Giving Priority To Reading In Rural English Teaching

To alter the situation of so-called dumb or deaf English, the teaching method of listening and speaking before reading and writing has been emphasized for many years, but it has turned out to be inefficient, especially in rural English teaching. On one hand, English is taught as a foreign language in our country, and there are no suitable language situations for the teaching of listening and speaking first. On the other hand, students don't have enough chances to be exposed to English, especially in Chinese rural schools. The principle of teaching listening and speaking before reading and writing doesn't conform to the objective law of foreign language teaching in Chinese rural schools. What's more, it isn't suitable for the students' psychological features and the teaching situations of English class. Therefore, the author claims that reading must be given priority in teaching English in rural areas.In the article, the author, first of all, presents the roles, importance and purposes of reading, and then addresses the current situations in rural English teaching. Because of these, the teaching method of listening and speaking first can't be put into practice well in the rural schools. Then, the author presents input theory, some foreign and Chinese experts' viewpoints about giving priority to reading, and even queried the teaching method of listening and speaking first. Meanwhile, the author states that reading has a great influence on the development of listening, speaking and writing abilities. The researcher has made an experiment to answer the question:Can the teaching method of reading first do better in improving students' listening,(?)eaking and writing abilities than that of listening and speaking first?The participants in this research project are junior students in grade eight from Huaitu Middle School in Sanming. Class One is served as the controlled group, and Class Three as the experimental group. In the experimental group, the teacher gives priority to reading, that is, pays more attention to students' reading aloud, reciting, intensive reading and extensive reading, while the controlled group is taught in a traditional method which is called "Five Steps Method". After a year's experiment, comparison about listening score and writing score are made in two classes. However, in rural schools there are no proper ways to check students' speaking ability, so the author just states the influence on speaking from the theory. The results show that the teaching method of giving priority to reading plays more positive roles in students' listening and writing abilities than traditional methods. Therefore, this kind of teaching method is an ideal method to be used in the rural schools.