On The Vocabulary Teaching Model Of Contextual Task For College English In Vocational College

The current English instruction for College English in vocational college iscontext-free, which, in a sense, results in students’ lack of cultural and situationalawareness, and therefore produces negative effects on their English acquisition andcognition; meanwhile, their knowledge learned in College English class can’t betransformed into their acquired knowledge adequately, in particular, the knowledgeconcerning vocabulary. Moreover, the striking difference in English competencebetween those from senior high school and those from secondary vocational schoolhasn’t been taken into full consideration, which results in students’ relatively lowconfidence and initiative in English learning, and hinders the fostering of theircommunicative competence, autonomy and cooperative ability.In view of the present situation, it is imperative that a new teaching model beconstructed, which combines the task-based instruction with the contextual elements.First of all, the paper constructed a contextual model, based on the concepts ofcontexts by the functional grammar school and Pragmatics, and the concept of culturein Intercultural Communication across Cultures. The contextual model also appliedCarl G. Jung’s model of human psyche. In a broad sense, the context of culture is asum of the man’s unconsciousness, composed of the personal unconscious, and thecollective unconscious, and is represented by the entire semantic system of thelanguage. The cognitive context of situation, a sum of the man’s consciousness, isrepresented not only by the old information, the new information and the deducedinformation, but also by linguistic knowledge and extra-linguistic knowledge. Text,in the semantic stratum, is an instance of linguistic interaction in which peopleactually engage: whatever is said, or written, in a cognitive context of situation.Then, based on the contextual model, the paper constructed the teaching model, i.e.the vocabulary instruction of the contextual task for College English in vocationalcollege. The dynamic construction of the cognitive context of situation from theinitial one to the later accessible one is the cause for the dynamic expansion of thecontext of culture and cognitive knowledge, which displays that the teaching model can facilitate students’ cognition. The mutual cognitive context of situation and thelearner-centered task-based instruction can promote students’ communicativecompetence, autonomy and cooperative ability. The interplay of the old informationfrom the context of culture and the new information from the cognitive context ofsituation can engender comparatively maximal contextual effect with comparativelyminimal processing cost according to the Optimal Relevance in the teachingimplementation, which is the reason for the contextualization of the teaching model.An interactive SLA framework serves as its guiding principle to better facilitatestudents’ English acquisition. And a contextual task is designed on the principle ofrelevance.Finally, the teaching model was applied in the instruction of College English ina vocational college for a whole academic year, and both qualitative and quantitativeanalyses were done in the empirical study. The results show the positive effects theinstruction of the teaching model had on students’ cognition, English vocabularyacquisition, communicative competence, autonomy and cooperative ability. In viewof the significant difference between the bottom group and two comparatively goodgroups, and that between the male and the female students, this paper proposes thatCollege English class in vocational college adopt dual-mode instruction, andaccordingly, a set of teaching techniques are suggested to meet the students’ needs forlearning and improve the English teaching quality.