在英语教学中通过合作学习.docx

AcknowledgementsThanks  for  giving  me  the  chance  to  accomplish  my  paper  as  well  as  make  a  conclusion  for  my  four  years  education.  I  have  gained  much  more  knowledge  than  I  have  supposed  from  writing  this  paper.I would give my sincere thanks to Mrs.  Zhang,  a  respectable,  responsible  and  resourceful teacher,  who  has  provided  me  with  valuable  guidance  in  every  stage  of  the  writing  of  this  thesis.  Without  her  enlightening  instruction,  impressive  kindness  and  patience,  I  could  not  have  finished  my  thesis.Also,  I  want  to  give  my  thanks  to  other  teachers  and  my  classmates  who  have  given  me  much  help.  Thank you.AbstractCooperative learning and autonomous learning have become heated topics in English teaching. They are not contradictory; instead, autonomous learning can better promote the development of the students subject during the cooperative learning. During the cooperative learning, if teachers bring students autonomy into full play, teachers can make students complete learning tasks effectively and efficiently. At the same time, the author found that many researchers emphasis high school students or university students autonomous learning ability in foreign language learning. Researches on junior middle school are paid less attention. However, junior middle school period is a golden time to cultivate and improve autonomous learning ability and cooperative ability because students age and learning ability in this period have already reached a relatively mature stage. Based on the reasons above, the subject of this paper is junior middle school students and this paper mainly studies how to cultivate and improve students autonomous learning ability for teachers by cooperative learning in the English teaching.Key Words: autonomous learning; cooperative learning; English teaching in middle school摘要合作型学习和自主学习已经成为了英语教学中热门的话题。它们不是相互矛盾的，相反，自主学习在合作的过程中能更好地促进学生主体的发展。在合作学习中，充分发挥学生的自主性能有效地完成学习任务。与此同时，笔者发现大多数研究者的侧重点为高中生以及大学生在外语学习中的自主学习而研究初中生的并不多。然而，初中时期是一个逐步培养和提高自主学习能力和合作能力的黄金阶段，因为在这个阶段学生的年龄和学习能力都已经达到了一个相对成熟的阶段。因此基于以上的原因，此研究的对象者是初中生以及主要研究老师如何在课堂上通过合作学习培养和提高学生的自主学习能力。关键词：自主学习；合作学习；初中英语教学Contents TOC o "1-3" h z u1. Introduction 52. Literature Review 62.1 Domestic and Foreign Research on Autonomous Learning 62.2 Domestic and Foreign Research on Cooperative Learning 73. The Concrete Performance of Junior Middle Students Autonomous Learning 84. The Main Reasons for Lacking Autonomous Learning Ability 104.1 Low Motivation 104.2 Limitation of Self-Discipline 114.3 Low Utilization Rate of Learning Resources 125. The Teaching Strategies to Cultivate Junior Middle Students Autonomous Learning Ability by Cooperative Learning 125.1 Specific Strategies for Cultivating Junior Middle School Students Autonomous Ability in Cooperative Learning Model 135.1.1 Setting Specific Learning Objectives, Strategies and Overall Planning for Individuals 135.1.2 Cultivating Students Self-Discipline 145.1.3 Leading Students to Do Self- Evaluation and Mutual Evaluation 155.2 Some suggestions for Teachers in Cooperative Leaning Model 165.2.1 Selection About Activity Content 165.2.2 Selection About Discussion Mode 165.2.3 Occasion and Extent of Intervening Students Learning 176. Conclusion 19Bibliography 21Cultivating Junior Middle Students Autonomous Learning Ability by Cooperative Learning in English Teaching1. IntroductionFor a long time, English Teaching in China has been using the traditional teacher-centered teaching methods. The class is like a one-man show of teacher and the students are just the audiences. This English teaching mode seriously stifles students learning initiative, creativity, autonomy, which makes students more passive in the learning process.The cooperative learning is committed to developing the students potential and cultivates learners autonomy, which can minimize the interference of non-intelligence factors and create the relaxed, pleasant, lively atmosphere in the classroom. It is based on the emotions between the teachers and students, students and students. In cooperative learning, learning to be autonomous can build a dynamic, active students-centered classroom mode. The introduction of cooperative teaching mode makes the students participate in the class activity from the passive attitude to the active attitude, which would give full play to the initiative and learning autonomy, so that the students personal potential and needs can derive great satisfaction.Therefore it is necessary for the teachers to cultivate the autonomous learning ability of students by cooperative learning.2. Literature ReviewThrough searching “autonomous learning”, “cooperative learning” as the keyword in the CNKI database, Chinese academic journals of library, reference room, the writer has got more detailed and rich information about autonomous learning and cooperative learning.2.1 Domestic and Foreign Research on Autonomous LearningDiscussion on Autonomous Learning in foreign language teaching began in the middle of 1970s. Henri Holec (1981) introduce the concept and connotation of autonomous learning as a foreign language teaching. He described the concept of learning in his monograph Autonomy and Foreign Language. Since then, the research of autonomous learning has been a heatwave. There were many monographs on autonomous learning, mainly include: Autonomy and Foreign Language Learning (Holec, 1981), Developing Students Autonomy in Learning (Bound, 1988), Learning as Dialogue: the Dependent of Learner Autonomy on Teacher Autonomy (Little, 1991). In addition, there were some articles published in famous foreign language journals. These contents generally include three aspects: (1) research on the definition of autonomous language learning; (2) research on how to cultivate autonomous learning of foreign language learners: (3) research on the factors influencing autonomous learning of foreign language learners. The definition about autonomous learning of foreign language learning research combines the various scholars definition about learner autonomy, namely: Foreign language learning is a kind of ability. The purpose of education is to teach learners how to learn in any situation and learn to be responsible for their learning behaviors.In our country, there was heuristic teaching of Confucius as early as in the Spring and Autumn period and in the pre Qin period Mencius considered that learning is the students business of their own, which reflected the affirmation of students subjectivity. Until modern times, there are a lot of the discussion about autonomous learning in the history of Chinese education, for example, the famous educator Tao Xingzhi made a similar point of view “teachers responsibility is not teaching, but teaching students to learn”. Although there were many studies of the traditional education on educator, educational goal, educational content and teaching methods ,at the same time they ignored the learners and their learning activities. In this educational environment, the learners dominant position is not implemented and has great restraint. Their learning initiative and enthusiasm have been greatly suppressed; the learners creativity cannot get great cultivation.2.2 Domestic and Foreign Research on Cooperative LearningIn the West, the ancient Rome educator Quintilian pointed out that students can learn from each other; Czech educator J.A. Comenius pointed out that students not only can gain knowledge from teachers teaching, but also other students teaching to acquire knowledge in his book Great Didactic. In 18th century, British J. Lancaster and A. Bell began to advocate the use of cooperative learning groups to implement the teaching. In the early of 19th century, the United States also began to emphasize the cooperative learning; C. F. Parker is one of the most outstanding representatives of cooperative learning in this period. He paid special attention to the status of children in the education process and pointed out that the teachers should study childrens regulation from their own activities; children should be in the central position in the process of education. At the beginning of the twentieth Century, as Parkes inheritor and developer, J. Dewey advocated cooperation with study group in the teaching. M.Deutsch found that cooperative learning can actively stimulate students cooperative consciousness and action, which group tasks and discussion would be improved through the research. From the beginning of 1970s, the theory embarked on a systematic way. Researchers of cooperative learning put forward a lot of effective cooperative learning strategies from theory and practice, which makes the theory of cooperative learning become increasingly perfect and gradually become an influential teaching theory and strategy system.In our country, the concept and practice of cooperative learning can be traced back to 2000 years ago. Chinese ancient masterpiece Subject of Education “You will learn nothing if you study alone” emphasizes learners cooperation and communication in the learning process. The research of educational theory in China began to introduce the foreign cooperative learning theory in late 1980s. After exploring and practicing for nearly 30 years, it gradually formed a cooperative learning theory with Chinese characteristics. “Cooperative learning refers to the group learning as the basic form and systematically uses the interaction among the dynamic factors in the teaching to promote students learning in groups.” (Wang Min, 2004). But it is worth noting that, when cooperative learning has developed for dozens of years in foreign countries, it is the new things in our country and its development is very slow.Although there are many studies of autonomous learning and cooperative learning at home and abroad, but the views of the combination are rare and lots of scholars considers the two as separation for the two types of learning method. This research is mainly based on the new curriculum reform of English learning. This research considers that the autonomous learning and cooperative learning method is a symbiotic relationship. In summary, these two ways of learning that is independent and mutual complemented to each other. Whether it is autonomous learning or cooperative learning, we cannot evaluate them separately. It is important for us to combine these two methods scientifically in the process of learning and be implemented effectively in the classroom, so that it will help the students with their English learning habits and skills.3. The Concrete Performance of Junior Middle Students Autonomous LearningIf teachers want to improve students autonomous learning ability by cooperative learning, teachers must learn about the concrete performance of junior middle school students autonomous learning in classroom. This is the good way for helping teachers to develop teaching strategies.Through comparing the different performance between the students who have great autonomous learning ability and students whose autonomous learning ability are weak in Grade Seven and Grade Eight of the authors working training school, the author has come the following conclusions: First, in the cooperative learning mode, students whose autonomous learning ability are weak would be more easier to blindly follow students who have the good autonomous learning ability. Second, poor autonomy students are more careless, more likely to make mistakes (i.e. The cow kick the horse.) Also, it is difficult for those poor autonomy students to find their mistakes on their own, sometimes they even need the teacher or the member of the study group to point out the mistake very clearly (i.e. T: “The house is building here is a wrong sentence”. Students of strong autonomous learning ability can get the answer by thinking: “The house is being built here.” But most of the poor autonomy students cannot get the correct the answer and need the teacher to say this sentence must be changed into passive voice or even directly tell them the passive voice in the structure is be +being +done.)The difference of the students autonomous learning ability will not only affect students learning efficiency, but also affect teachers teaching achievements. Therefore teachers should give full consideration to the influence of students autonomous learning ability difference when they constitute teaching strategy.For the students themselves, the lack of learning autonomy means that they will only accept the knowledge what be told by teachers without thinking, lacking of initiative to learn the knowledge and also greatly reduce the efficiency of their learning. In the course of time, the learning of students will become more and more difficult, and even some students listen carefully in class and complete the teachers task after class, but it is still hard to improve their academic record. Finally they may attribute their poor performance to intellectual factors and completely abandon their school work.Lacking of autonomous learning ability will not only impact on the students, but also has a great influence for teachers' teaching. Teachers must take full consideration about the factors of students autonomous learning ability when they make the formulation of teaching plan. The allocation of study group should be under the corresponding students' autonomous learning ability and difficulty of learning task. It would make the teachers actual teaching effect become weaker if teachers ignore the students autonomy.4. The Main Reasons for Lacking Autonomous Learning AbilityIn order to avoid the above, we must know the reasons behind these phenomena. The author concludes three main reasons by observing the students in Grade Seven and Grade Eight of authors working training school.4.1 Low MotivationThe author thinks that the low motivation is the most important reason that leads autonomy of middle school students to be poor. Due to the low motivation, the learning of students is like a car without engine, the learning progress will be stagnated.The reason for low learning motivation of junior middle school students can be mainly divided into the following three conditions.The most important reason for students low learning motivation is the absence of students self-awareness. Under the pressure of examination-oriented education system, many teachers pay more attention to strengthen the students ability of solving problems and questions in the exam, and there are no clear learning objectives to students. Learning of students is in teachers preaching for a long time and students are always in a passive position, which makes their learning initiative become poor, causing the majority of students believe that teachers always force them to learn