An Experimental Study Of Phonics In English Vocabulary Teaching In Primary School

Vocabulary teaching is an important part of English teaching,yet for learners especially primary school students,memorizing a large amount of words is a big difficulty.It is clearly elaborated in the Level-2 requirements of 2012 National English Curriculum Standard that ‘Students should be able to learn 600-700 words and pronounce simple words according to the spelling rules'.However,in daily vocabulary teaching,most English teachers adopt the inefficient and mechanic teaching method,which focuses on rote learning.As a result,it neglects the internal relationship between sounds and letters,which makes learners unable to memorize the words effectively.Owing to the ineffective method,most of students face the trouble that they can neither correctly pronounce the words,nor accurately spell them.It is very necessary to provide an effective vocabulary learning method to help primary school students expand their vocabulary.And phonics is a vocabulary teaching method worthy of our efforts.It makes students learn vocabulary in a more autonomous way by establishing the correspondent relationship between letters or letter combinations and the form of words.The study of phonics abroad has made great achievement,however,most studies of phonics are conducted among learners in English speaking countries and the studies in non-English speaking countries are far from adequate.So there is a possibility for the Chinese English teachers to apply the method to their vocabulary teaching.This paper firstly analyzes the present situation of English vocabulary teaching and the existing problems in primary school,and introduces the purpose and significance of the research.Secondly,the definition,function of phonics and the previous studies on phonics abroad and at home are summarized.Thirdly three theoretical basis of phonics are expounded.Fourthly,the teaching model is introduced in detail in the process of this experiment.Finally,the effect of phonics through the experimental study is discussed in English vocabulary teaching in primary school.The experimental group(N=20)and the control group(N=20)were chosen from Grade 4 in Baifo primary school in Julu County of Xingtai City.During one semester,phonics was implemented to the experimental group trained in phonics method while teaching vocabulary.Meanwhile,the control group adapted the traditional method.Through the comparative teaching experiment,the author tired to answer the following questions:1.Can phonics stimulate students' interest in learning English vocabulary?2.Can phonics improve students' English words reading and spelling abilities?3.Can phonics improve the students' English vocabulary memorizing ability?By using the questionnaire,interview,doing experiment,the author analyzed the pre-test and post-test results with the help of SPSS software.The result shows that phonics can not only improve students' English reading ability,but also improve students' English word spelling ability.At the same time,it is an effective way to promote students' memory of English words.Besides,most of students showed keen interests in phonics and would prefer to learn new words' reading and spelling by using phonics.Based on these findings,the study also provides some suggestions for primary English teachers such as strengthening students' basic knowledge and self-study ability,providing students more materials and opportunities to consolidate the results of phonics,and improving students' ability to learn English words with other teaching methods.