The Application Of Scaffolding Instruction In English Writing Teaching In Senior High School

Writing is a complicated language output process,which is the language of the students to be internalized and recreated.Writing is the best embodiment of the comprehensive ability of the students,and it is the essential part of college entrance examination.However,the writing ability of the high school students is not satisfying,and the English writing teaching in the school is a weak link in language teaching.Therefore,it is of great importance to find out an effective teaching approach to change the current situation.Scaffolding instruction is a teaching approach based on the constructivism theory,which originates from the Zone of Proximal Development.It assists students to explore knowledge autonomously through building up scaffoldings with teacher’s help,and step by step achieve the goal.The teaching process consists of five stages:setting up scaffolding,entering the scene,building independent exploration,conducting cooperative learning and making effective evaluation.This thesis combines scaffolding theory with the teaching of English writing in high schools,aiming to explore an effective way for English writing teaching,cultivating the students’ interest in English writing and improving the students’ writing ability.The research is conducted in two same-level classes of Senior Two in Cangwu Senior Middle School with the help of questionnaires,tests and interviews to test the efficiency of scaffolding instruction.One class is played as experimental class,the other acts as control class.Scaffolding instruction is adopted in the experimental class to the English writing teaching,while the control class is still applied the traditional teaching method.The experiment lasts five months.It aims to explore the following two questions:(1)Whether the scaffolding instruction can develop students’ interest in English writing?(2)Whether the scaffolding instruction can develop students’ writing ability?After a series of data collection and analyses,the results of the experiment indicate that the scaffolding instruction approach can develop students’ interest in English writing and students’ writing ability.It is concluded that the scaffolding instruction approach is more effective than the traditional teaching method.The author hopes it can have a positive guiding effect on further English teaching.However,the research also has its limitations.For example,the experimental period lasts not so long,and it is only carried out in two top-level classes.These limitations offer the guidance and suggestions for the future study.