| Students’ English writing ability is an important part of their comprehensive English ability.The 2017 edition of the Senior High School English Curriculum Standards has put forward new writing standards for senior high school students’ English writing.The increase in the weight of the English writing part and the difficulty of the content in the context of the New College Entrance Examination has also put forward higher requirements for senior high school students’ English writing quality i.e.,writing ability.However,judging from the current situation of English teaching in senior high schools,English writing is still a difficult point of teaching.There are still many problems in Students’ English writing e.g.,incorrect wording choices,improper collocations,grammatical errors,poor content,confusing structural organization,Chinglish,etc.The choice of teaching methods is considered to be closely related to students’ English ability development;therefore,it is necessary to explore effective English teaching methods to improve senior high school students’ writing quality.The Lexical Approach(LA)is considered an effective method of language teaching.Relevant research shows Lexical Chunks(LCs)can be memorized,processed,and extracted for use as whole units,hence possessing the advantages of saving mental processing resources in second language acquisition.However,research about the application of LA is rarely seen in senior high school English teaching classrooms.Even less research has been conducted on the effects of LA on the quality of English writing of senior high school students.Given this,based on the Psycho-linguistic Chunking Theory,Input Hypothesis,and Output Hypothesis,an empirical study was conducted to investigate the effects of senior high school students’ English writing quality in order to provide new insights into English teaching.Therefore,this study sets out to answer the following questions:(1)What impact does the Lexical Approach have on senior high school students’ English writing scores?(2)What impact does the Lexical Approach have on the complexity,accuracy,and fluency(CAF)of senior high school students’ English writing?Two parallel classes of 91 students of Grade One in a senior high school in Tianhe District,Guangzhou City were used as research participants of this study for a4-month teaching experiment.The English teaching method adopted based on the study of the Lexical Approach proposed by Lewis was employed in the experimental class(EC),while the control class was instructed by using the traditional English teaching methods.The present study used writing tests as instruments and adopted both a holistic scoring method and the CAF writing quality measurement system developed by Wolfe-Quintero,et al.,to compare the changes in students’ composition scores as well as their English writing complexity,accuracy,and fluency(CAF),which constitute the core dimensions of English writing quality,between EC and CC after a 4-month of LA treatment.The study shows that LA can effectively improve senior high school students’ English writing quality.In comparison,the English writing scores of EC have significantly increased(t(89)=0.762,p<0.05);and there are positive effects on students’ writing complexity,accuracy,and fluency(CAF)dimensions after the LA treatment,but the three dimensions are affected to different degrees.The LA has quite high effects on the complexity(t(89)=5.087,p<0.01;t(89)=3.049,p<0.01)and fluency(t(89)=2.932,p<0.01;t(89)=2.275,p<0.05)of students’ English writing,yet only limited effects on the accuracy dimension(t(89)=3.202,p<0.01)of students’ English writing.In conclusion,the Lexical Approach has its distinct advantages and can,to a certain extent,contribute to the development of students’ overall English writing abilities.Therefore,the findings of the present study may have some pedagogical implications and can provide certain references for front-line English teachers.Although this study has explored the effects of the LA on students’ English writing quality,there are still some limitations about it due to such factors as a short experimental period,limited sample size,and the fact that the research participants are only First Grade students of senior high schools. |
