On Formative Evaluation In Classroom English Teaching At Middle School

At present, English teaching evaluation methods depend so much on summative evaluation in our country. As is known to all, a student's testing scores are treated as final evaluation criteria in summative evaluation methods, so summative evaluation strengthens the function of testing scores. This has resulted in many students learning English only to pass examinations or to go to school. Apparently, this kind of instrumental learning motivation is hard to arouse students' learning enthusiasm or for them to keep their interest in learning. What often happens is that once students fail to get the score they desired, they become anxious and think that they are incompetent or worse than other students. Furthermore, their self-confidence may be greatly shaken. In addition, the present English testing papers at middle school still focus on grammar knowledge. Because of this, students pay excessive attention to memorizing language points, but neglect the importance of improving their integrate ability to use the language.In short, to a certain extent, summative evaluation ignores the evaluation on students' creativity and subjectivity. It is in this context that formative evaluation is proposed, which focuses on all kinds of students' authentic learning activities and tasks. Its purpose is to find out language aptitude of each student, improve and strengthen students' learning methods and provide feedback for teachers. According to the General Senior Middle School English Course Criteria (Trial Edition), "teachers should promote the combination of summative evaluation and formative evaluation and attach importance to the learning process as well as the final result. And evaluation should be primarily formative." From the angle of classroom teaching practices at middle school, this thesis attempts to bring English teaching theories and students' effective learning into a perfect harmony.In Chapter 1, the thesis introduces the concept of classroom teaching, the subject and the types of evaluation. After that, it compares diagnostic evaluation, formative evaluation and summative evaluation, and clarifies the relationship between them, followed by its four characteristics.In Chapter 2, this thesis analyzes the present situation of middle school English teaching and expounds the necessity and urgency of carrying out formative evaluation.In Chapter 3, based on the author's own teaching practice, the author explores how to carry out formative evaluation in classroom English teaching at middle school and include some experimental research. This chapter first introduces methods and means of formative evaluation in classroom English teaching at middle school, including self-evaluation, peer evaluation, teacher evaluation and teacher-student cooperate evaluation. And then, it approaches how to make use of them in classroom English teaching practices. This chapter then introduces the formative evaluation tools in classroom English teaching at middle school: teacher observation, portfolio, interview, project and presentation, multimedia and cartoon. This thesis mainly presents portfolio and task-based learning projects, and how to put them into effect. After that, this thesis analyzes the statistical results, which prove the effectiveness of the experimental research. According to Evaluation Reform on New Courses, "Summative evaluation and formative evaluation are not contradictory. The difference is the focal point. It proves that the result of summative evaluation will be better, if enough attention has been paid to formative evaluation." This thesis also expounds the enlightenment of the research.In Chapter 4, the author proposes and emphasizes the principles of carrying out formative evaluation.