An Action Research On "Reading For Writing" In Senior High School English Writing Teaching

In senior high school the development of students' comprehensive ability is the primary goal of English teaching.Comprehensive ability mainly involves four basic skills,namely,listening,speaking,reading and writing.Significantly,writing is the most difficult for English teaching in senior high school,for the effect of practical English teaching generally turns out to be frustrating.The problem is that the students can't do well in English writing and are scared when faced with a writing topic.This thesis is attempted to solve the problem with the students' poor English writing ability.Based on the theories of Krashen's Input Hypothesis,Swain's Output Hypothesis,a teaching action research was designed and conducted.In the process of research,the author guided students to understand a certain function of the text and its language structures and practicing English writing with the help of English reading so as to explore solutions to students' problems with English writing and improve their writing outcomes with a proper teaching method,i.e.Reading for Writing Teaching Method.Thus the research started with these questions:(1)What effects does reading for writing teaching method produce on the students' writing ability in using new expressions?(2)What effects does reading for writing teaching method produce on the students' improvement of writing organization?(3)What changes arebrought to the students' attitudes toward English writing under the instructions of reading for writing? Based on the previous research on reading for writing,this action research was designed and carried out in a high school of Qingzhen.The whole research lasted for four months and106 senior one students participated in it.Under the guidance of “reading for writing”" teaching method,the author instructed the students to complete a series of reading-for-writing activities and writing practice,on which the author had constant reflection for adjustment and improvement in the process of teaching.The research findings indicate that the students have become confident and comfortable in English writing.They have made good use of reading for the text information,including key words,the topic sentences and the sentence structure so as to complete the writing task.They have done better in composition organization,key words,phrases,topic and supporting sentences.During the writing process,the students could use new vocabulary,sentence patterns and cohesive devices so as to achieve the writing goal.Despite the limitations of the study for a variety of reasons,reading for writing is a very effective teaching method,which can really improve students' writing in English.