A Study Of Affective Strategies Applied In Senior High School English Teaching

In the new standard of English curriculum, affect is seen as one of the important learning targets. New curriculum puts emphasis on combining learners’affect with language teaching. Nowadays, more and more attention is paid to not only the learners’ language knowledge and language skills, but also learners’affect. In contrast with other subjects, the relationship between language learning and affect is much closer. Due to the characteristics of English learning, English teachers should cultivate students’ positive affect and help them develop independent personality during the process of teaching and learning. Meanwhile, teachers ought to communicate with students positively and establish a good relationship with their students. However, many teachers merely valued students’cognitive factors while neglecting the affective factors during the traditional teaching process. The related studies show that positive affect can facilitate students’learning and upgrade students’English efficiency. Therefore, it is very necessary for teachers to focus on students’inner mind and explore meaningful affective strategies in English teaching and learning.The thesis, regarding108students in grade1from Shenzhen Xixiang High School as research subjects, aims to explore meaningful affective strategies in English learning. To be specific, the research aims to seek the answers of the following questions:firstly, what are the students’ affective status in senior high school English learning and the students’understandings and expectations on application of affective strategies in senior high school English teaching? Secondly, what kind of the affective strategies can be applied in the aspects of contents, forms, assessment and relationship between teachers and students?The study is based on the theory of constructivism, humanistic psychology and Krashen’s Affective Filter Hypothesis. On the basis of questionnaire and English tests, the study collects and analyzes comparative results at the beginning of experiment and at the end of experiment. This thesis explores the affective strategies from several aspects, such as teaching patterns, contents, evaluation and relationship between teachers and students, etc. Through the four-month experiment, the author witnesses the changes of students’ affective status and their English proficiency at the beginning and the end of experiment respectively. Students’ improvement in experimental class with regard to test performance is statistically significant.Applying affective strategies in English teaching and learing, therefore, eventually stimulates students’ learning interest, builds students’self-confidence and reduces the anxiety. All in all, the explorations of various affective strategies greatly help students in their growth and realize their full potential in English learning.