Language is a tool for people to communicate with each other or change their ideas and information. In the whole process, students are the main body in the course of English teaching and learning. So the teacher should guide his students to appreciate and discover the beauty of English language, practice the language skills, express their ideas freely, and exchange information. The most important point is to communicate with others and understand cultures and customs of foreign countries. On the other hand, as students, they should pay more attention to cultivating their interest in English learning, having correct attitudes, seting clear goals and having right ways of learning English.
II. The Current Situation of English Teaching in Middle School
Last semester, I taught English in Caohe middle school as an internship. There is a stable development in English teaching in Caohe middle school during these two decades. However, owing to the aim of teaching in Caohe middle school, it reveals some defects. Although most of the English teachers claim that they use the task-based language teaching, as a matter of fact, they are using the traditional teaching method—the whole classes concern on teacher’s explanation rather than students’ exercises. According to my report, about fifty percent of English teachers spend most class time in explaining the texts. What’s more, most of English teachers spend almost all of the time on explanation. In addition, according to the system of examination, all English teachers focus on skills, vocabulary and grammar to make students get good results. In the same report, all of the interviewees said that they emphasized the cultivation of English skills. But cultures, strategies and emotions were neglected. A large number of English teachers only emphasize speaking skill and reading skill among the five skills—listening, speaking, reading, writing, and translation. And because middle school English is a comprehensive course, there is a lack of special writing and translation training. Students have their own physical and psychological features. They have a strong sense of curiosity and interest of learning, but their high enthusiasm cannot stand long. They are active and lively, but they are weak in control. They are good at imitation and have good memory, but their attention is likely to be attracted by other things and cannot keep long. Thus, the bottleneck in English teaching limits students’ learning activities, and calls for the appliance of the interest-arousing strategies.
III. Some Major Reasons
3.1 The Teachers
Firstly, the educational notion of teacher is out of date and the educational theories are inadequate. The teacher’s educational notion has a direct relationship with the quality of education. For a teacher, a new notion is the precondition and basis of improving his or her teaching ability. According to a survey, many teachers emphasize more on the experience, and less on the acquisition of theory and study. Some teachers think that education is just an exchange of experience, just like old friends gathering. Some even advocate training teachers by the way of imitating a fixed English teaching sample which is made out by the teachers themselves. And some teachers think researchers should care about the acquisition of theories. The sample questionnaire showed that 93% class did not carry the quality oriented education into effect; 70% teachers asked questions not covering the whole class; 75% teachers did not teach in English; 83% teacher liked full-class instillation, 81% students think their teacher judged them by their score. Because of the outdated notion of education, the teaching quality is at a low level. In turn, the learning of English often can not get a satisfying development. 初中英语教学现状分析与对策(2):http://www.youerw.com/yingyu/lunwen_6378.html