Teaching in English
Abstract:Under the "double reduction" policy, how to effectively reduce the excessive homework burden of students in the compulsory education stage and improve the core literacy of students is a problem that every teacher should think about. It is difficult for traditional homework to achieve the purpose of educating people, which requires teachers to break through the design mode of traditional homework, adopt diversified homework design principles, and improve the quality of homework, so as to achieve the effect of "reducing burden and increasing quality".
Keywords: junior high school English; reduce burden and increase efficiency; job design; Discipline core literacy.
The design of junior high school English homework has always been a very important part of the teaching process. Teachers can find problems in homework and diagnose students' mastery of teaching content, so as to optimize teaching design, improve teaching methods, and make up for deficiencies in the classroom. However, for a long time, in the context of "test-oriented education", many English teachers have assigned rote memorization and repetitive copying homework in order to improve students' test-taking ability. This kind of homework is monotonous and boring, which makes it easy for students to over-consume their enthusiasm for learning in the process of completing their homework, and gradually start to get bored of learning. There are also many teachers who blindly grasp the quantity of homework and ignore the quality of homework, resulting in students taking too long to complete homework and being under high pressure for a long time. With the introduction of the "double reduction" policy, English teachers should pay more attention to the design of homework and think about how to increase the effectiveness of homework. The author believes that in order to do a good job of "reducing the burden and increasing efficiency" and realize education in the homework, teachers should follow the following principles when designing homework:
First, the principle of fun.
The English Curriculum Standards for Compulsory Education (2011 Edition) (hereinafter referred to as the "Curriculum Standards") proposes that English extracurricular activities should focus on mobilizing students' enthusiasm for participation. Design the appropriate form and content of activities for them so that they can enjoy participating and generating interest and motivation to learn and succeed through hands-on experience and practice (Ministry of Education, 2012). In order to stimulate students' interest, teachers need to design interesting and novel assignments to inject freshness and vitality into after-class assignments, so that students can be more active in their assignments.
For example, for younger students, the teacher can have students work in small groups to voice the dialogue in the book on voice-over software and select the "best voice-over team" in the class. In order to be able to complete this assignment, students will constantly perceive and imitate the pronunciation characteristics of English. In this process, students can not only gradually develop a good sense of language, but also consolidate their language knowledge and develop listening and speaking skills. For older students, teachers can choose to make a movie list for students on the weekend. Let the students go home and choose a movie**, and ask one student to use five finger retell (mind map) to make a movie report for other students before each class next week, share the content of the movie they watched, and choose a "story king" in the class.
The assignments are designed to be based on life and the interests of the students. With the help of the competitive system, students are easily attracted and actively involved, experience the joy of success, and recognize the true value of English as a communicative tool.
Second, the principle of integration.
The design of assignments should also strengthen the interpenetration and connection between English and other disciplines, so as to promote the comprehensive development of students' cognitive ability, thinking ability, aesthetic taste, imagination and creativity. When designing English homework, teachers can use homework forms such as drawing posters, advertisements, making greeting cards, and adapting songs to improve students' interest in learning, give full play to students' strengths, and improve students' ability to "do things in English".
For example, after learning the second volume of the 8th grade of the benevolent version of "English", unit7 "food festival" topic 2"i'm not sure i can cook it well.After that, I asked the students to draw a poster called "A Bite of Chongqing". Students can choose one of Chongqing's famous dishes, draw them on a piece of paper, and use the target language of this unit to introduce the dish and how to prepare it.
This assignment not only enables students to consolidate their knowledge of the language in this unit, but also enables students to use their imagination and creativity to practice and understand this diverse world in an intuitive way, reflecting the concept of "learning by doing" in English.
3. The principle of openness.
Open-ended assignments focus on divergent thinking, and there are no standard answers. This kind of homework can improve students' comprehensive language use ability, and can also strengthen students' thinking character, which helps to improve students' core literacy in English subjects. When designing open-ended assignments, teachers should give the initiative to students, give full play to the uniqueness of each assignment, and improve the effectiveness of assignments.
For example, the 8th grade volume of the benevolent version of "English" unit3"our hobbies" topic3"What were you doing at this time yesterday?Section C (1a-1c) is about the fairy tale The Little Match Girl. The story mainly tells the story of a little match girl who froze to death on the street on Chinese New Year's Eve. The teacher can give students the option to complete an assignment:
1) Continue the story of the little girl after they found out that she had frozen to death.
2) Adapt the ending for the story.
3) Imagine that the next day people find out about the death of the little girl, how will the local ** report on it? Let's write a press release on this.
4) If you happen to witness the whole process of the little girl's death, in the face of the ** interview, how will you explain the whole incident to **? Please write down what you are going to say.
5) Work in small groups, choose 2-3 paragraphs from the essay, add possible dialogues between characters, and act them out in class.
The above assignments can take the form of continuing the story, rewriting the ending, writing a press release, interviewing, and performing a drama. These assignments allow students to further understand, assimilate, reason, and analyze information based on their life experiences. Constant thinking and discovery in the process of completing assignments gives each assignment personalization and creativity.
Fourth, the principle of stratification.
The Curriculum Standards emphasize that the English curriculum in compulsory education should be oriented to all students, focusing on the different characteristics and personality differences of language learners (Ministry of Education, 2012). This also reminds teachers that when assigning homework, they should also start from the actual situation of students, and set different homework for students at different levels, so that each student can get a sense of accomplishment in the process of completing the homework.
For example, after learning the second volume of the 8th grade of the benevolent version of "English", unit7 "food festival" topic 2"i'm not sure i can cook it well.After that, the teacher can assign the following layered assignments:
Required homework: 1) Choose any kind of food that has appeared in this topic** and follow the practice described in the text to make the food for your parents to taste.
2) Draw a mind map to sort out Western table manners.
Optional homework: 1) Go to a Western restaurant, taste Western food, and experience Western food culture.
2) Search for the food culture of the country you are interested in on the Internet, make a PPT, and make an oral report in combination with the PPT in class.
3) Students work in small groups to collect content about Chinese table culture on the Internet, perform it and make it into a **, and send it to the teacher.
Teachers design English assignments of different levels of difficulty for students of different levels to meet the different language needs of students. The required homework focuses on the internalization and sorting out of discourse knowledge, so that students can experience Western culture and establish a multicultural consciousness at the same time. In the optional assignments, students are asked to go to a Western restaurant to taste Western food, and search to understand the food culture of other countries, so that students can better treat and accept different cultures. The production of Chinese table culture** aims to allow students to deepen their understanding of the culture of the motherland, enhance their patriotic feelings, strengthen their cultural self-confidence, and gradually form a sense of cross-cultural communication.
In short, under the background of double reduction, English teachers should not only continue to learn and improve their professional ability, but also carefully design homework based on the core literacy of English discipline, and strive to improve the fun, openness, integration and stratification of homework. Let homework really play a role in cultivating students' interest in learning, and let students improve their creative thinking and cross-cultural communication skills while applying what they have learned, so as to achieve the educational purpose of cultivating "all-round development of people" and truly improve quality and reduce burden.