| Reading,as one of the main approaches of obtaining information,plays a significant role in developing learners' English proficiency.But it should be mentioned that most junior high school students in China show low interest and motivation towards English reading,especially for extracurricular English reading.Unknown words are considered as the biggest obstacles for students' successful comprehension of reading materials.How to deal with unknown words effectively in reading is what students need urgently.Therefore,instructing junior high school students to infer the meaning of unknown words by using proper lexical inferencing strategies is of great necessity.Up to now,tremendous attention has been paid to investigate the status quo of lexical inferencing strategies used by learners,but it is still not clear how different levels of English proficiency may affect learners' inferencing behavior with respect to the types and frequencies of lexical inferencing strategies they use.Also,almost all the researchers at home and abroad have confirmed that lexical inferencing strategies training can improve learners' lexical inferencing ability,but which level of learners can benefit more from lexical inferencing strategies training is still obscure.On the basis of previous studies,three research questions were proposed:(1)What is the status quo of lexical inferencing strategies used by junior high school students?(2)What are the differences of using lexical inferencing strategies among junior high school students of different levels?(3)How does lexical inferencing strategies training influence junior high school students' lexical inferencing ability?Two parallel classes with 78 students in Grade Nine from one of junior high schools in Hangzhou participated in the study.Firstly,questionnaire and interview 1were used to investigate the status quo of lexical inferencing strategies used by junior high school students.Secondly,the participants were divided into three groups,namely,high level group,middle level group and low level group.Lexical inferencing test 1 was used to explore the differences of lexical inferencing strategies used by different level participants.Thirdly,one of two parallel classes was randomly chosen as the experimental group(EG)and the other as the control group(CG).A teaching experiment on lexical inferencing strategies training lasting for two months was conducted in EG.After that,lexical inferencing test 2 and interview 2 were used to elaborate the influence of lexical inferencing strategies training on junior high school students' lexical inferencing ability.SPSS 24.0 was adopted in this study for data analysis.Based on the results of the questionnaire,two lexical inferencing tests as well as interviews,the following conclusions can be drawn:(1)Junior high school students use meaning-focused strategies and form-focused strategies more frequently than evaluating strategies and monitoring strategies.(2)The frequency of lexical inferencing strategies used by high level students is meaning-focused strategies > evaluating strategies > form-focused strategies > monitoring strategies,among middle level students is meaning-focused strategies > form-focused strategies > evaluating strategies > monitoring strategies,while among low level students is form-focused strategies > meaning-focused strategies > evaluating strategies > monitoring strategies.(3)Lexical inferencing strategies training in English reading teaching of junior high school is effective to improve students' lexical inferencing ability,especially for middle level students whose lexical inferencing ability is greatly improved.In accordance with the major findings,this study provides some implications for teachers' reading instruction,students' strategies application as well as editors' reading material compilation.Besides,the limitations of the study have been summarized and suggestions for future researches are presented for reference. |
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