The Application Of Progressive Dictation To English Writing Teaching In Junior Middle School

With the implementation of curriculum reform, the purpose of English teaching has changed a lot. Therefore, teachers are requested to cultivate students' comprehensive abilities in English, of which English writing ability is extremely important through task-based teaching. However, in senior middle school entrance examinations of recent years, the scores of writing are the lowest among all question types. There are many problems in students' compositions, such as spelling mistakes, grammar mistakes and lack of coherence. Tracing the source, the author finds that in some junior middle schools, teachers still use conventional teacher-centered teaching approaches. In writing classes, students are only passive receivers, and it is hard for them to experience the joy of writing and success. Gradually, students lose interest and confidence in English writing and some of them even give up this item. Therefore, it is urgent for teachers to find out a better way to develop students' writing ability.Dictation practice, which involves the skills of listening, writing, and understanding, combines language input with language output. By reviewing on previous related studies at home and abroad, the author finds that by making learners focus on language form, dictation can help students practice punctuation, grammar, spelling, and enable them to write accurately. But few studies focus on teaching practice in junior middle school. Therefore, on the basis of Input Hypothesis and Output Hypothesis, the author conducts a research on applying progressive dictation to English writing teaching in junior middle school. Through such an experiment, the author wants to find out the answers to the following three questions: 1. Is it feasible to apply progressive dictation to English writing teaching in junior middle school? 2. Can progressive dictation help to reduce spelling and grammar mistakes in English writing? 3. What influences can progressive dictation exert on students' interest and confidence in English writing, and on students' English writing ability?The subjects of the research are 102 students from two parallel classes of Grade Eight in Biyang Middle School of Henan Province, among whom 52 are in the experimental class(EC) and 50 in the control class(CC). The two classes are taught with the same teaching material by the same teacher at the same teaching pace. The only difference is that progressive dictation is used to teach writing in EC while the traditional method is used in CC. To make the research more reliable, the author uses several research instruments, including two questionnaire surveys, two tests, and one interview. Then all the information and data are collected and analyzed with the help of SPSS 17.0 software. At last, the results of the research provide answers to the three research questions. Firstly, it is feasible to apply progressive dictation to English writing teaching in junior middle school. Secondly, progressive dictation can help to reduce mistakes in word spelling and grammar. Thirdly, progressive dictation can increase students' interest and confidence in English writing, and improve their writing ability.