The Status Quo Of English Homework For Primary School Students

In2011, the Ministry of Education issued the new English Curriculum Standards,which provided guidance for primary school English teaching and refined the specificcontent and requirement for the English teaching and learning. The new courseteaching objectives are much preciser than before, and the new curriculumphilosophies are more sophisticated and perfect. Under the influence of the newEnglish Curriculum Standards, more and more people pay close attention to theclassroom teaching, and some positive changes have taken place in teaching methodsadopted by English teachers in recent years. Comparatively speaking, there are fewchanges in homework, which still lacks a more comprehensive, systematic andin-depth study.It is generally known that homework is an important part of examining teachingand learning effect and of getting teaching feedback. Whether the design of Englishhomework is scientific or not will affect the result of one of the missions of pushingforward the education reform, which is to improve the students’ English ability withless effort but more efficiency. Therefore, to some extent, the study of Englishhomework is imperative, which is a key step in the process of educational reform.By means of questionnaires, literature materials and interviews, the paper probesinto the primary school English homework based on learning and instructionaltheories such as humanism, constructivism, multiple intelligences and output theory.The questionnaire investigation was carried out in eight primary schools in PudongNew District, Luwan District, Minhang District and Songjiang District, Shanghai. Thestudy subjects are primary school students from third grade to fifth grade. In order toanalyze more deeply, the author interviewed eleven English teachers in the eightprimary schools. The content of investigation consists of twelve parts, includingpurposes, attitudes, homework types, interestingness, hierarchical design, the timestudents spent on homework, the amount of homework, difficulty level of homework,homework correction, etc.It is found that there have been few changes of English homework in primary schools since the new curriculum reform. Most students have a positive attitudetowards English homework, and most students can finish English homework quiteeasily. However, it takes students’ much time to do their homework. There are severalproblems in English homework as follows: single method of homework correctionand feedback, limited homework resources and types, simplistic and dull forms ofexercises, the lack of effective connecting among different grades, the low degree ofparental involvement, etc. According to these, the author puts forward the followingsuggestions, such as enriching the homework resources and types, designinghierarchical homework, adopting simple correcting methods and writing detailedcomments on students’ homework, letting parents participate actively in homework,providing students with effective homework guidance，actively creating networkcommunication platforms and constructing homework help system.In conclusion, the purpose of the study is to optimize the design of primaryschool English homework and to help students make it through the difficult situationof passively finishing homework. In this way, students can build self-confidence,develop good habits of doing homework positively and promote students’ integratedskills of using English.