A Comparative Study Of English Leaning Engagement Between Mongolian And Han Senior High School Students

Under the background of the new curriculum standards reform,English plays a more important role in senior high school teaching.In 2017 the Ministry of Education proposed in the English Curriculum Standards for Ordinary Senior High Schools pointing out that "English curriculum for ordinary senior high schools emphasizes the comprehensive training of students' language ability,cultural awareness,thinking quality and learning ability.The English curriculum in ordinary senior high schools should help students to further study and apply the basic knowledge and skills of English,develop the ability of cross-cultural communication,and create favorable conditions for them to learn knowledge of other subjects,absorb the essence of world culture and disseminate Chinese culture.This requires strengthening the training of students' abilities rather than simple knowledge transmission in the teaching processes.However,influenced by the traditional teacher-led teaching mode,there are still some problems in English education in minority areas,resulting in the lack of enthusiasm for students to participate in learning.Therefore,students' engagement in English learning has gradually become the focus of English teaching.Reviewing the literature at home and abroad,it is found that there have been many studies on students' engagement in English learning,most of which are about general students' engagement in English learning.There are relatively few studies on English learning participation of senior high school students in minority areas.By investigating and comparing the English learning engagement of Mongolian and Chinese high school students,the author finds out the difference between them,and finds out the reasons of the difference so as to provide some corresponding suggestions and guidance to students' problems in learning process.This paper makes a comparative study of English learning engagement between Mongolian and Han senior high school students.Mainly by means of questionnaires and interviews,396 senior high school students from Xilingol No.2 Senior High School and Mongolian Senior High School in Inner Mongolian are investigated.Referring to Professor Kong Qiping's definition and classification of learning engagement,the author divides learning engagement into three dimensions: behavioral engagement,cognitive engagement and emotional engagement.The questions in this paper are as following: 1.The overall situation of English learning engagement of Mongolian and Han senior high school students.2.The difference between Mongolian and Han senior high school students in English learning engagement.3.The reason of the difference between Mongolian and Han senior high school students in English learning engagement.Findings of the study can be summarized as following: First,students' learning engagement in both Mongolian Senior High School and NO.2 Senior High School are in the middle level.On average,Han students' learning engagement is higher than Mongolian students.Second,based on the results of independent sample T-test,there are some significant difference in behavioral engagement and emotional engagement between students in Mongolian Senior High School and NO.2 Senior High School.In the aspect of behavior engagement and emotional engagement,the participation frequency of Mongolian students is lower than that of Han students.Third,the reasons of Mongolian students' low engagement in English learning lie in the following aspects: the low proportion of their English achievements in the College Entrance Examination of the Mongolian nationality and their ignorance of English learning;less exposure to English and weak foundation;the traditional teacher-centered teaching method has many disadvantages;the negative influence in the process of transcoding between Mongolian,Chinese and English;few suitable Mongolian language textbooks.On how to improve Mongolian high school students' engagement in English learning,this paper puts forward several suggestions.First,psychological guidance should be strengthened and students' interest in learning should be cultivated.Second,teachers should guide students to make use of language learning experience and play a positive role in mother tongue transfer.Third,students' autonomous learning ability should be improved.Fourth,teachers should encourage students to make full use of their knowledge.This study tries to find out the reasons for the difference between Mongolian and Chinese students' engagement in learning so as to further deepen the theoretical study of Third Language Teaching and to provide some practical suggestions for improving the quality of basic foreign language teaching in minority areas.