院 系 名 称：

外国语言文学系

专 业 名 称：

英 语

届　 　别：

2014届

学 号：

SY1003329

学 生 姓 名：

黄宁妃

指导教师姓名（职称）：

胡静芳(副教授)

题　目

On Approaches to Improve Students' Listening Competence in Middle Schools

题目类型

囗　理论研究　　　应用研究　　囗　设计开发　　囗　其他　

命题来源

囗　教师命题　 　　学生自主命题　

拟完成时间

2014年　4　月　20　日

一、选题依据及意义（不少于300字）

As we all known, English is both a language and a subject. The keys of learning English are cultivating and improving students’ ability about using language for communication , which contains four skills of capability, including listening, speaking, reading and writing. We can easy to see, during the process of learning English ,listening is the foundation of all things. English, as an international language and a tool of communication, is playing an important role in modern international society. So, the ultimate aim of learning English is that can freely express our thought, realize the goal of communication. However, all of those things is based on listening, speaking cannot exist without listening. Imagine what will happen if we can’t follow what others say while we must make some response to it during a conversation? It is the most important that we should understand what people say before we give any proper response. Listening comes first.

But some statistics show that nearly 50 percent of the students regard listening as the most difficult skill to acquire .While many factors cause students’ poor listening ability. There are several reasons arousing the phenomenon: incorrectly pronounce, small vocabulary and the lack of grammar knowledge, the brain response speed is too slow, poor command of English different accents, unreasonably use study time, psychological causes, lack of adequate linguistic environment, and students been effected by mother tongue,etc.

Therefore , it's necessary and urgent to find an effective practical approach to solve the poor performance in the students’ listening. Relevant data shows that the adoption of the Schema Theory has made great achievement. Schema theory, which originated from cognitive psychology and which has already played an important role in the study of language reading, to the study of listening comprehension. Through expounding the significance of schema in English listening teaching ,it specifies the activation of lingual, contextual, stylistic and cultural schema in listening comprehension. So, using the Schema theory is a good way to improving students’ listening skill.

二、研究目标与主要内容（含论文(设计)提纲，不少于500字）

1.研究目标：

We can easy to see, during the process of learning English ,listening is the foundation of all things. English, as an international language and a tool of communication, is playing an important role in modern international society. So, the ultimate aim of learning English is that can freely express our thought, realize the goal of communication. However, all of those things is based on listening, speaking cannot exist without listening. Listening is a kind of comprehensive competence. As a form of language activity, it plays an important part in human cognitive activities. It should be integrated with speaking, reading and writing skills. Meanwhile, listening is a relatively difficult skill for the students. The new English curriculum standard issued by the Education Ministry stresses the importance of improving the middle school students’ listening ability as the problem of the students’ poor English listening is becoming more and more serious in China.

This paper mainly investigates the current situation of middle school students’ English listening ,analize the main factors which result from the difficulty to lestening English ,address some measures about English class education and make use of extra time so that listening conditions can be improved ,teaching quality can be inhanced, and finally make the students’ listening can be better.

2.主要内容（提纲）：

Chapter one: Introduction:

1.1 Background

1.2 Problem statement

1.3 Purpose and significance of the study

Chapter Two : Current Situation

Chapter three: Literature Review

Chapter Four Analysis

4.1 Analysis the current listening’s problems amount middle school students by the literature review

4.2 Analysis the current listening’s problems by society phenomenons.

Chapter Five The suggestions and methods

5.1 How to solve those problems

5.1.1 The improvement of student’s aspect.

5.1.2 The improvement of teacher’s aspect.

5.1.3 The guardian of a child’s supporting.

5.1.4 The improvement of teaching material.

5.1.5 The help from social.

5.2 How to improve listening ability

5.3 Grasp the necessary skills about listening

Chapter Six Conclusion

三、研究方法和手段

(1) 研究方法

1. Literature research method: To read some relevant books, journals and search internet for materials.

(2) 研究手段：

To collect, sort, analyze dates and materials from books, journals and on the internet.

四、参考文献目录（作者、书名或论文（设计）题目、出版社或刊号、出版年月或出版期号）

[1] Alice Omaggio Hadley. Teaching Language in Context [M]. Shang Hai: Foreign Language and Research Press, 2003.8

[2] Gandara, Patricia, Maxwell –Jolly ,Julie and Driscoll. Listening to Teachers of English Language learners: A Survey of California Teachers’ Challenges, Experiences, and Professional Development Needs. University of California Linguistic Minority Research Institute, 2005

[3] Paul Davies. Success in English Teaching [M]. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 2001

[4]穆诗雄.英语专业毕业论文设计写作[M].外语教学与研究出版社，第二版

[5]刘也玲.论图示理论与英语听力教学[J].衡阳师范学院,2011

[6]郭跃进.新课程教学法[M].沈阳：东北大学出版社,2004

[7]蒋关军.如何提高农村中学生英语听力的能力[J].保山师专学报,2005

[8]肖红生.农村中学生英语听力障碍初探[J].湖北省郧县城关一中

[9]赵鹤.中学生听读能力不均衡发展现状的思索[J].中小学英语教学与研究,2012(2)

[10]周相利.图式理论在英语听力教学中的应用[J].外语与外语教学,2001,10(163)

[11]占卫兰.让听力生动起来[J].中小学教学与研究,2011(专刊)

[12]陈洪友.多角度培养农村学生英语听力水平[J].中小学英语教学与研究

[13]石春兰.浅谈初中英语课堂的情景教学[J].学周刊,2011（10）

[14]沈银珍.基于现代图式理论提高学生英语听力[J].职业技术教育(教学版)2006,27（471）

[15]蔡羽.关于如何提高英语专业学生听力能力的探索[J].纳雍县职业技术学校考试周刊2010（16）

[16]尹保林.初学者怎样提高英语听力水平[J].河南省平顶山师专尹保树

[17]王柏.让英语情景教学更富实效的几点建议[J].中小学英语教学研究,2012（2）

[18]王守元.苗伟英语听力教学的理论与方法[J].山东大学外国语学院,2003 (92)

[19]王蔷.英语教学法进程[M].高等教育出版社,2008

[20]浅析中学生英语听力困难原因及对策

五、文献综述（在对选题涉及的研究领域的文献进行广泛阅读或调查的基础上，对该领域的研究现状、发展动态等内容进行综述，并提出自己的见解和研究思路。不少于700字）

It is necessary and compulsory to learn about the prior studies about this thesis, since they are helpful to make this study more persuasive and creative.

Listening plays an essential role in the communication process. A child can listen long time before he is able to speak. Alice Omaggio Hadley (2003) has pointed out an important reason for developing listening skill. According to Yin Baolin’s research, listening is an important aspect of our communicative competence, but also one of the important ways of learning English. Through the hearing understanding language is a complex process, it includes several kinds of information: identification, judgment and understanding of voice signal levels of mental activity. People accept information, through the brain to identify and understand the meaning of each voice signal, and then the appropriate response is been fed back. The same person’s recognition and understanding, and knowledge of personal experience have the close relation amount the speed of feedback, and judge the answer whether correctly or not.

However, Yin Baolin also points out listening is difficult. He agrees that In the actual study, because the listener is often difficult or even unable to control the listening material, the speed of the speech articulation of language and character of the speaker's expression .So in the limited time to accurately understand and grasp the meaning of the speaker is a fairly difficult learning task. In Londe and Zsuzsa C’s view(2009), assessing listening comprehension is an “invisible cognitive operations”, it is difficult define define the construct of listening comprehension.

From the studies above, we can see that English listening is very important in the communication in the daily life. It is also a necessary skill which is needed to develop in English teaching. While the students suffer a lot when comes to listening.

Through recent years of teaching observation, scholars believe that the many factors that affect students' listening comprehension can be classified into three categories: fear solid language foundation knowledge is not enough and lack of listening skills. According to the press” The current students' English listening problems and solutions” (2010), there are three key listening problems confusing students :First ,the language barrier of hearing nothing, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. Second, heard of it, but don't understand -- cognitive impairment. Third, they would never be able to learn anything. from listening material ---mental disorder. This kind of phenomenon is more obvious in the countryside. Xiao Hongsheng (2009) states that With the in-depth implementation of the new curriculum standard, English vocabulary is increasing, more and more requirement of the student English listening .And the junior middle schools’ English foundation is not enough in countryside, listening skills are relatively weak. So, improve the rural English listening teaching, improve the students English hearing level is imminent .

On account of the importance of listening and the current problems, the experts and teachers need to search an effective method to improve listening skill.

Gandara, Patricia, Maxwell –Jolly ,Julie and Driscoll (2005) have pointed out that  English Language Learners (ELS) must learn English, learn it well, and meet rigorous standards. No matter what the method or program of instruction, teachers of English language learners need special skills and training to effectively accomplish this task. Zhan Weilan(2011) underlines that vitality of English listening.

Schema Theory, which originated from cognitive psychology and which has already played an important role in the study of language reading, to the study of listening comprehension. Through expounding the significance of schema in English listening teaching ,it specifies the activation of lingual, contextual, stylistic and cultural schema in listening comprehension. So, using the Schema theory is a good way to improving students’ listening skill.

Zhou Xiangli(2002) did a research about Schema theory, he points out that more and more importantce is attached to listening comprehension, as a basic language skill. But learners usually pay more attention to their improvement of pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, etc, but ignore the closely related background knowledge, that is, the accumulation of schemata.Shen Yinzhen (2006) states that schemata plays a very important role in the filed of language understanding.There are two kind of the processing of information’s way in Schema Theory: bottom – up and top – down, bottom- up also called data- driven process. Liu Yeling points out that schema is activated by entering into some information which makes schemata plays a role in the brain, or makes the person produces the inspiration. But this information must match the receiving information existing schemata. Therefore, when English teachers have the listening class, not only to help students to build schemata, more important is to try to activate the existing schema in their minds. Make it easier for new information to be understood and absorbed, and correctly understand and memory by what they hear.

As mentioned above, we can see that the Schema Theory which utilize all kind of situations is useful in listening process.

In the hand of improving English listening ,Xiao Hongsheng(2009) points out that based on the countryside’s state quo to improve listening competence, we should do the follow three points: Concept of English teachers don't fall behind, English teachers should demonstrate by personal and under the condition of commanding the skill of English listening,and then let students boldly attempt. Cai Yu(2010) points out that exercise interesting, and flexible listening material is a good way to improve listening competence. In Wang Shouyuan’s(2003) view, he holds that there are five suggestions shoud be made to improve listening ability: pay attention to the stages of listening teaching;② give emphasis to developing micro-skills of listening;③ attach importance to developing students’ listening strategies; ④ teach listening integratively with other language skills ⑤ make good use of modern audio-visual media and other learning facilities.

Even though the Schema Theory is useful in listening teaching, but it still needs to observe the principles. Such as in the field of English class, Liu Yeling (2011) points out that Under the guidance of the schema theory , English listening teaching can not only fully arouse students’ subjective initiative and the interest from listening material, carry on the positive and effective thought when students are learning English ,but also bring listening teaching from word and sentence --centered to discourse. As a result, in listening teaching, teachers must be good at helping students to establish more schemata, and guide them to activate existing schema, making the development of their listening comprehension ability effectively.

In short, researches both at home and abroad have made great contributions to this field. This thesis lays its emphasis on the importance of listening in daily English learning, and analysis the current problems in listening teaching, proves the effectiveness and practicability of the situational teaching method and provides an effective and practical approach for the students to improve the listening ability.

六、工作进度安排（时间、内容、步骤）

1. Preparation period.

1). From the time 10th Sep, 2013 to 30th Nov, 2008, I would search for the related materials in order to set down the title, preparing the report of the paper.

2). From the time 1st Dec, 2013 to 25th Dec, 2013, I would search for suitable goal, approach and content, finishing the report.

3).Before 25th Dec ,2013, I will hand in my report to my guide teacher.

4). From the time 6th Jan, 2014 to 5th Mar, 2014, I would read the materials carefully and search for more.

2. Written period.

1). From the time 5th Mar, 2014 to 10th Mar, 2014, I would generalize the materials and the data , then , I would finish the first draft.

2). From the time 11st to 31st Mar, 2014, I would hand in the paper to the teacher and revise it according to her advice.

3). From the time 2nd Apr ,2014 to 24th Apr, 2014, I would truly finish the paper and make it checked, preparing for argument.

3. Oral defense period.

七、预期成果

On Approaches to Improve Students' Listening Competence in Middle Schools

（以上内容在教师指导下由学生填写）　学生签名：　　　　20　　年　　月　　日

八、指导教师审核意见：

　　　　　　　　　　　指导教师签名：

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　20　　年　　月　　日

九、教研室审核意见：

　　　　　　　　　　　　教研室主任签名：

　　　　　　　　 20　　年　　月　　日