语境理论在高中英语阅读教学中的应用(英文)
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语文学刊・外话教育教学 2010年第9期 Applying Context to the Teaching of English Reading o Sun Di (Affiliated High School to Inner Mongolia Normal University,Huhhot,Inner Mongolia,010022) 【Abstract] 耶1e teaching of English reading is all important component in the English teaching of semor high schoo1.Combining theory of context in functional linguistics with cognitive context in pragmatics,the essay did a research in education from a new angle.Through the analyses,I hope the essay can offer some new ideas for the teaching of En sh reading comprehension in senior high school through the using of the theory. [Key words] Context;Reading accuracy;Reading speed [中图分类号]H319.3 [文献标识码]A [文章编号]1672-8610(2010)09-0160-02 I。Introduction Context is an important concept in hnguistics。It refers to the environment in which language is used.Specific context Call influence the conveyance of meaning of words,sentences,para— graphs and even texts in the particular language environment. Context is often divided into linguistic context and non—lin— guistic context by many overseas scholars and domestic scholars. Linguistic context is the inner—linguistic factors that influence the meaning of language.On the other hand,non—linguistic context refers to the extra—-linguistic factors that affect the prac・- tieal use of language in the particular context.They influence and restrict langu ̄e meaning from two diferent aspects.In the  ̄Howiag part,the author will analyze the application of context in the teaching of English reading of senior high school from the two aspects separately. II.The Application of Linguistic Context 2.1 Inferring the Meanings of New Words There are often many complains that there are to many new words in the reading materials,and the most usual way for students to get the meaning of new words is consulting the dic— tionary or the electile dictionary,which cost them much time and energy.As we know,English vocabulary is very great,so meet— ing with new words is quite natura1.If you took up.the dictionary whenever a new word appears,reading will become an extremely boring job.In the end,you would probably lose your patience In fact,when readers meet the unfamiliar werds,they can infer the meanings of new words by making use of context.According to the general principle of semantic co—occurrence,a word must be semantically consistent with the elements surrounding it,that is to say,the interpretation of certain element in the text is de・ pendent on that of another;from this aspect,we can infer the meaning of a new word by means of cohesion,f0r example:there [作者简介]孙迪,内蒙古师范大学附属中学教师。 一160一 is a paragraph in the pass ̄e. The polluted air becomes poisonous and dangerous to heal£b. One way to get rid of the polluted air is to build a car that does not polute.That is what several of the large car factories have been trying to do.But to build a clean air is easier said than done.Progress in this field has been slow. Some students do not know about the meaning of get rid of in the passage.But everybody knows that polution is bad for us. So from the former paragraph and the other sentences in this par- agraph,we can know that get rid of may be has the sanle mean- ing of giving up.So from the analysis ofother sentences,we van get the meaning of unfamiliar words and phrases.It would not afect the understanding of the whole passage. Inferring the meaning of a new word by studying its context is a quite useful reading skil1.It can solve our problem and pre- vent us form wasting too much time.At the sanle time,it can also help us to learn more new words.The students should try to get rid of their habits of relying on dictionaries,and develop their capabilities of reasoning and thinking on purpose. 2.2 Anticipating the Coming Content of Reading Material Another important ability in the process of reading is Antici— paring ability.Halliday values it greatly(Iju Chendan,1999). While reading,the leaders would sometimes stop and ask them— selves such a question“What would happen next”,and then find out the answers to it on the basis of analy ̄ng the preceding part of the text.Anticipation has two direct advantages.First,it helps you to check and deepen your understanding of the text; second,it speeds up your reading.For example,when you have read the first few lines of a text,you could guess what would happen next according to the given information.If what follows in the text corresponds with your judgment,you will gain more con— fidence and have more desire to go on;if it goes against your guessing,you will try to find out what is wrong with your reason—
TEACHING RESEARCH Sun Di/Applying Context to the Teaching of English Reading ing and then correct your mistake,which could deepen your un— derstanding of the text.The capability and habit of anticipation is quite useful to the students.and it must depend on the informa. tion supplied by the linguistic context.In our teaching practice, we should not only make the students realize the importance of anticipation but also teach them how to do it by making use of eontext. Ⅲ.The Application of Non—linguistic Context Reading comprehension is also influenced by the non—-lin・・ guistic ones besides the linguistic factors.Non—linguistic con- text refers to the extra—linguistic factors that affect the practical use of language. Although a book,even a paragraph usually just tells a story or just talks about a problem,the historical anecdotes,cultures and customs,science knowledge,even the background or view- points of the writer cannot be clearly known to everyone.That is why sometimes the readers still feel quite puzzled the language of alI article seems easy,the readers still feel quite puzzled even though the article is quite simple.Therefore,it is the teacher’s duty to enable the students to connect the meaning of a reading material with the non—linguistic factors it touches upon.Only in this way could tIle students understand what they are reading exactly and deeply.We can apply it in English reading in the following ways: 3.1 Reducing the Cultural Diferences between the Reader and the Wrher ‘‘Any actual context of situation that has brought a text into being,is not just a random jumble of ̄amres but a totality that typically go together in the culture.People do these things on these occasions and attach meanings and values to them:this is what a culture is”(Halliday&Hasan,1985).That is to say all the faetom constituting the context of culture“determine,collec- tively.the way the text is interpreted in its context of situations” (ttaliday&Hasan,1985).So it is helpful to build in some knowledge of cultural background.From this aspect,we know the teacher’s task is to introduce background knowledge con- cerned and students themselves also ought to broaden the scope of knowledge. And sometimes we can rely on the context of culture to get the implied meaning.In the teaching practice,the teacher should encourage the students to enlarge their world knowledge, especially the knowledge about the western cultures,customs, historical anecdotes and habits,etc.In this way,the cultural difie:rences between the East and the West could be reduced and lessened.Cuhum1 difierence is fl serious barrier of the mutual understanding between the Westerners and Chinese people.In order to break through this barrier,the students should pay atten— tion to the accumulation of the knowledge in this field.However, only mastering the knowledge is not su ̄cient,they should also learn to apply the knowledge in their reading practice. 3.2 Appreciating the Reading Material While reading,the poems and literary works can trigger the reader to see more and more things,letting the reader have hundreds of imaginations and make thousands of inferences so that the reading can enrich his/her cognitive knowledge.And these imaginations,inferences and cognition are based on the shared knowledge and mutual manifest assumptions between the author and the reader.,I'llat is to say,in the reading process,the reader takes advantage of all kinds of his own memorized sehe- matic knowledge to fully appreciate the literature works(Zhang Qi,2003). I11e process is not just simply.encoding and deco— ding,but is cognitive inference and complete comprehension. Reading comprehension is a complicated cognitive psycho— logical process.We should master the information processing印一 proaeh,and combine what we have learned from the reading ma- terial witIl our memori ̄d schemata in our cognitive environment. Then the writer and the readerwill have mutual tacit agreement, mutual manifest cognitive information,and mutual manifest infe ̄ ences. Not all aspects of reading comprehension can be used at the s ̄qle time;diferent students may use diferent kinds of context for comprehending the same text. 语境理论在高中英语阅读教学中的应用 别、迪 (内蒙古师范大学附属中学,内蒙古呼和浩特010022) [摘 要] 英语阅读教学是高中英语教学的一个重要组成部分。本文试从一个新的角度,把系统功能语言 学的语境理论和语用学中的认知语境相结合来分析语境是如何通过显性和隐性手段共同作用于阅读教学中的语 篇理解的,从而证实语境理论的使用能够帮助学生提高阅读理解能力,希望可以为高中阶段英语阅读教学提供新 的思路。 [关键词] 语境; 阅读速度; 阅读准确率 一