A Survey of the Application of Task-Based Approach to English Teaching in Junior Schools in Northern Part of Jiangsu Province.doc

苏北初中任务型英语教学实施现状调查研究a survey of the application of task-based approach to english teaching in junior schools in northern part of jiangsu province摘要：我国教育部2001年出台的英语课程标准（实验稿）明确鼓励教师“采用任务型的教学途径”。自新课标实施以来，各种各样的相关改革研究活动已遍布全国。为了了解当前初中任务型教学(tblt)在初中英语教学中应用的实际情况, 本研究以盐城市滨海县县城的四所中学共60名教师为研究对象,采用问卷、访谈和实地考察等方式进行调查研究。本文将呈现调查结果，分析数据，找出原因，提出建议，旨在通过调查研究促进苏北初中英语教学改革，提高该地区英语教学质量。关键词：任务型教学法,初中,苏北,调查1 introductionenglish, an international language, plays an ever-increasingly important role in the world. considering the importance of second language teaching, many foreign language teaching researchers have been devoting themselves to the course of exploring more practical and efficient teaching methods. and among their research findings, task-based language teaching (tblt) is one, which now wins the worldwide fame. the new national curriculum syllabus for english language teaching, published in 2001, advocates the use of task-based language teaching (tblt). however, some people argue that this teaching approach is not practical in china as it ignores the importance of grammar. the disparity demonstrates that problems exist in the application of tblt. in order to find out the current implementation of tblt, the author conducted this research.2 literature review2.1 theory of languagelanguage is a complex communicative system and its primary task is to convey meaning. according to socio-linguistics, functional linguistics and other linguistic theories, language does not occur in a vacuum but is used in certain social and cultural environments. apart from the literal meaning, language also expresses the interpersonal meaning. and tblt attaches great importance to the authenticity of both form and content of teaching.2.2 theory of language learningthe interaction theory advocates that through meaning negotiation, students interlanguage system can be fully used and developed. the core of the sociocultural theory is that interaction activities do not merely include meaning negotiation, but more importantly, students can work together to construct meaning in these activities. the basic view of cognitive theory is that students pay all their attention to language forms in traditional teaching while tblt encourages them to properly distribute their attention to language comprehension, expression and other fields. constructivism holds the view that language is constructed by ones own rather than taught by others. 3 methodology3.1 participants this research lasted one week from march 27 to april 3, 2008. four junior high schools in the country of binhai were visited during the research. the participants were 60 english teachers from these 4 junior high schools. 3.2 instrumentsthe survey was conducted in three ways: questionnaire, interview and observation.3.2.1 questionnaire eighteen questions are involved in the questionnaire, which can be classified into three parts. the first part is questions about the teachers attitudes, understanding and beliefs towards tblt. the second part is questions about the design of teaching including teaching objectives, teaching content, teaching materials, teaching activities, teaching procedures and assessment. and the third part is questions about the effects of teaching. 3.2.2 interviewthe aim of interview is to explore the teachers understanding, attitudes, beliefs, and thoughts towards tblt and the difficulty that they meet in applying tblt as well as the barriers that prevent the smooth implementation of tblt. the interview was done by face-to-face talk. 3.3.3 observationobservation in this research includes two parts: classroom observation and reading teaching plans. about eight lessons were observed and fifteen copies of teaching plan were read during the whole research.3.3 date collection and analysismicrosoft office excel was used in analyzing the statistics. interview was done by face-to-face talk. notes were taken during interview and later were arranged and summarized. necessary notes were made to record the teaching procedures and classroom activities.4 results of the survey4.1 results of questionnaire the questionnaire includes eighteen questions which can be divided into the following seven parts: understanding and applying of tblt, teaching objective, teaching content and teaching materials, teaching activities and time allotment, assessment, teaching procedures and teaching effects. the data of each part is presented respectively in the tables and graphs.4.2 results of interview the results of interview have revealed that most teachers more or less know something about tblt but very few completely understand it. most of them frankly admit that they do not apply it in their classes and will not do so in the near future. according to them the biggest obstacle that prevents them from applying tblt is the current assessment system which itself highly focuses on testing students linguistic knowledge rather than language competence.4.3 results of observationthe results of observation shows that teachers passionately explain with great patience while students do not seem to actually get themselves involved in the class. teachers play a central role in class while students learn passively and mechanically and have few creative thoughts. consequently, students become so dependent on their teachers that they almost lose the ability to think independently.5 analysis of the results5.1 comparison between tblt and current situation of english teaching the general objective of tblt is to foster students overall language ability. however, over 81.67% of the investigated teachers think that the main teaching objective should be that students are able to master vocabulary and grammar.the content of tblt is a series of purposeful tasks, which the students have to fulfill. about 78.33% think that teaching content is just the texts in the textbook and some related language points.tasks are the most important and exciting part in tblt. “a task is an activity or action which is carried out as the result of processing or understanding language (richards, platt and weber 1985).” in tblt, classroom teaching should be student-centered rather than teacher-centered. but the results of survey show that most of the time is occupied by teachers explanation of language points, grammar and texts. as the tblt attaches great importance to students language competence, the traditional submissive assessment, which purely evaluates students language ability by their scores, doesnt work. however, the reality is that only score is convincing under current assessment system.in tblt, teaching activities usually can be categorized into three parts: pre-task activities, while-task activities and post-task activities. however, the outcome of questionnaire demonstrates that about 76.67% of the teachers adopt 3p-teaching procedures.5.2 reasons for unsuccessful implementation of tbltthe following three main reasons that lead to the unsuccessful implementation of tblt have emerged. firstly, most of the investigated teachers are not clear about what tblt really is, which shows their ignorance of language teaching theory. most of them have misunderstandings towards tblt. secondly, the limitation of using one single textbook prevents the smooth implementation of tblt. one single textbook is sufficient to meet the demands of traditional ways of language teaching. however, in tblt, abundant teaching materials should be collected before hand by teachers from all available sources according to different communicative objectives. thirdly, the current assessment system is a fatal factor that stops the applying of tblt. without the reform of assessment the implementation of tblt can never be truly and fully carried out. 6 suggestions6.1 enhancing teachers study on teaching theoriesthe above problems highlight the importance of enhancing teachers study on teaching theories. without having a clear idea about what tblt really is, one can never put tblt into real practice. therefore, it is necessary for teachers to further study those teaching theories that closely linked to tblt as well as the new national curriculum syllabus. first of all, teachers should shift their study from structuralism to functionalism. besides, teachers should strengthen their study on constructism which is the language learning theory of tblt. whats more, teachers should enhance their study on new national curriculum syllabus.6.2 changing the function of teaching materialsthe function of teaching materials should be changed. in traditional teaching, teaching materials play the central role. both teaching objectives and classroom activities are designed to serve the textbook. different from traditionally teaching methods, tblt attaches great importance to improving students ability to use language. therefore, instead of playing the dominating role in language teaching, teaching materials in tblt should be subordinate to communicative tasks. teaching materials should be selected and organized according to specific communicative objectives. 6.3 reforming the current assessment systemlast but not least, the current assessment system should be reformed. the current assessment focuses too much on the evaluation of students linguistic knowledge. students are labeled and leveled by the scores they gain. obviously, this kind of education, which only serves examination, cannot meet the new demand of the development of society and without the reform of assessment the implementation of tblt can never be truly and fully carried out. therefore, it is suggested that current evaluating form should be reasonably adjusted. besides, teachers should combine the assessment and teaching closely. the diversity of assessment is also advocated. 7 conclusionaccording to the latest related research findings, it is proved that tblt is an effective foreign language teaching approach in promoting learners language competence. however, this survey shows that the implementation of tblt does not seem to work very well in junior high schools. the investigation mainly consists of three parts: questionnaire, interview and observation. the result of the investigation shows that teachers ignorance of language teaching theory, the limitation of using single unified textbook, and the current assessment system are the main reasons that prevent the smooth application of tblt. therefore, the following suggestions are offered: teachers study on teaching theories should be enhanced; the function of teaching materials should be changed;