T: Who is your favorite singer? Does he belong to a band? S: Bryan. Yes. T: Is it your favorite band too? S: Yes. Westlife. T: What kind of music does the band play? S: Pop music. T: Do you often listen to such kind of music? S: Yes. 这是一段教师与学生在一堂阅读课前导入时的一段对话,这段对话最大的问题是:教师提出的问题缺乏探究性,无法启迪学生的思维,学生的对答往往只需是简单的“yes”或 “no”, “what”或“who”,如此简单机械的重复,无需学生的分析,综合,组织语言,运用语言,也就很难使学生的思维处于一种兴奋的状态,或者使课堂处于形式化的热闹之中。
案例二:(听说课:A birthday party in an American family)
Step two : While-listening The first and second listening 1. What does this dialogue begin with? 2. How old is Richard? 3. Who is late for the party? 4. Why is he late? 5. What is his name? (How do you know?) 6. Did they make the cake or buy the cake? 7. What present does Richard receive from his grandpa? 8. Why does his grandpa give Richard this present? (一次听力后学生答出的题目平均是3-4题左右,很多学生对此缺乏信心。) The second listening(再次听力旨让帮助学生听懂一些较难的词汇,以及掌握一些词汇的用法。) 这个案例最大的问题在于教师设计的问题在难度上缺乏梯度。教学内容应该从易到难,提问也应该如此,这才符合学生的认知水平和接受能力。其实现实课堂上的冷场往往是由于教师一系列的过深过难的问题堆砌而造成的。
对策四:对于较难的问题,此前一定要设计一系列的小问题,力求深入浅出,化难为易,才能激发学生进一步探究的积极性。如上述的案例我们只要作如下的变动,效果便是完全不同的。
Step two : While-listening The first listening Whose birthday is it? Who is late for the party? Why? The second listening How old is Richard? Did they make the cake or buy the cake? Who? What’s the name of the father? ( How do you know?) What present does Richard receive from his grandpa? (问题的设置,在难度上设有一定的梯度,但授课教师在环节处理中作了以下的变化:一、事先对学生可能的难点作事先的铺垫;强调了让学生要特别留心的地方;二、通过预测,对学生有难度的两个题目进行有目的地部分回放,并且教学生猜测的技巧---如从最后乐器的声音猜出礼物harmonica是“口琴”;经过这样的处理,学生原先对听力的障碍取消了,课堂的气氛恢复了生机,教师也不再陷入冷场带来的尴尬境地。) 5.课程资源利用的不充分性
随着现代信息技术的发展,教师手中除了教科书,各种图书资料、报刊杂志、录像录音、光盘、计算机软件以及网络信息化资源应有尽有,因此我们可以看到许多教师在追求“内容新颖”的目标驱使下,搜寻大量的相关教学资源,使课堂成为大量材料的简单堆砌和展示。这些课外资源也往往如过眼云烟,给学生留下印象的并不多。这其中授课教师忽略了最重要的一点:教材才是最核心的英语课程资源,尤其是新课程理念下的英语教材内涵已经有了新的发展,只要我们灵活处理、综合整理运用,课堂的有效性便能得到保障,学生在此后的巩固复习中也有了可以参照的材料。课程资源利用的不充分现象尤其体现在高中英语阅读课堂中,以下便是一个典型的低效阅读课堂的例子:(M4 U2 Working the land )
Step 1 : Brainstorming 1.Talk about the words and phrases related to “agriculture”. 2. Show the students a lot of pictures and ask them to make a list of agricultural products . Step 2. Warming up 1. Match the pictures—the procedures about how to grow the grain. 2. Pre-reading discussion: Rice is our main food. 1.What do you think would happen if tomorrow there was suddenly no rice to eat? 2. If you had the chance to do one thing to help end hunger in the world, what would you do? How to solve hunger? 3. Play a short video ---introduce the main character of the text, Dr. Yuan 4. Showing the students the flash version of the traditional Chinese ancient poem and understanding the title of the text----Pioneer for all people Step 3 Fast-reading 1. The students read the text quickly and do the true or false judgment exercises (10 sentences) 2. Match the main idea of each paragraph. Step 4 Careful reading 1. Answer five questions about Yuan Longping What does Dr Yuan look like? What is his achievement? Why did Dr. Yuan want to increase the rice output when he was young? How does he help rid the world of hunger? What did Dr Yuan’s rice look like in his dream? 2. Complete the personal information about Dr. Yuanlongping by doing a cloze test. Step 5 Post-reading and discussion Activity1: What kind of person is Dr Yuan Longping in your mind? Activity2: Compare Dr. Yuan and Jane Goodall and find their similarities and differences to be a great scientist. Activity3: Do you think Dr Yuan’s dreams can come true? Why do you think so? Give your reasons. 对策五:要改变这种低效阅读课堂模式,以下几点是关键:1、 导入的目的是为了引入到阅读的主题,让学生熟悉一些相关的词汇和知识,所以教师对大量的,形式多样的课外课程资源应该进行精心的删选,如上述的图片展示,电影短
片,flash动画等,都要思考其所花时间与语言学习习得之间的关系。2、在学生阅读过程中,教师应设计多种形式的任务引导学生关注语言材料本身,千万不要以挖掘几个没有层次的问题,以匹配文章的段意,以正误句子的判断等简单的思维活动代替文章篇章及对文章中精彩语言现象的分析。3、最后的discussion环节语言应考虑语言输入与输出之间的关系,帮助,启发学生运用新的语言现象或者提取文中精彩的观点去表达或升华自己的观点。
6. 课堂活动的形式化
以学生为主体,鼓励学生积极参与课堂活动,营造活跃的课堂气氛,是新课程理念的体现。但我们看到的往往是对这一理念的曲解---即过多的表演式课堂活动造成了形式化的英语课堂。这种形式化往往体现在以下两方面:(1)哗众取宠的多媒体的应用。多媒体课件集声音、图像、文字等多种信息于一体,能极大程度地满足学生的视听等感官需求,激发学生对课堂内容的极大兴趣,使课堂看上去很热闹,于是很多教师便在课件中集中了大量声音图像信息,并在课堂上充分运用。但这样做的弊端往往是限制了学生的思维及想象力的发挥,同时也占用了大量的课堂时间。(2)无序的或者是随时穿插的小组合作活动,这是最常见的课堂活动形式化的体现。让我们看以下案例:( M1 U2 Festivals around the world)
… T: Since we have learned so much about the diversity of the English language around the world. Now let relate it to a similar situation in China. China is so large a country that it has so many dialects , but the Chinese government is encouraging people to use one. Do you know what it is? Ss: Putonghua. T: Yes, then let have a discussion in groups of four, and tell me what’s your opinion about this action? Do you think all the Chinese people should use the only language or should we still maintain the present situation, that is , to keep the diversity of the Chinese language? Now let’s go. (学生3分钟的讨论时间)… T: (问第一组学生) Can you tell me the result of your discussion? Who will be the reporter? …(冷场)No one in your group? Any volunteers? …(学生面面相觑) Then what about you? 在这个案例中,我们不难看到教师在组织四人一组的小组活动前并没有对小组的形成做出任何的指导,更没有对小组成员之间的分工合作做任务上的分配,从而导致较长时间的冷场,也造成了不必要的课堂时间浪费。
对策六:新的课程标准提倡学生之间的“合作学习活动”。但小组合作需要每个学生都应承担具体的任务,并对自己的任务负责,通过合作最终完成共同的目标。要改变小组活动无序的状态,老师不仅要重视布置任务,还要重视小组讨论的过程调控,从而不会导致小组合作其实只是一些优秀学生的成果展示,或者
在展示讨论结果时学生相互推诿,不肯承担“说”的任务。其次为了让学生真正能“积极”参与课堂活动,教师不仅对合作学习的时机问题要有明确的思考,对合作学习的内容更要有精心的设计,摒弃那些没有思维容量,或者范围很大,学生无法讨论的问题。
7. 对学生学习成果的处理表面化
新课程标准以学生为主体的课堂组织形式,学生探究活动和合作学习活动为主的教学活动,都涉及到教师如何有效处理学生课堂学习成果展示的问题。而英语课堂的低效性也体现在教师对学生学习成果的处理表面化,尤其表现在以下两种课型。其一是阅读课后的Discussion环节,教师在安排学生进行热烈的讨论后,让小组成员陈述其观点之后,往往缺乏对这些观点的总结,概括和分析的过程,这就使得这些观点的再度利用价值不高。其二是写作课后的写作展示环节,很多教师往往是借助实物投影仪,对着全班同学将好的文章读一遍,最多将一些明显的语言错误纠正过来。让我们看以下的一个案例:(NSEFC Module4 Unit2
Reading, Speaking and writing—designing a poster advertising your “green food”) Step 1 Leading in 1. Show some pictures of food and ask the students: Which food do you prefer/don’t like? Why? 2. Discussion. In pairs try to find reasons to persuade your partner to like the same food as yours. Try to use the following expressions: I would rather… I don’t like …because… I’d prefer…because… It’s a great pity that… 3. Group activity: (说) Suppose you are a vendor, try to find reasons to persuade people to buy your food and use the above expressions. Give students a sample: I’d rather you bought these apples. Look, how clean they are! My apples are free of insects, and any chemicals, because while they were growing, we wore paper bags for each of them. They are delicious, pretty, clean, and the most important, healthy. An apple a day keeps the doctor away. So don’t miss them, buy! Come on! Buy some! Divide the students into groups of four. One acts a buyer, the others act vendors. Give students some minutes to prepare dialogues, and then ask some groups to act out in public. (设计目的:用图片调动学生愉快的学习情绪, 引入写作话题。出于对学习对象的考虑,在活动之前,给学生一些例子的引导,教学过程由浅入深,层层递进,使每个学生都能参与其中,同时也为下一步的写作做铺垫。) Step 2 Pre-writing (读) 1. Ask the students if you want to persuade more and more people to buy your food, what you will do? 2. Show some sample advertisements. Ask the students to pay more attention to the structure of the sentences and the feature of the language. 3. According to some samples, ask students to summarize the characteristic of words and sentences in English ads, and then summarize the structure of a poster. (设计目的:逐步引入广告写作的话题,呈现一些广告作品和广告词,让学生自己观察、总结、归纳出广告的语言特点和结构特点。提供范例, 引导学生归纳出英语广告的写作框架,为写的训练积累必要的素材。) 4. Skimming. Ask the students to skim the short passage in Ex.1 Page 15, and find out what are the advantages of green food. (设计目的:读是信息输入的重要手段之一,采用泛读方式,引导学生快速捕获所需信息,为写作整理出有利的信息。) Step 3 While-writing (写) Divide the students into groups of four. Give them 5 minutes to design a poster. (设计目的:通过四人小组合作学习的方式来完成广告的设计任务,使学生体验与人合作共事的乐趣,培养其合作意识和创新精神。) Step 4 Post- writing The students display their posters to the whole class by reading them aloud. (设计目的:鼓励学生上台展示自己的成果,相互共享观点。) (最后:最后环节课堂气氛活跃,同学们欣赏着五颜六色的广告纸,听着上台的同学一个接一个朗读着他们的广告语,笑声不断。老师最后的结束语:Do you think they all did a good job? Let’s give a big applause to them for their great performance.) 这堂写作课的总体设计有以下亮点:课堂以学生为主体,以任务为载体,而且每一个任务的下达都是紧紧围绕着“写”这一主题,符合课型特点;在难度上能遵循学生的认知特点,从易到难;授课教师进行了反复的语言输入,这对于写作(综合的语言输出)很必要;教师也很重视写作技巧的指导,如poster写作的框架结构,语言特点的指导。但这堂课的败笔在于,对于学生的习作,精彩在何处,弱点在何处,老师并没有作任何的点评,这就使得他们留在学生脑海中的印象如过眼云烟,所起的作用也就微乎其微了。
对策七:其实对于这样的写作课堂,教师在对写作后的评价环节和写作前的准备工作应该予以同样精心的备课。教师可以对学生习作从主旨大意,篇章结构,语言流畅性,语言准确性,语言的优美性,语言的模仿性,观点的精彩性等各方面全面,系统地或者有目的性地择要进行评价,也可以结合浙江省英语高考卷改错形式的新思路,组织学生进行互评,使学生在课堂中的受益更大。当然,对学生的互评教师应做出相应的指导,如上述案例中,我们如将最后的环节改为:
Step 4 Post-writing 1. In groups, the students check their mistakes in the poster and make assessment. 写作报告评价量表 评价项目 5分:非常符合 4分:比较符合 得分 Items 3分:基本符合 2分:不太符合 1分:不符合 Scores 内容 观点新颖,论证清楚 Contents Good opinion, clear and logical support 1 2 3 4 5 组织 条理清楚,连接词汇使用 Organization Well-organized and make sense 1 2 3 4 5 Appropriate conjunctive words and expressions