A Study on English Reading Teaching in Secondary Vocational school from View of Discourse Analysis

韩霜

【Abstract】English reading teaching Strategies are very important for students to understand a language and also to train the language reading skills. English teachers of Secondary Vocational school should understand how to train the students thinking abilities and improve the students reading abilities， which is an important issue to be researched and to be solved. It is hoped that this research can popularize the knowledge of Discourse analysis and to improve the teachers views of language teaching in Secondary Vocational school.

【Key words】discourse analysis； reading abilities； reading teaching strategies

1. Introduction

English reading teaching is the key and the difficulty of English teaching in Secondary Vocational school. Nowadays there are various versions of English textbooks in different Secondary Vocational schools in china and each version contains different types of and structures of discourses. Thus， it is very important for English teacher to choose the right and reasonable reading teaching strategies according to different discourses. Influenced by the traditional teaching methods， many English teachers just pay attention to the interpretation and exercises for words and grammar from some reading materials， instead of the attention about the background knowledge， the way of text presentation and interpretation of discourse structure. Based on the actual situation of the English reading teaching in Secondary Vocational school， the researcher attempts to put forward and solve the following research questions from the perspective of discourse analysis.

2. Literature review

2.1 Classroom discourse analysis

American structural linguist， Harris （1952） published an article for the first time to lead several experts to make a research on the theory of discourse analysis. As we all know， the theory of discourse analysis is introduced into the field of the research on language teaching in the nineties. Since the 1980s， our Chinese scholars of linguistics have gained the remarkable research results about the theory of discourse analysis. To sum up the concept， classroom discourse is the language happened in the classroom teaching， including students learning language and teachers discourse.It is believed that text interpretation is the process of reading the text for readers through the analysis， judgment and mining the meanings to make a creative sublimation for the meanings of text.

2.2 Input and Output Hypothesisendprint

One of the greatest and most profound theories in the field of study on the second language acquisition is krashens theory of the second language acquisition. This theory includes the Acquisition hypothesis， Natural order hypothesis， Monitor hypothesis， The main idea of his Input hypothesis is that the learners language of comprehensible input will contain the linguistic project of a bit higher level than the existing language level， if language acquisition can occur. This study will improve both students and teachers views of language teaching by integrating the two theories of Text interpretation and Discourse analysis into one unit in Secondary Vocational school.

3. Research questions and instruments

The researcher attempts to put forward and solve the following two research questions from the study on English reading teaching strategies in Secondary Vocational school from the perspective of discourse analysis. （1） What are the problems influencing the current English reading teaching strategies based on Discourse analysis in Secondary Vocational school？（2）What are the English reading teaching strategies based on Discourse analysis in Secondary Vocational school have a positive effect on developing students reading ability？

In this study， the classroom observation about English reading teaching in Secondary Vocational school is used， which are video-recording， transcribing， analyzing. Classroom observation refers to the collection of data from classroom situation under the clear aim of researcher through sense or other auxiliary means （Observation Scales and camera etc.） （Qing， 2005）. It is easy for researchers to operate. As this study surveys the activities in the classroom， it needs video-recording. It observed two reading classes The Fountain Square Book 1 Unit 7 Go Out and Enjoy Life， in October， 2017.And it is based on reading teaching class. Ms. Yu （T1） and Mr. Wang （T2） were asked to give demo classes for us based on different structures for the same lesson. Keeping the research questions in mind， I pour more attention to the interaction between those teachers and the students， and students changes of facial expressions and learning motives. Meanwhile， two classes are recorded by a colleague in our school.

4. Analysis and discussion

4.1 analyses

The author attended lessons in Huaiyin Commercial School of Jiangsu in October. In the process of observation， the author recorded the class process and took notes. In this part， the results of classroom observation will be explained from teachers and students perspective respectively. The textbook， including 8 compulsory books. Each book consists of 10 units， each unit includes six parts， listening and speaking， reading and writing， language in use. Each topic of unit are carefully chosen by the writers to help students master basic knowledge and skills， such as listening and speaking skills， reading and writing skills， analyzing， discussing， evaluating and summarizing.endprint

At the beginning of a new lesson， teachers explained the usage and new words. Because of the preparation of these basic language points， students will feel more confident in their reading. When it comes to the passage， teachers gave some easy jobs in accordance to the practice in the book， such as predicting the content of passage from the title or photographs， skimming to find the main idea of the whole passage and each paragraph， locating the answer of a certain question， these tasks are easy to be find from the text， and aim to get the literal idea of the text. After these steps， teachers often pick up some long and difficult sentences and explain grammar to students. Some teachers even translate the whole text from the beginning to the end.

Its obvious to see that the teaching method applied by teachers is still traditional method. Traditional English reading teaching emphasizes the acquirement of language points；teachers often pay more attention to the teaching of grammar and vocabulary， which would mislead students that the most important in reading is to master related words and sentence patterns. Under this circumstance， students often skip the deep and further meaning of the text， which will prevent students from thinking.

T1 asked 21 questions， and T2 asked 17 questions. The total numbers of questions are different， but they share same characteristics. The number of display questions was much more than the referential questions. Long & Sato （1983） found out in their research that 79% of the questions required to be answered by the students in the class were display questions. This result showed that using referential questions could increase the language output， help to build language acquisition. Nunan （1987） proved again that students used more complicated language when teachers asked referential questions and the conversation was more like to the one in the natural environment. Thus teachers should give more referential questions in the classroom.

Students answer teachers questions in three ways， in chorus， volunteer and in a whisper. The way questions are answered can show interactional relationship between teachers and students in classroom.

Generally speaking， students answered most of the questions in chorus， and sometimes teachers assigned students who is good at English to answer questions if the classroom was in silence. If there was no students answer the question， teachers would answer it themselves. Although this way can reduce the embarrassment in classroom， it makes students depend more on teachers.endprint

4.2 discussion

Through the analysis of the classroom observation， problems can be draw as follows：

（1） Teachers attached too much importance on grammar and vocabulary and seldom on the inspiration of reading ability.

（2） Students are unwilling to answer the questions independently， and they showed less interests in current English reading teaching.

4.3 Suggestions for reading teaching

The main purpose of teaching reading is to encourage students to process information and construct meaning for them effectively. They need to analyze， question， appreciate and evaluate about the text and be able to understand author. In order to activating students prior knowledge to help understand unknown elements and facilitate comprehension when dealing with a new text， teachers can design meaningful lead-in classroom activities that are related to the article. Successful lead-in can arouse students curiosity and reading expectation.

Analyzing the main idea of the text and find out the topic sentence of each paragraph and supporting details. This is a commonly used way in traditional reading teaching. However， what is suggested in reading teaching is that students not only required to find out the general idea of the text and paragraph， but also asked to observe how the main points get together in writing.

5. Conclusion

In short， actions must be taken to change the traditional teaching method. Teachers should put less emphasis on grammar and vocabulary， design interesting classroom activities that can arouse students attention. Setting environments for students to communicate with each other so that students may have the eagerness to read critically. For students， the research encourages students to do more than before. When reading， they are supposed to make analysis， evaluate inference and so on to facilitate their deep understanding about the text and finally form their own opinion.

References：

[1]Harris，Z.1952.Discourse Analysis[J].Language，28.

[2]Krashen S.D 1982.Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition[M]Oxford：Pergamin Press.

[3]Nunan D.（1987）Communicative language teaching：Making it work[J].ELT.

[4]清風.课堂观察法[J].新课程研究（教育研究与实验），2005，03： 69-70.

[5]董美珍.高中英语批判性阅读教学的实证研究[D].福建：闽南师范大学，2015.endprint