Research On High School English Reading Teaching Based On Cooperative Learning

Reading is an important way to get language input and definitely a foundation ofother three language skills—listening, speaking and writing in view of the fact thatdomestic middle school English learners have no access to adequate exposure toauthentic English. Furthermore, from the perspective of NMET, a student’s readinglevel is the most decisive factor in the academic performance in English examinations,therefore leading to teachers having a tendency to give priority to reading in students’daily training. However, educators will inevitably face the reality that teachers have toaccomplish enormous teaching assignments and large amounts of drills in limitedlessons and periods. Teachers have no alternative but to present solution or conclusionto learners directly without any opportunity to inspire learners to discuss or think bythemselves. They save time to pursuit satisfactory academic marks at the cost ofcultivating or strengthening students’ creative or critical thinking, which is along-term and complicated contradiction we are currently faced with. Therefore, thisresearch aims to find out the effects of English reading teaching in cooperativelearning and attempts to achieve a win-win balance between short-term academicachievements and long-term divergent or exploratory thinking development so thatstudents could acquire cognitive development and promote discourse analysis andinterpersonal cooperative abilities in a freedom-based learning environment.The research began with a questionnaire aimed at gaining an accurate andall-round information of dominant model of senior high English teaching.137Englishteachers from5senior high schools in Kunshan area participated in the survey.Secondly, a4-month experimental study was designed to check whether theexperimental group (with cooperative reading instruction) could achieve better scoresthan control group (with traditional reading instruction) or to what extent theexperimental group could enhance their reading comprehension. Afterwards, the researcher gained feedback from students by means of interviews on theirpsychological status.The following research questions are addressed in this study:1. What are the major characteristics of the dominant teaching model in currentsenior high English teaching？2. In comparison with the dominant teaching model employed in today’s seniorhigh English teaching, can the cooperation-based teaching of reading implemented inthis study improve learners’ grades in reading？If yes, to what extent？3. Psychologically speaking, what effects does the cooperative reading have onthe learners？The research findings are summarized as follows:Firstly, according to the questionnaires involved in analysis, the researcher drawsa conclusion from the following aspects: the overall situation in middle schoolEnglish teaching, specific teaching methods, feasible teaching recourses or facilitiesand the roles of teachers&students in daily lessons. According to the survey, currentEnglish teaching is at a transitional period from traditionally teacher-centered teachingto an advanced student-centered teaching. Teachers recognize the strengths of newmodels and weaknesses of out-of-date teaching, but meanwhile they are driven by thepressure from examination results, and also cannot reform thoroughly overlookingstudents’ habitual learning on a teacher-dependent basis, which means teachers shouldgradually take tentative steps in transforming current teaching situations.Secondly, the experimental study indicates English reading teaching incooperative learning does play a vital role in improving students’ reading. Mid-testhas no evidence that there is significant difference between experimental and controlgroup after2months as a result of students’ long-term and deeply-rooted reliance onteacher-oriented lessons. However, statistics from post-test illustrates significantdifference between the two groups after students’4-month adaptation tocooperation-assisted reading teaching, which means the model stimulates students’active reasoning and thinking that bring about reading enhancement and also studentsmay well improve their cognitive strategies and abilities in the long term. Thirdly, psychological factors contribute to the improvement according to thefeedback from participants interviewed. Inner group communication enables studentsto gain a sense of achievement and intergroup competition spurs students’ thirst forexcellence and their values of group honor; therefore, students’ motivation and activeparticipation are greatly strengthened in cooperative reading. On the other hand,anxiety is among the most influential hindering factors in terms of students’ learningeffects and efficiency, and this reading model decreases their negative anxiety inpreparation and input periods.The research sheds light on present English teaching in senior high schools.Firstly, teachers should be given more opportunities to have further training onadvanced teaching models in order to combine strengths in traditional teaching andpositive elements in new teaching methods flexibly, attaching importance to bothacademic marks and thinking development. Also, teachers should promote theirguidance in ridding students of passive memorizing and mechanical internalization;instead, they should inspire students to reason, analyze, question, create, andcooperate. Last but not least, students’ psychological factors in reading can never beunderestimated in teaching in that affective factors including participation, motivationand anxiety, etc. are the key to reading teaching. On the whole, the study hasundoubtedly confirmed the feasibility of English reading teaching based oncooperative learning.