A Comparative Study Of The Effects Of Deductive And Inductive Approaches Applied In The Teaching Of Inversion In Senior High Schools

Grammar is an indispensible aspect of learning a language. It is an important anddifficult part in Chinese students’ language learning. In traditional grammar instruction,teachers mainly use deductive approach, in which grammatical rules are first presented tothe learners, and then examples are shown, followed by concentrated practice. Thoughknowledge is clear, systematic and easy to understand in a deductive way, students arealways passive receivers in classroom.Due to the implementation of the New Curriculum Standard, more and more peopleand scholars are in support of students’ independent study and cooperative learning. Thus,inductive approach is becoming the main stream of current teaching methodology, whichlays emphasis on self-directed learning and discovering ability. It helps learners developlanguage ability and skills, but accuracy of language is to some extent neglected. There arepros and cons of each method. In current teaching situation, it is high time that grammarinstruction be reformed.This thesis presents a teaching experiment carried out in a high school in Jilinprovince, aiming to compare the effectiveness of deductive and inductive approaches. Thetwo parallel classes are senior2students. There are64subjects in the experimental classand65subjects in the controlled class. According to the results of pretest, no differenceexisted between the grammar levels of them. The author adopted inductive approach in ECand deductive approach in CC in teaching grammar item “inversion”, which lasted for onemonth. The posttest scores showed that deduction outperformed induction slightly in themean scores of the two classes. Afterwards,129questionnaires were distributed to thesubjects, and125valid ones were collected. Most students were used to the deductive wayof learning to master English knowledge, but a large percent of them favored induction forinductive teaching made them become more interested in grammar and they feltself-satisfactory when rules were discovered on their own. The classroom atmosphere waslivelier than the former. At last, the author held an interview with the English teacher whotaught both classes. She applied deduction more frequently in grammar classes. But sheadvocated that inductive was more productive to enhance students’ language ability whenlearners are of high motives.This thesis consists of five parts. The first chapter is an introduction of the wholethesis, including background information, significance, and the aim of the study. Thesecond part is literature review. The definition, development, pros and cons of deductiveand inductive approaches are summarized. The theoretical foundations of the study are constructivism, task-based teaching and proximal development zone. Chapter Three is theresearch design illustrating how to fulfill the research objectives. The research subjects,instruments, procedures and how data are to be collected are presented. The fourth part setsout to analyze the data and extend a discussion about the results. The last chapter mainlydeals with the conclusion of the whole thesis. Implication and limitation of the research arealso included in this part.This study demonstrates some findings of deductive and inductive approaches appliedin English grammar instruction in senior high school. It is hoped that the study will shedlight on grammar teaching in future researches.