The Influences of Lexical Approach on College English Teaching in China
The Influences of Lexical Approach on College English Teaching in China
I. Introduction
1.1 Background
In recent years, college English teaching research focuses on exploring more effective teaching methods to improve the students’English proficiency and self-learning ability. China 's college English teaching find itself caught in a dilemma of time-consuming but low-efficiency. The undesirable language teaching situation drives the teaching researchers to make great efforts to innovate present teaching ideas and methods. No matter how much attention has been paid to reading and writing training, teachers and students generally think that vocabulary teaching is of vital importance and it is the foundation of English learning. However, a majority of students acquire new words by rote learning and some students even try to memorize the words based on the vocabulary list. Although students ' vocabulary size is increased quickly, their English language skills have not been improved. In order to resolve these problems, we can try to update the teaching idea of vocabulary and to improve the teaching method.
1.2 Purpose of the Paper
The focus of traditional English teaching is mainly on grammar and vocabulary, which are regarded as two independent items. In fact, students cannot express themselves very well even though they have acquired many words and grammar rules. So, how can we change the situation? Many studies have been conducted to improve English teaching efficiency in order to equip students with practical ability in English. Among them, the Lexical Approach, which was put forward by American scholar Lewis, sheds some new light on English teaching in China.
In view of the problem that most students know many new words but unable to use them correctly, the paper, based on the Lexical Approach, discusses the strong points of integrating the ideas of the Lexical Approach into college English teaching. From both the teachers’ and learners’ perspectives,
I. Introduction
1.1 Background
In recent years, college English teaching research focuses on exploring more effective teaching methods to improve the students’English proficiency and self-learning ability. China 's college English teaching find itself caught in a dilemma of time-consuming but low-efficiency. The undesirable language teaching situation drives the teaching researchers to make great efforts to innovate present teaching ideas and methods. No matter how much attention has been paid to reading and writing training, teachers and students generally think that vocabulary teaching is of vital importance and it is the foundation of English learning. However, a majority of students acquire new words by rote learning and some students even try to memorize the words based on the vocabulary list. Although students ' vocabulary size is increased quickly, their English language skills have not been improved. In order to resolve these problems, we can try to update the teaching idea of vocabulary and to improve the teaching method.
1.2 Purpose of the Paper
The focus of traditional English teaching is mainly on grammar and vocabulary, which are regarded as two independent items. In fact, students cannot express themselves very well even though they have acquired many words and grammar rules. So, how can we change the situation? Many studies have been conducted to improve English teaching efficiency in order to equip students with practical ability in English. Among them, the Lexical Approach, which was put forward by American scholar Lewis, sheds some new light on English teaching in China.
In view of the problem that most students know many new words but unable to use them correctly, the paper, based on the Lexical Approach, discusses the strong points of integrating the ideas of the Lexical Approach into college English teaching. From both the teachers’ and learners’ perspectives,
References: 1. Austin, J. L. How to Do Things with Words[M]. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962. 2 3. Carter, R. & McCarthy, M. Vocabulary and Language Teaching[M]. New York: Longman, 1988. 4 5. Lewis, Michael. The Lexical Approach: the State of ELT and a Way Forward [M]. England: Language Teaching Publications, 1993. 6 7. Lewis, Michael. Pedagogical Implication of the Lexical Approach[M]. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 2001. 8 9. Schmitt N, McCarthy M. Vocabulary: Description, Acquisition and Pedagogy [M]. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 2002. 10