An Empirical Study Of The Impacts Of English Picture Books On Pupils' Reading Literacy

Education reforms based on the Key Competences of students have become the basis for many countries or regions to formulate educational policies and carry out educational practices.Reading is an effective way of language input and it plays an important role in cultivating students' Key Competences.Therefore,the cultivation of reading literacy has attracted wide attention.However,students are not interested in English reading and their reading literacy is not high.The English picture books as good supplementary reading materials of textbooks are preferred reading sources among primary school students.For EFL learners,English picture books can provide the real context for learning English,help students develop language ability,encourage their interests and cultivate their divergent thinking.As to language learning,picture books carry two such crucial attributes as instrumentality and cultural transmission.This thesis adopts the literature review method,the questionnaire research method and the experimental research method and focuses on two questions as followings:(1)How do the English picture books affect the pupils' reading literacy?(2)What kind of teaching design in reading picture books is appropriate to pupils?This experiment was made between two classes of Grade Four in Zhongshan Second Primary School for two months,with one being the experimental class and the other being the control class.Each class has 30 students.The experiment was conducted with the help of my former college classmate,who is the English teacher of the two classes.During the eight-week experimental period,the English teacher added one reading lesson to two classes every Friday on the premise of completing teaching tasks.In the experiment,picture books are used in reading lessons in experimental class.Correspondingly,plain texts extracted form picture books are used in reading lessons in control class.Data were collected through a variety of instruments: Pre &Post Testing,in addition to students' questionnaires and interviews.They were analyzed by SPSS and Excel.Based on the data,the study comes to the following conclusions.(1)Picture book teaching has a positive impact on students' reading literacy.On the one hand,the pre-test and post-test of reading comprehension prove that the development of picture book reading lessons is conducive to improving students' reading ability.On the other hand,the results of questionnaires and interviews showthat picture book lessons also have a positive impact on students' reading experience and reading habits.(2)Through the study in elementary school,the researcher explores an efficient teaching design in reading picture books.It includes the selection of picture books,reading methods,activities,assessments,etc.It is suggested that in the selection of picture books,three factors should be given considerable consideration: the consistency between picture books,the cognitive style of the students and the language level.In addition,the layout,linguistic features,and emotional value of the picture are also important.Second,teachers should set teaching goals to improve the affinity of the teaching process.By fully analyzing the text of the picture books,teachers are advised to choose appropriate reading methods such as Picture Tour,Jigsaw Reading,Reading Circles and Story Map based on the students' current language level and the characteristics of picture books.Finally,the author also summarizes some recommended assessments for the picture book reading lessons.Through applying theories into practice,this study explores the value of English picture books in elementary schools,and aims to provide educators and teachers with some inspiration in the application of picture books to reading lessons and make them truly effective in elementary school reading lessons of English language.