A Research On Application Of Focus On Form Instruction To Senior High School English Grammar Teaching

Grammar has always been an essential part in English teaching,which makes teachers spend much time and efforts on teaching it,traditional teaching method which centers on language forms and communicative teaching method which centers on language meaning are much used,however,the result of that is unsatisfying.Nowadays,there are some problems in senior high school grammar teaching,which exist as follows:teachers use traditional teaching methods;they overemphasize the correct usage of grammar whereas students' communicative competence is ignored.The traditional grammar teaching methods make grammar points separated from its context in teaching,students cannot understand grammar and its usage comprehensively,which results in that students cannot use the learned grammar properly in real-life communication,hence,classroom efficiency and students' learning initiative are not high.Therefore,the author tries to apply Focus on Form Instruction to senior high school grammar teaching to research on the effects of the instruction in grammar teaching in senior high school.Based on Noticing Hypothesis,Interaction Hypothesis and Processing Instruction,Focus on Form Instruction(hereafter,shortened as FFI in this thesis)advocates that students'attention should be shifted occasionally from language meaning to language forms once there is an obstacle in understanding a language point in class.However,after the problems have been solved,students' attention should be shifted back to language meaning and its authentic usage in smooth daily communication.Therefore,this instruction means to teach grammar in a certain context,so as to make students have a deep understanding about grammar,finally they can master its usage and use it appropriately in daily life.There were many theoretical researches about FFI,while few experimental researches were done.Researches about FFI were mainly on vocabulary in college,there were few researches on grammar in senior high school.Therefore,this research studies on senior high school grammar by applying FFI to teaching and it tries to answer the following questions:1.Does the application of FFI affect senior high school students' grammar scores?2.Does the application of FFI influence students' grammar learning interest in senior high school?3.What are the advantages of FFI in teaching grammar,compared with traditional grammar teaching methods?Subjects in the experiment are two classes in Grade 1 from a senior high school from Dalian,110 in total.Class 2 is experimental class(EC),and Class 1 is control class(CC).This experiment lasted for four months which began from September,2016,ended in December,2016.The research techniques contain quantitative research and qualitative research,such as tests and questionnaires.During the experiment,students of both EC and CC use the same book,and they are taught by the author.In EC the author applies FFI to the instruction of all the grammar items in Student's Book 1,while in CC traditional teaching method is used.In this thesis,author only singles out one grammar item "the objective clause" as a case study and detailed teaching sample will be presented.Data of tests and questionnaires are collected at the end of the experiment,and the data are analyzed by SPSS 21.0 statistical software.Result of the experiment shows that application of FFI makes students' grammar learning interest improved a lot,most of the students prepare for the class before they take it,and they take part in classroom activities actively.Students realize the importance of cooperative learning,what's more,they are able to focus on language form in learning English.Finally,student's leaning effectiveness and English scores get improved.