A Study On The Integration Of Culture Into Vocabulary Teaching In Senior High Schools In Remote Pastoral Areas

Vocabulary teaching is an important part of language teaching. The efficiency of vocabulary teaching has a direct impact on the realization of the ultimate goal of language teaching. As a vital component of language, vocabulary is most closely connected with culture. So the interpretation of words can not be separated from the intervention of culture. Vocabulary teaching is actually cultural teaching. However, the close relationship between vocabulary and culture has not been paid enough attention in the history of vocabulary teaching in our country. Affected by the examination oriented education, vocabulary teaching still remains in the spelling, pronunciation, morphology changes, grammar and literal meaning. It is on a very superficial level, and the cultural meaning of vocabulary has not received its deserved attention. Therefore, the lack of cultural meaning of vocabulary has caused many learners to misunderstand and misuse those culturally loaded words, which often results in the misunderstanding and barriers in cross-cultural communication.In recent years, with the rapid development of China's reform and opening up and the integration of the world economy, international cooperation is increasing, and the exchange between Chinese and Western culture gets more and more frequent. The new curriculum criterion has put forward specific demands on the cultivation of intercultural awareness of students, "understanding English slang and idioms and their cultural connotation; understanding the commonly used classical allusions and legends in English communication; understanding the similarities and differences in company manners and every-day manners between people of main English speaking countries and Chinese; understanding the relationship between English language and its culture". The new middle school English syllabus also formally puts forward that students' intercultural communicative competence must be focused and cultivated as a kind of important ability, which makes a lot of teachers and scholars begin to recognize the importance of the cultural integration into vocabulary teaching. But the present research just stays at the theoretical level. The teaching practice is lack of systematic and effective guidance, especially in remote pastoral areas, where economy is backward, communication with the outside world is rare, and information is relatively inaccessible. Students acquire English knowledge just from textbooks and dictionaries, no other efficient ways available, which makes English vocabulary teaching and learning, especially vocabulary teaching with culture subjected to a certain degree of difficulty.Through questionnaire survey and test, it is found that the majority of senior high school students in remote pastoral areas have a meager knowledge of the cultural connotation of vocabulary. English teachers themselves pay little attention to cultural integration in vocabulary teaching, and even their knowledge of cultural connotation of vocabulary is not comprehensive. Most teachers have been sticking to the same teaching mode for a long time, that is, the pronunciation of the words in the first place, word formation and grammatical category in the second place, and finally, the list of meaning and usage of words. The teaching of vocabulary follows three principles:pronunciation, form and meaning. And the teaching of "meaning" only stays in literal meaning or grammatical meaning. The internal relationship between words and words and the cultural factors behind them are completely neglected. English language teaching which is separated from the cultural background makes it difficult for students to understand the words comprehensively and use the words correctly.In view of this, this thesis surveys the current situation of vocabulary and culture teaching and expounds the importance of cultural integration into vocabulary teaching, aiming at putting forward the specific principles and methods for improving foreign language learners' intercultural communicative competence and the quality of foreign language vocabulary teaching in remote pastoral areas in our country.