A Study Of The Application Of Roots Strategy To College English Vocabulary Teaching And Learning Of Art Majors

As is known to all that vocabulary is the basic and important component of language.Without enough vocabulary,people can hardly express themselves accurately.So whether learners can grasp enough vocabulary directly decides the effectiveness of language learning.But in fact,it is vocabulary learning that bothers Chinese college students most,especially the students of art.To find out the solution,learners should turn to roots,the core part of a word,for help.Many researchers at home and abroad have investigated the significant value of roots in vocabulary learning.However,most of the studies were from theoretical perspective and few empirical studies were conducted to promote the application of roots strategy.On the basis of the research background above,to verify the feasibility and validity of the application of roots strategy in college English vocabulary teaching and learning of art majors,the author conducted an experiment with two classes of second-year students of fine arts in Xi’an Polytechnic University under the guidance of Nation’s roots strategy in an empirical approach both quantitatively and qualitatively.In the four-month experiment,one class was selected as the controlled class and the other as the experimental class.As the author was the English teacher of both classes,she participated in the experiment directly.The author adopted the traditional vocabulary teaching method in the controlled class while she applied roots strategy in teaching students vocabulary in the experimental class.The pre-test,the post-test and the interviews were conducted to both the experimental class and the controlled class.The information as well as the data was collected by the author and then the data were analyzed by SPSS(21.0).The research results demonstrate that:1)Roots strategy hasn’t been widely applied in college English vocabulary teaching and learning of art majors;2)There is a statistically significant difference in vocabulary proficiency between the students of the controlled class and the students of the experimental class after the experiment.In other words,the application of roots strategy can practically improve students’vocabulary proficiency;3)The application of roots strategy has a very positive effect on college English vocabulary teaching and learning of art majors.As a result,the application of roots strategy in college English vocabulary teaching and learning of art majors is completely necessary and feasible,and it will bring benefit to both students and teachers.Accordingly,it is English teachers’ task to promote the application of roots strategy to college English vocabulary teaching and learning of art majors and consequently change this process into an enjoyable and effective one.