A Study On Cross-cultural Consciousness In The Illustration Of PEP Junior English Textbooks

As a bridge between teachers’ teaching and students’ learning,English teaching material is an important instrument of teaching.The cultural content,arrangement structure and potential intention contained in English teaching material will directly affect the teaching effect.Therefore,it is very necessary to discuss the cultivation of students’ cross-cultural consciousness in the elementary education stage from the perspective of text analysis of English textbooks.The research object of this thesis is all the illustrations in the English textbooks for junior high school students in the People’s Education Edition.The research is carried out through the methods of questionnaire survey,interview and documentary data.This thesis uses schema theory and dual coding theory to study how to cultivate students’ cross-cultural consciousness based on illustrations in textbooks.The focus of this thesis is to analyze and study the cross-cultural consciousness and its characteristics hidden in the illustrations of PEP junior high school English textbooks,so as to provide enlightenment for the selection and compilation of the contents of English textbooks,especially illustrations.By observing how often teachers use illustrations in textbooks and whether they excavate the cross-cultural knowledge presented by illustrations,this thesis analyzes teachers’ understanding and cognition of illustrations and cross-cultural consciousness.The purpose of the research is to better cultivate students’ national consciousness and international vision,and improve their core literacy.The conclusion of this study is that there are a large number of illustrations in the PEP English textbooks for junior high schools,but few of them can present the corresponding cultural knowledge of English-speaking countries.In the process of using illustrations,teachers lack relevant knowledge background and do not fully penetrate into the illustrations in teaching.They failed to find all the culture elements presented in the illustrations and do not have a good grasp of the similarities and differences between Chinese culture and the culture of English-speaking countries.There is still room for improvement in the methods of cultivating students’ cross-cultural consciousness through illustrations.In addition,this thesis classifies and analyzes the number,function and content of illustrations in teaching materials,and then puts forward some suggestions on the arrangement of teaching materials,teachers’ teaching and students’ learning of illustrations.At the same time,it improves teachers’ cognition of illustrations and English speaking countries,and makes full use of illustrations to cultivate students’ cross-cultural awareness.Finally,on the basis of summarizing and reflecting on the shortcomings of this study,the author puts forward some suggestions for the improvement of teaching materials arrangement and teaching,so as to promote the follow-up research.