| The English Curriculum Standards for Junior High School(2011 edition)has put forward a clear requirement on students’ vocabulary size.The corresponding junior high school textbooks of the People’s Education Press have also adjusted and increased the vocabulary size that junior middle school students should master.At present,there are few empirical studies on the combination of prototype category theory and English vocabulary teaching,and most of the researches are focused on college or high school students,and relatively few of them are on junior high school students.Therefore,this study attempts to explore the effects of Prototype Category Theory on English vocabulary learning of junior high school students.Based on the Prototype Category Theory and Cognitive Model,this study aims to explore the following two research questions:1.What effects does English vocabulary teaching under the guidance of Prototype Category Theory have on junior high school students’ concepts of vocabulary learning and their use of vocabulary learning strategies?2.What effects does English vocabulary teaching under the guidance of Prototype Category Theory have on the vocabulary size of junior high school students?In order to solve the above questions,this study selected 100 students from two intact classes of Grade Two in a rural middle school in Yueyang County as research subjects to conduct a 16-week teaching experiment.The vocabulary tests,English achievement tests,questionnaires and interviews are used as experimental tools to collect data.Through qualitative and quantitative analysis of the collected data,this study finds that,students’ concepts of vocabulary learning have undergone some positive changes,and their awareness of using vocabulary learning strategies has been improved.The frequency of using attention strategies,autonomous learning strategies,repetition strategies and coding strategies in vocabulary memorizing has changed significantly.After the experiment,the students’ vocabulary size has been expanded to a certain extent,in which the vocabulary size of the experimental class has changed significantly,and the enlargement of vocabulary size has further promoted the improvement of students’ English achievement.The results show that it is feasible to teach English vocabulary in junior high school under the guidance of prototype category theory. |
