A Study Of“Student-Centered”Teaching Structure Of College English Classroom

Since the 21 st century,the reform of college English in Chinese colleges and universities is fired up.In fact,in July 2010,the publication of the National Outline of Medium and Long Term Education Reform and Development Planning(2010-2020)aroused the educational scholars’ attention to recognize the imperative trend of educational reform and the importance of classroom reform,which is the most essential and basic form of school education.However,for the development of college English classroom teaching reform in China,there are still many aspects unsatisfied.In the early time,most of the reforms and explorations were carried out around teaching content,teaching means and teaching methods.But the classroom teaching structure has been neglected.And this neglect causes the reform only touched the minor elements of classroom teaching but failed to be supported by the deep teaching structure.Few studies on the classroom teaching structure have led to the “structural dysfunction” of teaching reform.Thus,a research on college English classroom teaching structure is really worthy of people’s attention.Optimizing the teaching structure of college English classroom is the key to improve the quality of college English teaching,and it is also the key to build a harmonious and efficient college English class.Recent years,college English classroom teaching structure has aroused groups of researchers’ interests abroad.However,domestic related research is still in its infancy and does not form an independent research field.There is even not an official definition of the college English classroom teaching structure.Also,most of the studies simply focused on the perspective of teacher.Specifically,few systematic studies were based on the perspective of student in college English classroom.Therefore,guided by constructivism,focusing on the perspective of students,this study is mainly to explore the student-centered teaching structure of college English classroom and tries to answer two questions:1.What are the key elements of “student-centered”college English classroom teaching structure ?2.What are the relationships of the key elements in “student-centered”college English classroom teaching structure?In this study,the literature review method,classroom observation method and personal interview method are used.Five English natural classes from a university in Northeast China,totally 336 students are selected as the subject for classroom video observation.And two students are randomly selected from each class videoed to make the personal interview.The research tools are classroom video and personal interview records.In literatures studies,the key elements in college English classroom teaching structure are concluded as the student element,college English teacher element,college English teaching content element and college English teaching media element.Through classroom observation and personal interview,it is found that in current college English classroom teaching structure,(1)For the relationship between students and college English teachers,college English teachers are gradually becoming the promoters of students’ study cognition construction and the founders of students’ learning situations.Also,they gradually focus more on guiding and organizing.However,while promoting students’ study cognition construction,college English teachers should also pay attention to promote the participation and interests of each student.(2)As for the relationship between student and college English teaching content,the college English teaching content has been greatly expanded and reformed,and its form has been continuously enriched,which can create a better learning situation for students.However,college English teaching content is too authoritative for students,and there are few students who dare to question and challenge it.(3)And for the relationship between student and college English teaching media,the college English teaching media has also been gradually transformed from the teaching content presentation tool and the teachers’ teaching aids to the students’ cognitive tool.Also,college English teaching media is able to construct an information-based learning environment for students.However,the balance between students’ cognitive level andthe presentation of teaching media needs to be improved.From this study,it can be seen that the overall development trend of college English classroom teaching structure is pretty good.However,there are also some problems,such as the neglect of students’ overall participation,the weakness in students’ independent selection of college teaching content,as well as the imbalance between the content presented by the modern college English teaching media and students’ cognition level.Therefore,based on constructivism,this paper puts forward the following suggestions to improve the relationship between student element and other key elements in current college English classroom teaching structure:(1)For the relationship between student and college English teacher,college English teachers should promote students’ self-examination and self-reflection as well as the mutual review and the mutual evaluation between students.They should also improve students’ participation in various activities.Moreover,they should and help students to create and maintain corresponding learning situations.(2)As for the relationship between student and college English teaching content,students should be brave to question the authority.Also,they should be good at selecting,reorganizing,and reprocessing various learning resources.And they should learn to become an initiative constructor of knowledge as well.(3)For the relationship between student and college English teaching media,teachers should flexibly apply English teaching media in order to improve students’ performance.What’s more,teachers should require students to make full use of such teaching media in order to enhance the learning experience in the good learning context they construct.This study is an analysis of the situation of the relationship between student element and other key elements in current college English classroom teaching structure.And it is hoped that this study can provide some inspiration for the future studies on college English classroom teaching structure.