Applying Production-oriented Approach To College English Teaching:An Action Research

Production-oriented Approach(POA)is a Chinese TEFL approach to address the pressing problem of "learning-using divide" in English instruction in tertiary education in China.It has generated great interests of both TEFL researchers and practitioners.However,there is still a huge theory-practice gap to be bridged before its effectiveness could be proved.How to put the abstract theory into practice?What challenges would await its practitioners?Does POA have a positive effect on students' learning?Does it need any improvement?All these questions need to be addressed at practical level in real classroom.To bridge the theory-practice gap,this study explored the application of POA through a three-cycle proactive action research in college English teaching context.Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected during and after each action cycle,with aims to inform the practice of POA and to refine the POA theory with practical knowledge obtained from the action research.The present study summarized its findings through a comprehensive reflection-after-action which was sublimated into "practical theory":to begin with,the potential challenges confronting POA novice practitioners were presented and addressed.Then,new interpretations of the three phases in POA teaching procedure were made in order to optimize their effects and ensure their feasibility in practice.In addition,five underlying teaching principles for the three basic teaching phases—motivating,enabling and assessing—were concluded:1)The "motivational current" principle;2)the"problem-solution" principle;3)the "step-by-step goal-achieving" principle;4)the"learning zone" principle,and 5)and "teaching,learning and assessment integrated"principle.Based on these principles,the original linear teaching procedure model was reconstructed into a more comprehensive one,in which the "motivating" current flows throughout the whole process;"enabling" is divided into several sub-aims,each of which relates to the other and snowballs into the final production;"assessing" includes both formative assessment giving feedbacks for both sub-and final product and diagnostic assessment steering for teaching design.Finally,the study evaluated the effectiveness of POA from three perspectives:its' effect on students learning outcomes,on classroom learning climate(external factors in learning)and on students' emotional experience and learning strategies(internal factors in learning).This study ends with three implications:1)successful application of POA depends on synergy between teacher and students;2)the curriculum system needs to be built in line with POA instruction in order to optimize its effect;3)POA could be a favorable method for both English for General Purpose and English for Specific Purpose classrooms if the concept of "production" could be more inclusive.