A Research On The Application Of Lexical Chunks To English Extracurricular Reading In Senior High School

The famous linguist Michael Lewis, who puts forward the Lexical Approach, points out that language is a system of grammatical lexis rather than a system of lexical grammar, and the lexis is the core of language learning. However, the present situation that the vocabulary high school students have grasped is unsatisfactory. Therefore, it is worthy of exploring how to guide students to expand their vocabulary outside class.Generally speaking, Lexical chunks, which lies between traditional grammar and vocabulary, are composed of two or more words or phrases. The form is usually fixed or semi-fixed pattern of block structure, when needed, it can be extracted and used as a whole, which contributes to the improvement of the language fluency and accuracy. The research on lexical chunks in English teaching mainly focuses on classroom teaching, while there are few researches on extracurricular acquisition of Lexical chunks. Extracurricular reading is considered as an effective way to obtain information, enhance the sense of language, enlarge English vocabulary, and improve their English proficiency. So this thesis will focus on feasibility and validity of the application of lexical chunks in extracurricular reading.The subjects of this research are students of two parallel classes in Grade Two, one is chosen as experimental class and the other as controlled class. The experimental class was adopted by the Lexical Approach in extracurricular reading, while the controlled class was adopted by regular reading approach. After the experiment, by means of comparative analysis of scores of both experimental and controlled classes between pre-test and post-test, and summarize the result of interview. The result of experiment shows that the application of lexical chunks in extracurricular reading is feasible, which can increase students' lexical chunks and raise students' awareness of lexical chunks learning. Students' awareness of accumulating lexical chunks during extracurricular reading contributes to broadening their vocabulary, enhancing the sense of language, and improving the comprehensive ability of English.