Application Of Conceptual Metaphor Theory To English Vocabulary Teaching In Junior Middle School

The thesis mainly studies the application of conceptual metaphor theory to English vocabulary teaching and learning in junior middle school. The experiment testified that this method in junior middle school English vocabulary teaching and learning is feasible.Vocabulary is the basic form of language and metaphor, as a thinking way of human beings exists in all language. In China, more and more scholars realized the importance of English vocabulary teaching, and some researches had achieved successful results. But in practical classroom teaching, some problems still exist in vocabulary teaching and learning. In former English vocabulary teaching, some of the students learn vocabulary by mechanical analysis and rote memorization, and the teachers do not have appropriate methods to improve their cognitive ability of English vocabulary, so it makes the vocabulary teaching which has some limitations. For vocabulary learning, not only need the students master the quantity of words, but also have the ability to use these words. There is no doubt that it is a huge challenge for junior middle school students.How to help students learn vocabulary effectively and master the strategies of vocabulary are becoming linguistics and scholars’ research issue. In 1980, with the publication of the famous work Metaphors We Live By(Lakoff and Johnson,1980), which marked that the study of metaphor came into a new stage—conceptual metaphor. According to this theory, metaphor is not only a prevalent language phenomenon but also an indispensable cognition tool to human beings. There is a close connection between conceptual metaphor and language learning, especially vocabulary learning. The application of conceptual metaphor to English vocabulary teaching and learning has its practical significance. However, few researches about the connection between conceptual metaphor and language teaching have done, especially vocabulary teaching. In classroom teaching, the teacher should help students have a deeper digging for the metaphorical vocabulary. The analysis of metaphorical vocabulary can improve students’ cognitive ability of English vocabulary and cultivate the students’ language using ability as well as innovative ability.This paper from the perspective of cognitive linguistics, discusses the effect of conceptual metaphor theory in English vocabulary teaching. According to Lakoff and Johnson’s conceptual metaphor theory, the author wants to find an efficient way to help students improve their ability of English vocabulary learning. The subjects are from two classes of NO. 2 Middle School attached to Qinghai Normal University. Both of them are in Grade Seven.The thesis is divided into five chapters:Chapter One lays out a brief introduction of the research. It contains the research background, research purpose, the significance of the present study and the organization of this thesis. The literature review will be presented in Chapter Two. In this chapter, the abroad and domestic theoretical foundations about conceptual metaphor will be presented, including the definition of conceptual metaphor, working mechanism of conceptual metaphor and the classification of conceptual metaphor. Chapter Three is to discuss the research design, research questions, subjects, instruments and procedure. Chapter Four is data collection and analysis, in which the answers to the research questions will be shown and the results found out from the experiment are discussed. Chapter Five is the conclusion, which is composed of major findings, practical implications, limitations of the study and suggestions for future study.