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An Investigation Into Senior High School Students’ Willingness To Communicate In English In Chinese EFL Classrooms

Posted on:2016-07-02Degree:MasterType:Thesis
Country:ChinaCandidate:Y B LiuFull Text:PDF
GTID:2297330503451535Subject:Subject teaching
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English Curriculum Standards for General High Schools(Draft)(2011)stresses that the ultimate goal of language study is the application of languages. With China’s growing emphasis on English learners’ communicative competence, the focus of English education in China is transiting gradually from the mastery of basic language skills to the training of students’ English communication skills. Currently, in China high school students generally learn English mostly in English class in school; however, many of them are unwilling to talk in English in class. Mac Intyre and other scholars(1998, p.547) have defined the willingness to communicate in a second language as “a learner’s readiness to enter into discourse at a particular time with a specific person or persons using the second language”. To truly improve high school students’ English communicative competence, it is the primary task of English teaching at present to develop students’ willingness to communicate in English.Research on willingness to communicate in English is still in its infancy in China; moreover, most of such studies focus on college students, while less concern has been given to high school students. Based on Mac Intyre’ WTC(willingness to talk) Model(1998), this paper attempts to have an in-depth understanding of the status quo, characteristics and influencing factors of middle school students’ willingness to communicate in English class.Both quantitative and qualitative methods are used in this study. By random sampling, 78 senior high school students a local high school in Yuxi, Yunnan are involved in the questionnaire survey, and 4 students are involved semi-conducted interview. Survey data are statistically analyzed using SPSS17.0 software. Results show that: Firstly, senior high school students’ willingness to communicate in English in class is generally not high; Secondly, female high school students’ motivation to speak English inside the classroom is significantlyhigher than male students; Thirdly, interviews also find that factors such as English communicative competence, learning motivation, forms of classroom activities also influence high school students’ willingness to communicate in English class. It is suggested for high school English teachers to encourage the students’ confidence in communicating in English, to cultivate students’ interest in English learning, and consciously change their view of learning English for the college entrance examination. It is also recommended to teach in English as much as possible, to design classroom activities with varying difficulties, and to create on English-speaking environment for students. The authors hope these suggestions can facilitate future high school English teaching, and better promote the implementation of new high school English curriculum reform.
Keywords/Search Tags:senior high school students, willingness to talk in English, Chinese EFL classrooms
PDF Full Text Request
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