Research Into The English Homework Design For Senior Middle School Students Based On Multiple Intelligence Theory

Since 2003 when Chinese Ministry of Education promulgated the new Curriculum Standard for English(trial),the overall goal of English courses in senior high school has been set for the development of students' comprehensive language ability,which is based on language skills,language knowledge,emotional attitude,learning strategies and cultural awareness.As an indispensable part of the teaching process,homework plays an irreplaceable role in promoting students' learning.However,due to the influence of exam oriented education,our senior high school English homework is still dominated by traditional homework mode,which causes students to have much learning pressure and even have negative attitude to English.These phenomena are all contrary to the new Curriculum Standard for English(trial),since the theory emphasizes that it is necessary to pay attention to the individual differences of students and promote the overall development of students.Therefore,in order to reduce the students' learning burden and promote the all-round development of students,the author introduced MIT to homework design.The author selected Senior Two students in Class 5 and Class 7 in Rizhao NO.5 Middle School as participants,the former as the experimental class and the latter as the control class.The author conducted the research for a semester in order to answer the following questions:(1)Given the guidance of Multiple Intelligence Theory,do the reformed homework improve students' English achievements?(2)After the experiment,do students change their attitudes towards English?Firstly,through consulting a large number of relevant researches,the author analyzed and introduced the research achievements on extracurricular homework and MIT at home and abroad.Then,the author had a preliminary understanding of the high school students' intelligence status through the Multiple Intelligence Questionnaire.The results of questionnaire show that students' multiple intelligences are on a medium level.The mathematical logic intelligence is on the highest level,while the interpersonal intelligence is on the lowest level..In order to explore the problems in English homework in senior high school,and design a good structure of homework for students,the author designed a homework questionnaire,which were distributed to both control class and experimental class.The questionnaire covers five dimensions,including function,type,difficulty,and amount of homework as well as students' attitudes towards homework.The results show that the students were not satisfied with the current mode of homework because of the boring content and unitary goal,failing to be aware of the value of the work.At the same time,in order to make the research more reasonable,the author also designed an interview for teachers.The results of the interview shows that all teachers know the importance of homework,but they fail to design an effective homework system for various reasons.As a result,combining the above viewpoints and actual situation with Gardner's MIT,the author designed and adopted MIT-based homework in the experimental class,while the control class still followed the traditional mode of homework.After the experiment,the author also conducted the same questionnaire in both classes,but two subjective questions were added to the questionnaire in the experimental class.The two questions were used to ask students' opinions after experiencing the reformed homework.The results of post-questionnaire show that students were highly satisfied with the reformed homework,and they believe MI-based homework plays an important role in cultivating their multiple intelligences due to its interesting content and diversified goals.Through the comparison between pre-test and post-test in the experimental class and control class by means of SPSS,the results show that the scores in experimental class have significant difference while the scores in control class have no significant difference.Consequently,it can be concluded that MI-based homework design can help students improve their English achievements and change their attitude towards English.