An Experimental Study On Lead-in In Junior Middle School English Reading Instruction

English reading is the most frequent activity in English learning.So in the junior middle school teaching,it is considered as the important part to develop the students' reading ability.And lead-in,as the first essential teaching step,plays an indispensable role in the whole teaching.Although taking up several minutes,it has a close relationship with the other teaching steps.Based on experimentation,questionnaire and interview,the research mainly discusses three questions:(1)Whether the English reading class with lead-in could improve junior middle school students' reading achievements or not ? In which aspects are the students' reading achievements improved?(2)Why are the junior middle school students' English reading achievements improved by applying the lead-in ?(3)What means of lead-in do junior middle school students like best in the English reading instruction?In the research,the author carries out the experiment in two classes of Grade 8 in Langxiang No.1 Middle School.During the experiment,the conditions of the experimental class and the control class including the teacher,the textbook,the times of the class,teaching activities in class and homework after class are the same.The unique variable is the lead-in.In the English reading class there is lead-in activities in the experimental class and no lead-in in control class.The author explores the effectiveness of lead-in in English reading instruction by comparing the students' reading achievements of two classes before and after experiment.At the same time,the author analyzes the reasons of students' improvements in reading and favorite means of lead-in by handing out questionnaire in the two classes.Finally,through the interview with the students from different levels in experimental class,the recognition and evaluation of lead-in could be reflected specifically.Based on the data analysis by SPSS.17.0,the main findings of the research are summarized as follows: 1.The students' reading achievements of the post-test in the experimental class are improved obviously by comparing and analyzing the students' reading achievements of pre-and post-tests between the experimental class and the control class.Most students' reading achievements are improved in the experimental class in inferring the meaning of unknown word from context,making propositional informational inferences,understanding the relationship among sentences in a paragraph and grasping the main idea of a passage.At the same time,it is illustrated from the questionnaires that lead-in has an active impact on the students' learning state in English reading.A majority of students in the experimental class join the English reading class more actively.2.According to the results of the questionnaire and interview in the experimental class,the reasons of students' improvements in English reading achievements are summarized as follows: Firstly,lead-in in English reading class could stimulate the students' reading interests.Secondly,lead-in in English reading class could attract students' attention.Thirdly,lead-in in English reading class could build the bridge between the old and new knowledge.Finally,lead-in in English reading class could make clear the teaching objectives.3.The junior middle school students like the multi-media lead-in best according to the results of the students' questionnaire and interview in the experimental class.Although there still exist some limitations on the time and subjects of the experiment in the research,it is also expected to strengthen the junior middle school English teachers' awareness on the importance of lead-in,and then supply a kind of new idea and perspective for teachers to improve the quality of junior middle school English reading instruction.