An Empirical Study On The Communicative Approach In Uyghur High School English Classrooms

Trilingual is the abbreviation for the native language,national language,English(or Japanese,Russian)in the education of ethnic minority areas.It originates from bilingualism,and it is a special language phenomenon.Trilingual teaching is an activity that uses three languages.Due to Xinjiang’s remote location,education is still relatively lagging,and there are few studies in trilingual teaching,thus leaving a gap in the literature with regard to teaching English as a third language.The emergence of the communicative approach has enriched the theory of trilingual teaching,shedding some light on relevant research fields.This study takes a high school student in Turpan as the research object,using classroom observations,interviews,questionnaire surveys,and experiments to solve three problems.Question 1: What are the difficulties English learners faced in a trilingual context?Question 2: How is a trilingual English class distinguished from a bilingualEnglish class in Uyghur high school English classrooms?Question 3: How does the communicative approach benefit English teaching in atrilingual context in Uyghur high school English classrooms?The experiment lasted four months in Uyghur high school.First,questionnaires,classroom observations,and interviews are conducted to know the problems in trilingual classrooms and the differences between trilingual and bilingual classrooms.Then SPSS22.0 statistical analysis software are used to compare and analyze the two tests scores of the two classes.It is verified to show what advantages does trilingual teaching has.Finally,an interview is used to investigate students’ satisfaction with the application of the communicative approach in trilingual teaching.The results show that in the English class of Uyghur high schools.Firstly,students’ competence of using English remained weak.Secondly,compared with the bilingual classroom,students in trilingual classrooms can take advantage of their native language to better master the pronunciation of English and effectively motivate them to learn English.Finally,Uyghur students have changed their learning attitude.It is also evident that the students’ language learning ability was significantly improved.At the same time,teachers’ enthusiasm for communicative teaching has also increased.