The Application Of Lexical Approach To English Reading Teaching In Senior High Schools

Reading ability is an important way to test students’ comprehensive English language ability.Studies have shown that Lewis’ theory of lexical chunk processing plays a positive role in English reading teaching.So this paper tries to apply lexical approach to reading teaching in senior high school to improve students’ English reading comprehension ability.In accordance with the ethical principle,this study was approved by the senior high school and study subjects and then adopted the methods of questionnaire survey,experiment and interview.The experiment selected the students of two classes of senior grade one in Jining city as the research object,and the experiment lasted for a semester.In the process of reading teaching in the experimental class,the lexical chunk teaching method is applied,while in the control class,the traditional teaching method is used.This study raises two research questions:(1)Can lexical chunk approach reduce students’ English reading anxiety?(2)What is the impact of lexical chunk approach on students’ English reading comprehension ability?In this study,two tests,two questionnaires and post-experiment interview were conducted successively,and then SPSS25.0 software was used for statistical analysis of the data.The result of questionnaires and the interview showed that students’ reading anxiety was alleviated.The results of pre-test showed that there were no significant differences in reading comprehension scores and five aspects of reading comprehension abilities between the experimental class and the control class.The results of post-test showed that compared with the control class,the reading comprehension scores of the experimental class were significantly improved.Among them,the scores of the two abilities of understanding the specific information and the basic structure of the text in the experimental class have been significantly improved under the guidance of the lexical chunks approach.In terms of the score of understanding the thesis theme,the improvement of the experimental class is not as big as that of the control class.It can also be seen from the interview.Therefore,lexical chunks teaching method can improve English reading comprehension ability of senior high school students.This study draws the following conclusions: The English reading anxiety of senior high school students can be relieved by the lexical chunk approach;The English reading comprehension ability of senior high school students can be improved by the lexical chunk approach.Based on the analysis of the research conclusions,the author puts forward some suggestions for English reading teaching in senior high schools from the perspective of cultivating lexical chunk consciousness,grasping the key points of the content of explanation,accumulating lexical chunks,expanding lexical chunk size,paying attention to the pragmatic function of lexical chunks and designing more output exercises of lexical chunks.It is hoped that this study can provide valuable reference for peer teachers’ teaching.