Problems And Solutions: A Survey On Oral English Teaching In The Rural-urban Middle School

With the in-depth reform of foreign language, the foreign language teaching becomes more and more important. How to improve oral English teaching under the guidance of the new English Curriculum Standard is worth being pondered by every educator. Regional differences lead to big differences in oral English teaching. Compared with eastern coastal areas, the situation of English teaching is generally worse in the western underdeveloped regions. The city in which the author lives is a typical western mountainous city, where English teaching situation is not so good. With the expansion of cities on a large scale and the accelerating of urbanization to rural areas, the rural-urban fringe has come into being. And a large group of typical middle school students appear in this areas. Based on this, the author selected one of the “rural-urban fringe” middle schools — Dalu junior middle school as the research object. This article starts with the existing problems in oral English teaching to learn about the current situation of oral English teaching, and puts forward the corresponding countermeasures to solve these problems, so as to improve the quality of the oral English teaching.In order to know the current situation of the oral English teaching in the “rural-urban fringe” middle school, 15 English teachers and 300 students from Dalu middle school are randomly selected. The questionnaire survies are used to do the research. The questionnaires are divided into part A and part B. Questionnaire A is designed for teachers, it mainly looks into teachers’ attitudes to oral English teaching, their professional qualities, theoretical levels, the current situation of oral English teaching in classroom, their teaching methods and their teaching reflections, etc. Questionnaire B is a questionnaire designed for students. There are a lot of differences among students who come from urban and rural regions, which is of great value to the study. Questionnaire B looks into students’ motivation, their anxieties in oral English learning in classroom, their oral abilities, etc.The survey shows that conditions of “rual-urban fringe” middle schools have been improved; the overall level of oral English teaching also has been enhanced. But many problems still exist as they are located in the “rural-urban fringe” area. Students’ language abilities vary as they come from different areas; teachers’ professional qualities are not good enough; teachers and students do not attach enough importance to oral English teaching; students show anxieties towards speaking, etc. Based on some teaching theories, the author puts forward the corresponding countermeasures to solve the above problems, which include establishing the mechanism of oral tests, smoothing transition of the English teaching between primary schools and middle schools, utilizing graded teaching pattern and building up students’ confidence in speaking, as well as making full use of multimedia technology to carry out various class activities, etc.