The Application Of Lexical Approach To English Teaching In Junior High School

According to the National English Curriculum for Nine-year Compulsory Education,students at the end of Grade 9 are required to "learn 1500 ~ 1600 words and 200~ 300 idioms or fixed collocations".But the current situation of vocabulary teaching and learning is not satisfactory.Traditional vocabulary teaching method is used in most classes,where students recite lots of English words and the Chinese equivalents.But students still find it hard to use the language.Thus,a more effective vocabulary teaching method is of vital importance in English teaching.Based on the lexical approach put forward by Lewis,the author of this paper conducts an experimental research on English vocabulary teaching.The research questions are as follows:(1)Is the lexical approach efficient in enlarging students' English vocabulary?(2)Is the lexical approach efficient in improving students' ability to use English vocabulary and their overall English proficiency? If so,in what way?The author chooses two parallel classes at Changshu Xieqiao Junior High School to perform the teaching experiment.In the experimental class,lexical approach is used,while in the controlled class,the traditional vocabulary teaching method is used.The teaching experiment is conducted through questionnaires,tests and an interview.The data and results are analyzed by using SPSS 20.0.The data and results show that compared with the students in the controlled class,those in the experimental class have a significant increase in English vocabulary after the experiment.Besides,the lexical chunk approach has positive influence on the students' ability to use English vocabulary and their overall English proficiency.