Training Of Dialect-association Strategy:Improving Chinese Senior High School Students’ English Vocabulary Learning

Generally,development of language skills,such as that of listening,speaking,reading,writing,and translation,all depends heavily on vocabulary;insufficient vocabulary affects the improvement of language skills directly.In the process of English learning among senior high school students,expanding vocabulary is the key to improving scores.Unfortunately,most students lack scientific and effective vocabulary learning strategies,which results in poor learning of vocabulary.On the other hand,with the English teaching reform going further,the new national curriculum for high school English in China sets up higher requirements for vocabulary use.Thus,faced with heavy pressure,limited classroom teaching time and other problems,efficient and interesting vocabulary learning strategies are in demand.Yet,although researchers from China and elsewhere have paid close attention to vocabulary learning gradually,most of the studies are theoretical,and few studies are empirical.Thus,a teaching experiment was conducted on the acquisition of English vocabulary by senior high school students in China.The subjects were students of Grade Two from a senior high school,and the target words for the experiment were the new words of a unit from the textbook.The methods of experiment,interview and questionnaire-based survey were employed to compare the effectiveness of dialect-association strategy and the generally practiced method for vocabulary teaching.The following are the questions to be answered.1)Is dialect-association strategy more effective in improving senior high school students’ vocabulary learning interest?2)Is dialect-association strategy more effective in improving senior high school students’ memory of English vocabulary?3)Is dialect-association strategy more effective in improving senior high school students’ English proficiency?In the teaching process of vocabulary,the control class used the generally practiced method.That is,the teacher read aloud new words,explained the word formation,collocation and usage,and then students used their own method to memorize words,and spelling check followed later.In the experimental class,dialect-association strategy was used to help students memorize vocabulary.To be specific,students learned to read words at first,and then they processed them,associating their pronunciations and meanings personally with Ningxia dialects,quickly and effectively.In other words,the dialect-association strategy was recommended to individuals to memorize the pronunciation and semantics of English vocabulary,by combining them with their own dialects,associating pronunciation of dialects with similar English vocabulary.The closer the dialect sounds were to the English pronunciations,and the more vividly the dialect words were semantically related to English vocabulary,the more they could help learners remember the pronunciation and semantics of the English vocabulary.The research tools are a questionnaire,an interview guide,a word-spelling exercise,and an English test.The experiment results show:(1)Dialect-association strategy can effectively improve the English vocabulary learning interest of senior high school students.(2)Dialect-association strategy can help to improve students’ ability to memorize vocabulary.(3)Dialect-association strategy can help students improve their English proficiency.