively improve students’ oral English grades, andoptimize the learning process and teaching effect.