A Study Of The Application Of Process Approach To English Writing Teaching In Junior High School

The junior high school stage is a critical period for the formation of students’ English written expression ability.Judging from the current situation of high school students’ English learning,writing has always been a relatively weak link.According to the author’s teaching practice,the author found that the main reasons for junior high school students’ difficulty improving English writing ability are: students’ lack of interest in writing;the single writing teaching method and the complexity of English writing.Under the product approach,teachers focus on students’ language knowledge drills,such as vocabulary and grammar.Students can form sentences with vocabulary and connect sentences into a grammatically structured essay,but it is difficult to create a thought-provoking essay with a specific social and communicative purpose,which deviates from the real purpose of writing.In this context,the process approach,which is communicative,student-centred and focused on the writing process,has emerged.Numerous studies by domestic and foreign researchers have proved that the process approach is an important initiative to improve English writing teaching compared to the outcome approach,but few studies are designed for junior high school students.Therefore,this thesis aims at exploring,through an experimental study,effective application of the process approach to teaching English writing in the junior high school classroom.The author chose 111 students in two parallel classes in the eighth grade of a junior high school as the research objects,and carried out a four-month teaching experiment.Grade Eight,Class Seven is the experimental class,which adopts the process approach,and Grade Eight,Class Nine is a control class,which uses the product approach.The teaching experiment aims at solving two research questions:(1)What effects can process approach produce on students’ English writing interest in junior high school?(2)What effects can process approach improve students’ English writing performance in junior high school?The research process is divided into three stages: pretest stage,teaching stage and post-test stage.In the pretest stage,a questionnaire survey and a pre-writing test were conducted for both the experimental class and the control class.In the teaching experimental the process approach is used to teach English writing in the experiment class and the product approach is used in the controlled class.The teaching process includes six steps: preparation before writing,drafting and self-evaluation,peer review,writing the second draft,teacher review,and finalizing the draft.In the post-test phase,the same set of questionnaires was used to conduct a post-questionnaire and a post-writing test for the experimental class and the control class,as well as interviews for the experimental class due to the grades.After the experiment,the author draws the following conclusions:1.The results of two writing tests showed that the EC got a higher score than the CC,which suggested that the process approach was more effective in trials than the product approach.2.Statistics of Pretest and Post-test scores were analyzed by SPSS 21.0,and the analysis proved that the process approach had a positive effect on students’ performance and writing ability.3.From the statistics of the survey led by questionnaire and interview,the majority of students in EC prefer the process approach,which contains brainstorming,discussion,repeated drafts and revisions.And they have faith in improving their writing levels with the guidance of the process approach.And students’ writing interest has improved.