An Application Of Micro-lecture In English Reading Teaching In Higher Vocational Colleges

With the rapid development of network communication technology,the human beings have stepped into a network "micro-era" and an "era of fragmentation." "Fragmented learning" is thus a certainty and,accordingly,information teaching is becoming an inevitable trend.As an outcome of the intrinsic requirements of the new era,Micro-lecture is a new form of educational resources as well as the core of resources construction of educational technological information in China.It is short in length,clear-cut in theme,diverse in resources,flexible in interaction and apt in expansion.And it serves as platform for higher vocational education in China.Since the first mention of Micro-lecture teaching,scholars at home and abroad have taken great academic interest in an extensive exploration of the Micro-lecture teaching.But,unfortunately,their study mainly focuses on the theoretical dimension of the Micro-lecture and seemingly neglects the empirical study of its application in English teaching in higher vocational colleges.Therefore,it will be of great practical significance to apply Micro-lecture in English teaching in general and in English reading teaching in particular in higher vocational colleges.The present author attempts to apply Micro-lecture in English reading teaching,based on Constructivist Theory and the Input and Output Theory of the second language acquisition.The present study is aimed at the exploration of the following two major questions:What effects does the application of Micro-lecture have on students' English reading interest in higher vocational colleges?What effects does the application of Micro-lecture have on students' English reading proficiency in higher vocational colleges?The present empirical study was conducted in Hunan Technical College of Railway High-speed and lasted 16 weeks from September in 2016 to January in 2017.The 60 subjects with similar English levels are from first year non-English majors in their first semester.Both the controlled class and experimental class,which are composed of 30 students,were given the same teaching hours and were taught by the same teacher.Before and after the experiment,all the students had tests of PART ? READING COMPREHENSION of PET A.The regular English reading teaching method was used in the controlled class while Micro-lecture was applied to English reading teaching in the experimental class.The experiment was divided into three different phases.Before the experiment,the theory concerning the Micro-lecture was introduced.During the experiment,the present author acted as a non-participatory observer equipped with research instruments such as questionnaires,interviews and English reading tests for the purpose of the research data collecting.After the experiment,data were gathered,sorted and analyzed.The combination of both qualitative and quantitative research methods ensured a reliable conclusion.At the same time,the statistic software SPSS 21.0 was employed in this study in hope of analyzing the gathered data in a scientific way.The findings are as follows:Micro-lecture can effectively enhance students' English reading interest;Micro-lecture can effectively enhance students' English reading proficiency.It shows that students hold positive opinions on the application of Micro-lecture in English reading teaching.They think that Micro-lecture has provided them with an opportunity to acquire more knowledge and urged them to study by themselves.Besides,it acquainted them with more knowledge about their own strong points and weak points.In conclusion,Micro-lecture is an effective way to enhance students'English reading ability as well as arousing students' English reading interest.This empirical study can provide certain references for further studies in the reform of assessment method.Owing to short time,small sample size,limited research instruments and personal ability,there still remain some drawbacks in the present study.