A Research On Using Mind Map To Cultivate Students’ Divergent Thinking Among Middle School English Teachers

Key Abilities Development for Chinese Students requires creative thinking among students in secondary schools.Divergent thinking is the core of creative thinking,while Mind Map,a tool to cultivate students’ divergent thinking,has been widely accepted by both the society and schools.So this thesis not only explores how middle school English teachers use Mind Map to cultivate students’ divergent thinking,but also analyzes the existing problems and solutions.Firstly,this thesis elaborates both home and abroad researches on Mind Map,and discovers Mind Map is very effective way for facilitating divergent thinking.In addition,these researches provide middle school English teachers a theoretical framework and indirect experience.Secondly,in order to explore the present status of Mind Map application in middle school EFL classes and improve both reliability and validity,this thesis takes three middle schools at different levels in Qingdao city.Through classroom observation,questionnaire and interview,results reveal problems such as insufficient attention of school officials,inexperience of English teachers and uneven level of students in using Mind Map.Based on these problems,for the sake of promoting the implementation of using Mind Map cultivating divergent thinking in English teaching in middle schools,it is suggested from three perspectives that schools should encourage teachers,teachers change traditional teaching concepts,students improve self-cultivation of divergent thinking,etc.Finally,according to the research results,teachers are advised in aspects of teaching vocabulary,grammar,reading,writing and homework.For vocabulary,encourage students to associate cognate words or synonyms with the Mind Map;for grammar,lead students to summarize pragmatic knowledge with the Mind Map in connection with the old;for reading,guide students to enrich the Mind Map and put forward new ideas based on the passage;for writing,appreciate students’ original ideas,or help them amplify Mind Map in reading class;and for homework,let students organize what they learned with Mind Map freely.In this way,the middle school English teaching can be more effective in training students’ divergent thinking,and can build up a good foundation for improving students’ key competencies.