A Study On The Role Of English Teacher’s Book In Junior High Schools Based On The Cultivation Of Cultural Awareness

In the 2022 edition of English Curriculum Standards for Compulsory Education(hereinafter referred to as the New English Curriculum Standards),cultural awareness is listed as one of the core literacy of English subject education.Cultivating students’ cultural awareness is considered to help deepen their understanding of Chinese and foreign cultures,improve their cross-cultural cognition,attitudes and behavioral orientations and strengthen cultural self-confidence,aiming to build a human community with a shared future.In this context,studies relating to textbooks,cultural content,cultural knowledge,cultural awareness,and global awareness have emerged at home.However,as a subordination of curriculum materials,the teacher’s books are obviously overlooked comparing to textbooks.Thus,the study selects teacher’s books in junior high school of PEP edition as the main research object,analyzes the objective status of teacher’s books based on the discussion of cultural awareness cultivation through quantitative statistics and case studies,and makes corresponding suggestions to the editors and users of teacher’s books.Based on the cultural region theory of Cortazzi Martin and Jin Lixian,the New English Curriculum Standards and the three-dimensional CAB model of intercultural communication competence,this study employs a qualitative analysis of quantitative data,aiming to discuss the following three research questions: 1)How is the structure and content related to the cultivation of cultural awareness presented in the teacher’s book? 2)How does the teacher’s book complement the cultural content in the student’s book? 3)How does the teacher’s book guide teaching activities in the cultivation of cultural awareness?The study found that the structure of cultural content presented in the teaching materials shows that there are separate sections of “Cultural Notes” and “Culture Focus” in the teaching materials,which show the importance of cultural awareness cultivation,but most of the contents are definitions of cultural terms and cultural background introduction,which are not integrated with teaching procedures enough.Second,in terms of origins of cultural teaching contents(breadth perspective),both textbooks and teacher’s books mainly focus on the cultural contents of the target language countries,mainly the United Kingdom and the United States,followed by the native Chinese culture,while other international cultures account for the least,demonstrating a clear distribution of cultural hierarchy circles and an obvious cultural bias.In depth,in terms of the classification of cultural contents,teacher’s books mainly emphasize the supplementation of knowledge in three major aspects: history and geography,lifestyle,and literature and art,while relatively neglecting the aspects of higher cognitive and behavioral aspects: values and behavioral norms.Third,from the perspective of teaching guidance of cultural activities,the cultural activities provided in the teacher’s books are brief and single in form,with fewer specific suggestions for teaching design of cultural contents,some of which are not highly related to the unit objectives and have low pedagogical practicability.Based on the above current situation and problems in the cultivation of cultural awareness presented in teacher’s books,this study puts forward several suggestions on the compilation and use of teacher’s books respectively,aiming to put into practice the cultural teaching guidance of teaching books in order to eventually help students enhance national identity and national sentiment and strengthen their cultural self-confidence,while establishing a sense of the community of human destiny.