An Action Research Of Applying Cooperative Learning To Lessen Students’ Negative Reticence In College English Class

Students’ negative reticence in English class has long been a hot topic for research, with the previous focus on the stage of middle and primary schools. However, in the college English class which should have been freer and more thoughtful, the phenomenon of students’ negative reticence could be more serious. Most students are unwilling to answer teacher’s questions and don’t want to take part in class interaction, being reluctant to think and communicate positively. All those problems bring troubles to the college English teaching, making it uneasy to carry on the English class and affecting teacher’s judgement and policy making. More seriously, lacking oral communication makes it hard for students’ acquirement of English competence and cultivation of English learning ability.As a result, based on the previous studies of the reasons for students’ negative reticence, the author decided to take an action research in her own English class, applying the cooperative learning to promote the communication in the class, so as to change students’ passive attitude to the English class as boring and depressing, and ultimately to improve the reticent class learning atmosphere. The action research combined with quantitative and qualitative methods aims to solve an umbrella question: can cooperative learning lessen students’ negative reticence in college English class for non-English majors? To solve this one, two sub-questions need to be answered at first. 1. What is the present situation about students’ negative reticence in college English class for non-English majors? 2. Whether cooperative learning can lessen students’ negative reticence in English class? If so, how can it be realized?There was a pilot research coming before the invention to investigate the current situation of students’ negative reticence. Then some students were interviewed to get a deeper understanding of their ideas about classroom reticence and cooperative learning in English class. Thus, the formal intervention began. In the first round, some simple and common cooperative learning methods were introduced and adjusted at the end of the first round according to the feedback from students and the teacher. In the second round, new methods were used and another questionnaire investigation was done in the end. Through the whole action research in this semester, the teacher would conduct classroom observations regularly, interview students formally and informally after the class to tract their opinions and attitudes, and keep writing the teaching journal. Also, students were required to write summaries after cooperative activities. Thus, all the data collected provided for a scientific analysis and discussion for the action research.Based on the research results, two conclusions can be drawn. 1. The phenomenon of students’ negative reticence in the college English class is so serious that it has impacted the communication between the teacher and students and their attitude to English learning. 2. Through the intervention lasting for a whole semester the degree of negative reticence has reduced, with less talking from the teacher, less time of negative reticence in the interactive activities and more talking from the students. Therefore, all those results have proved the great influence of cooperative learning on lessening students’ negative reticence.It is an undeniable fact that this action research has many limitations. First, the time of the research is limited, with only one semester. And the research subject is constrained to only one class, which is a small sample for a pedagogical research. Besides, the research methods are subjective to some extent. Therefore, scholars are hoped to extend the research subject and improve research methods with a more abundant content so as to make full use of the cooperative learning in lessening students’ negative reticence in college English class.