Implications Of Krashen’s Input Hypothesis On English Teaching In Rural Junior Middle Schools In China

Since nine-year compulsory education policy and basic education curriculum reform were carried out in2001, fast development of English education in China’s rural areas has been witnessed, among which, as an indispensable part, secondary schools’English teaching has also gained an inspiring achievement. However, the overall status quo, namely,"high cost yet low effect with an increasingly serious exam-oriented inclination", is still unchanged. Compared with cities, a notably wide gap of English teaching can be seen between schools in rural areas and those in cities and no hint of an obvious narrowness of the gap is sensed, which makes the current conditions unoptimistic. Besides, the problem that English teaching in rural areas fails to meet the need of reform and opening-up policy and economic development is becoming more and more salient. More appeals have arisen for a deeper educational reform. Therefore, there is no better choice other than keeping on with a further and more targeted reform on English teaching in rural areas.The comprehensible input hypothesis proposed by Krashen has a great contribution to researches in Second Language Acquisition and its effect is extensive and profound in both domestic and overseas academic fields. With it as the guidance to practice and reform on English teaching in China’s rural areas, a satisfying result is sure to achieve. Secondary school students in rural areas, due to restraints of some known elements, such as outdated teaching methods and poor-quality teachers etc., often have weak bases and various levels of English. This thesis, with an ordinary junior middle school in the north of Jiangsu Province as a sample and within the framework of comprehensible input hypothesis, tries to put forward some understandings and feasible solutions, which aims at promoting effect of SLA of rural secondary schools’students and better executing basic concepts of English course in compulsory education. It has been proved in practice that SLA is a rather complicated process during which input plays a critical role.In our country, rural population accounts for the majority. Consequently, as an important part of compulsory education, the quality of English teaching in rural secondary schools determines whether our country’s compulsory education policy is successful or not, which altogether come to the conclusion that the fundamental way out lies in a further reform of rural English teaching. This paper finally proposes that during the course of reform, SLA theories, especially the comprehensible input hypothesis should be fully applied to analyze thoroughly the status quo of English teaching in rural secondary schools and with the implication obtained, to strive truly to put theories into practice so as to improve the effect and level of SLA.