A Study On The Design Of Grammar And Usage Section In Advance With English

Grammar plays an important role in English teaching and can lay a solid foundation for English learners to improve their communicative competence. At present, it has been widely recognized that grammar learning is both necessary and significant in second language acquisition. Since September, 2005, Advance with English has been adopted as the formal English textbooks for high schools in Jiangsu Province. As an important part of this set of textbooks, Grammar and Usage section is used by high school English teachers as the major material for grammar teaching. Thus the design of this section has far-reaching influence on English teaching and the evaluation of it has great significance.According to the new English Curriculum Standards for High school, based on current theories of material evaluation and second language acquisition, this thesis conducts an internal and external evaluation of Grammar and Usage section in Advance with English and aims to find out how the Grammar and Usage section in Advance with English is designed,how it is used and evaluated by teachers and students and then offer some suggestions for textbook writers and teachers. Therefore, this thesis is aimed to solve the following questions:(1) How is Grammar and Usage section designed in Advance with English? (2) What is the students' and teachers' evaluation of the design of this section? How is this section used in practical English teaching? What are the problems or difficulties in learning and teaching this section? (3) What are the advantages and disadvantages of the Grammar and Usage section in Advance with English?After analyzing textbooks and carrying out a survey, the following conclusions have been drawn: (1) Centering on the topic of each unit, linked up to the Reading section, the design of Grammar and Usage section adopts presentation-practice approach. (2) According to the survey, the design of Grammar and Usage section can basically meet the need of grammar learning and teaching in high schools; the teaching methods used to teach this section are mainly audiolingualism on account of the design features and the pressure from examinations; the low degree of difficulty and the lack of systematization and cohesion are the major problems textbook users face in in using Grammar and Usage section. (3) Based on the analysis above, the advantages of the design of Grammar and Usage section can be concluded as follows: centering on the topic of each unit, the design of Grammar and Usage section reflects the three-dimension theory of grammar teaching and the fundamental ideas advocated in the New English Curriculum Standard for High School in terms of layout of grammar items, presentation of grammar points and design of grammar practice. However,there are also some drawbacks existing in the design of this section. For example, the layout of grammar items is not systematic to some degree,the form of grammar exercises is not various enough and more emphasis should be paid to enhance students' communicative competence.Therefore, in order to solve the problems mentioned above, relevant authorities are advised to do more research on the needs of teachers and students, improve the design of Grammar and Usage section accordingly and offer more guidance to teachers to help them use the textbooks better. On the other hand, teachers ought to update their professional knowledge and qualities and use the textbooks creatively and wisely by adopting different teaching methods and strategies according to students' features, which may improve the quality of grammar teaching and help students develop their integrated ability to use English.