An Action Research On The Application Of Production-oriented Approach To English Writing Teaching In Senior High School

The English Curriculum Standards for Senior High Schools(2017 Version 2020Revision)clearly state that English teaching should develop students’ language skills of listening,speaking,reading,viewing and writing.Writing,as an expressive language skill,reflects students’ ability to use language comprehensively and to think critically and is a focus of English learners.English writing requires excellent language application ability,topic mastery ability and structural organization ability,and is therefore always tricky in English learning.However,some problems still cannot be ignored in the English writing classroom in China today.For example,students memorize many writing templates but cannot output them effectively and lack initiative in the learning process.Moreover,students have little confidence and interest in English writing and become resistant to it.As a result,it is difficult for students to improve their writing abilities effectively.In order to address these problems and to improve the current situation of“separation of learning and using” in foreign language teaching in China,Professor Wen Qiufang has developed a localized teaching method,namely the Production-oriented Approach(POA),which takes “Learning-using Integrated Principle” as its teaching philosophy.In order to investigate whether POA can have a positive impact on the teaching of English writing in senior high school,this study applies POA to writing classes and conducts a 14-week action research with a senior class of students in a senior high school in Luohe City,Henan Province.The study focuses on the following three questions:(1)What is the effect of POA on students’ English writing language?(2)What is the effect of POA on students’ English writing content?(3)What is the effect of POA on students’ English writing structure?The study lasts 14 weeks,including preliminary preparation and two rounds of action research.During the study,two questionnaires are conducted before and at the end of the study.Three writing tests and interviews are conducted before the beginning of the study,after the first round of action research and at the end of the study.The results of this study show that POA has a positive impact on English writing in senior high school in terms of language,content and structure.After the implementation of English writing teaching guided by POA,the following changes occur in students’ English writing:(1)In language,students’ writing vocabulary is more advanced and sentence patterns are more flexible and diverse.(2)In content,students’ writing texts are more logical,content is more relevant and details are more sufficient.(3)In structure,students’ writing texts are more coherent and logical.The effective cohesion and coherence between sentences and paragraphs have increased,and the phenomena of logic confusion and order inversion have reduced.In conclusion,this study has demonstrated the feasibility and effectiveness of applying POA to the senior high school writing teaching with a certain range,which has certain implications for the teaching of English writing in senior high schools.However,this study inevitably has some limitations,and further researches on the effective use of POA are needed afterwards.