A Research On The Application Of Cooperative Learning In Junior 1 English Class

Traditional English teaching in junior middle school has always been teacher-centered and test-oriented.Knowledge is instilled into the students,who are only silent passive recipients of knowledge.Therefore the students lack interests in English,especially the junior 1 students,who are not accustomed to the study in middle schools but begin to learn English systematically.However,during English learning,a strong lasting interest,as well as a solid foundation,is very important for the freshmen in their continuous learning.Those students' problems can be solved by cooperative learning.English Curriculum Standard indicates that English teaching should be linked with their emotional education in order to promote students' group study and cooperation,and cultivate their collective sense of honor and achievement.Currently,cooperative learning is a popular teaching theory and a system of strategy,as well as a sort of teaching reform that has been widely adopted all over the world and has been regarded as the most effective teaching model and strategy to promote students' creativity,consciousness of collectivism and cooperation.In the past decades,many people have studied cooperative learning and practiced it in China, where the theory is proved to be helpful to enhance students' enthusiasm for study. Group study is a new learning approach advocated by our new curriculum standards to enable students to jointly carry out learning activities,to research,explore and complete the teacher's assignments together in order to promote the study of each student,to develop their spirit of cooperation and sense of competition in the process of cooperative learning.According to this mode of learning,students should be divided into several heterogeneous groups according to their different levels, personality traits,gender differences in order to complete the study and mission work together.This mode enables every student to participate in them,to encourage students to aid mutually to study and experience the collective sense of honor and sense of achievement through experience,practice,discussion,cooperation,etc,for the final purpose of improving students' performance and overall score in English learning.In her research,the author uses experimental method to probe into the application of cooperative learning in English classes of junior 1,aiming at inquiring into whether this teaching model will effectively improves students' performance and the overall level of English proficiency,and realizing a smooth transition from primary school to middle school.In the experiment,the author explores in theory the possibility and necessity of application of cooperative learning in English classes and simultaneously proves in experiments that the cooperative learning is more suitable for junior 1 middle school students than traditional teaching methods in improving their performance and interests in learning;it creates an environment more conducive to the smooth realization of junior 1 students' transition from primary school to middle school.The thesis adopts common quantitative research based on data collected from the students of two classes in junior 1 the author taught from July, 2008 to February,2009.The author analyzes the data she collects on the students' achievement and their viewpoints on teaching approaches,by using Excel.The conclusion of the experiment is that cooperative learning can promote the interaction in junior 1 English class and is suitable and helpful to class English teaching and learning,and favorable for the students' keeping high learning interests as well.