A Study On The Current Situation Of English Demonstration Classes In Junior High Schools

With the further implementation of the Education Reform, more and more educational researchers and experts come to realize that the core of the reform is curriculum reform. In the time of the annual parliamentary sessions of China, dubbed as "two sessions", Zhang Zhiyong, deputy to National People’s Congress points that the destination of the curriculum is for the students, and for helping the students actively construct systematic knowledge. English demonstration class is an efficient way to practice the curriculum reform, which is widespread and implemented for spreading the new ideas. But due to a lack of comprehensive understanding of new curriculum reform,various negative attitudes and behaviors to English demonstration class emerged which seriously hinder the development of teachers and students. As far as this condition concerned, the author contemplates and intends to get a better understanding of the current situation on English demonstration classes by drawing on the theories of attitude,constructivism and teacher professional development. And the author attempts to answer the questions:What are teachers and students attitudes to English demonstration classes?/What are the problems existing in English demonstration classes in junior high schools?/What factors hinder the successful implementation of English demonstration classes in junior high schools?The present researches on English demonstration classes mainly focus on its types,significance, problems or else without any perspective from teacher and students’ attitudes. Furthermore, most of the articles on demonstration class are lack theoretical basis and just forefront teachers’ criticism to it.The author attempts to gain an in-depth exploration into the English demonstration class practice, so she designs teachers and students questionnaire from four aspects of attitude: understanding, feelings, behaviors and effects. In order to keep the diversity of the samples, the author adopts paper and online surveys. This study issued 30 questionnaires for teachers, recycled 30 questionnaires, among them, only 25 valid questionnaires, so the recovery rate is 100% and the effective rate is 83.3%. As to the students, 300 questionnaires were issued, 300 questionnaires recycled, 285 valid, so the recovery rate is 100%, and the effective rate is 95%. During her process of data gathering from September to December in 2015, the author tried her best to survey as many teachers and students as possible with the help of her classmates and sojump.By data analysis, the author finds that the current situation of English demonstration classes is unsatisfactory with teachers and students’ severe negative attitude. 80% of teachers who perform the English demonstration class are often arranged by the teaching and research department without teachers’ willingness. 84% of teachers do trial teaching in order to achieve a certain perfect effect on the class. 48% of the teachers usually take the class as a burden and a frustrating experience. They conduct it just because of a school assignment. Out of utility purpose, teachers even choose active students to answer the classroom questions, which is contrary to the constructivism learning theory. As a result, 40.7% of the students even dare not put forward their own questions, and 41.6% of the students have a sense of tension and stress in English demonstration classes. Although the value of English demonstration class is to promote educational research, the English appraisal class and English competition class go against the primary purpose with the development of the times.After the data analysis, the author discussed the underlying influencing factors that influenced the effective implementation of English demonstration classes: students’ negative attitude, teachers’ utilitarian purpose, administrators’ improper guidance and backward regulations. Based on the results, the current implementation situation of English demonstration classes have impeded teacher professional development and students development.In view of the above findings, the author puts forward the following suggestions for the effective implementation of the English demonstration class:The task of English teachers in demonstration class is to help students construct and learn. The principal part of learning is students, who have their own "proximaldevelopment zone ", which teachers should according to forming a generative class. At the same time, teachers should have a comprehensive understanding of the role of English demonstration class in teacher professional development and students development, as well as the relationship between predetermination and production. For schools, the essential function of English demonstration class is teaching and researching, and ultimately improve the teachers’ teaching skills and the development of the students. The authorities should try to arrange different kinds of English demonstration classes according to different level of teachers’ professional development with certain discussion themes.The author ventures to provide an alternative way of understanding the English demonstration classes with theoretical basis. Meanwhile, the study illuminates new perspective for investigating English demonstration class. Further improvement in terms of research methods and data collection is needed in future studies.