A Practice Report Of OBE-Based Teaching Of English Writing In Junior High Schools

English Curriculum Standards for Compulsory Education(2022)brings forward specific requirements in English writing to be met by the students accomplishing the nine-year compulsory education.However,we find it hard to say optimistically that our students can conveniently meet these requirements.It is generally agreed that the current mode of teaching and learning as well as the commonly-used evaluation method may have hampered students’ progress in English writing.The writing classes are usually teacher-centered,the students are not very clear about the goals of writing practice,and the writing evaluation is not very encouraging and lacks effectiveness and efficiency.Against this background,the Outcome-based Education(OBE in short)occurred to the researcher.OBE,first proposed by American scholar William Spady,has three main notions.That is,"student-centeredness","reverse design and forward implementation" and "continuous improvement." It emphasizes that teaching should cater for all students,be preceded with the preset learning outcomes,and continuously improve itself based on evaluation.In the United States,OBE has been applied to the educational practice in some secondary schools and achieved some success,while China has involved the notions of OBE in its evaluation framework for university program accreditation.Here is reported a tentative practice of OBE in Chengdu X Experimental Foreign Language School.This pioneering practice aims to explore the feasibility of OBE in the teaching of English writing in junior high schools.The feasibility will be assessed with the two indicators of instructional design and teaching effects with the former including the setting of teaching outcomes,the arrangement of teaching processes,the design of evaluation methods,and the improved instructional design based on the evaluation,and the latter including the students’ writing attitudes and writing performance.A class of 21 students in Grade Eight is selected as the research participants.The experimental practice,mainly composed of four rounds of outcomes setting or resetting,corresponding instructional designing,evaluating and improving the instructional designs,lasted for one academic year(from September 1st,2020 to July 2nd,2021).Questionnaires,tests,interview,and classroom observation were used to collect data.Both the teaching practice and the data show that it is quite feasible to introduce OBE in the teaching of English writing in junior high schools.In terms of the teaching practice,the general procedure of outcomes setting or resetting,conducting instructional designs,finding the existing problems through evaluation and making continuous improvement can be successfully implemented,which is time-consuming but worthwhile in that every step of the procedure is learning for both students and teachers.In terms of the teaching effects,data analysis shows that both the writing attitudes and performance of the students have changed.By the end of the experimental practice,they turn more positive in such aspects as self-efficacy,external motivation and internal motivation.In addition,their writing performance improves in vocabulary,sentence,grammar and content.It must be admitted that a class of 21 students is not a typical size in Chinese secondary schools.It requires further evidence to prove the feasibility of OBE in the English teaching of bigger classes.Besides,whether the same feasibility can be found in the classes of English listening,speaking,or reading also demands more experimental practice.