A Study On Grammar Translation Teaching And Communicative Language Teaching In The English Class Of Senior High School

Stephen Bax's(2003) argument for 'teaching in accordance to specific context' is very similar to that of some other researchers(e.g.Holliday1994) who have warned that a method cannot easily be exported from one context to another.Larsen-Freeman(2000:182) has called this position 'relativism'.The relativists argue that a method is not equally suited to all contexts,and that different methods suit different teachers and students in different contexts.Based on this argument,people may argue that since China has its own specific teaching context,Chinese teachers should not adopt western Communicative Language Teaching(CLT).However,this is not a view I share.Although CLT meets with many obstacles in Chinese senior high school,yet it is still useful for our students;On the other hand,Chinese traditional Grammar Translation Teaching(GTT)is still useful for current entrance policy of college and students get accustomed to it,though it has lots of disadvantages.It is difficult for students and teachers to change their mind rooted deeply by Chinese culture tradition.How to deal with the relationship between CLT and GTT? My opinion is that reconciling CLT to GTT is better than that of GTT in improving senior high school students written exercises and listening results.This is what the thesis will study.This study was designed to examine the hypotheses:1)reconciling CLT to GTT is better than that of GTT in improving senior high school students written exercises results;2) reconciling CLT to GTT is better than that of GTT in improving senior high school students listening results. In the present study,about 60 senior high school students were chosen as the subjects from two intact class(Class 1 was randomly assigned as the controlled class,Class 2 as the experimental class) in Beijing Culture University Affiliated Senior High School in Da lian.Based on the results of initial investigation on students' listening results by using Senior High School Matriculation English Examination 2006,and reconciling CLT to GTT teaching method was performed in the experimental class while the conventional GTT was performed in the controlled class for one and half an year by the same teacher.The data collected were students' initial listening and written exercises results(pre -test)and post listening and written exercises results(post -test) with two teaching methods.All the data were calculated by SPSS 15.0.The result indicates that reconciling CLT to GTT not only overcomes CLT and GTT's disadvantages and makes full use of their advantages,but also improves senior high school students' written exercises and listening results compared with that of GTT in senior high school English class.