An Empirical Study Of The Effect Of Literature Circles Teaching Model On Junior High School Students' English Reading Character

Reading plays an important role in the foreign language learning and the cultivation of reading literacy is of great significance in the development of students' comprehensive language competence.The evaluation system of reading literacy both at home and abroad attaches great importance to students' reading character which includes two aspects,reading habit and reading experience.However,in real reading teaching,there are problems in junior high school students' reading character such as improper reading behaviour and limited reading engagement time.How to improve students' reading character by updating the current reading teaching has become one of the important needs of English teaching in China.The teaching mode of Literature Circles is student-centered,which combines independent reading and cooperative learning in extracurricular reading activities.The implementation of this reading model might be a solution to improve students' reading habits and cultivate their reading character.This study reviewed cooperative learning theory and reader response theory related to literature circles teaching model and defined some key concepts like literature circles teaching and reading character.On the basis of searching and consulting the applied researches of reading teaching through literature circles model at home and abroad,the author carried out an empirical research on improving junior high school students' English reading character by literature circles teaching model,aiming at solving the following research questions: 1)What are the characteristics of current junior high school students' English reading character? More specifically,what kinds of reading habits and reading experiences do they have? 2)How doesliterature circles teaching affect junior high school students' English reading character?What aspects are affected most? 3)Whether literature circles teaching model improve junior high school students' English reading proficiency?This study mainly adopted documentary analysis,quantitative and qualitative research methods.The method of documentary analysis was used to explore relevant theories and key concepts,and summarize relevant foreign and domestic researches.Experimental method was also adopted in this study.Two parallel classes from a junior high school in Hangzhou were selected as the experimental class and the control class.The teaching mode of literature circles was conducted in the experimental class.The data was collected by questionnaire,test and interview,and analyzed by SPSS(20.0).The research found that:1)The current situation of junior high school students' English reading character is not very optimistic and there are some prominent problems in students' reading character especially in the aspects of reading character structure,reading behavior,extra-curricular reading quantity,reading interest and self-evaluation.2)Literature circles teaching model is effective in improving students' English reading character and the improvements of three aspects including reading amount,reading behaviour and self-assessment are significantly obvious.3)After one semester's involvement in literature circles teaching activities,the experimental class students' English reading performance was improved so literature circles teaching is also conducive to the improvement of junior high school students' reading proficiency.Based on the above findings,this study puts forward the following suggestions for English reading teaching: 1)Literature circles teaching model can effectively improve students' English reading character and teachers should attempt to adapt this reading model in second language learning context to improve students' reading habits and enhance their reading experiences.2)English reading habit and reading experience are equally important to students' language development so teachers should attach sufficient attention to the two aspects and take actions to cultivate soundEnglish reading character.3)Teachers should strengthen the training of students' reading behavior and reading strategies and adjust them according to their learning situation when conducting literature circles teaching model in second language learning context to prepare students with competence and confidence.4)The combination of extracurricular cooperative reading and self-regulated autonomous reading is effective in improving reading engagement time,long-term extra-curricular reading motivation and self-assessment competence.5)Meaningful peer discussion and diversified productive language activities should be encouraged in literature circles teaching so as to improve reading comprehension and reading experience.6)Last but not least,teachers should flexibly adjust the reading roles in literary circles and creatively design various role tasks to maintain reading motivation and improve reading proficiency.