References 18

1. Introduction

Over the past decades, the student-centered teaching approach has become an inevitable trend of the times, and should develop with times and innovate with social development.

1.1 The Request of The Full-time Compulsory Education English Curriculum Standards(2011)

New English Curriculum Standards (2011) advocates quality-oriented education and all-round learning. And the development of students’ communicative competence is the ultimate goal of English education. With respect to the new curriculum standard, traditional lecturing and rote learning are to give way to student-centered teaching methods, such as small group work, discovery methods, and project-based inquiries.

1.2 The Influence of the Constructivist Learning Theory

During the past decennia, a wide range of new teaching methods came up due to the influence of the constructivist learning theory, which defined learning as an “active process in which learners are active sense makers who seek to build coherent and organized knowledge(Mayer,2004)” . This constructivist learning theory acted as a source for the development of student-centered approaches, which were described by Cannon and Newble(2000) as “ways of thinking about teaching and learning that emphasize student responsibility and activity in learning rather than content or what the teachers are doing ”.

1.3 The Importance of Student-Centered Teaching

Generally, student-centered learning is a form of study in which students have the primary responsibility for planning, carrying out, and evaluating their own learning experiences, rather than being passive recipients of knowledge as instructed by teachers’ direction. That is, the student-centered perspective focuses on ‘what learners do’ and ‘why they think they are doing it’, rather than ‘what the teacher does’. 

In recent years, much of the research has recognized the importance of student-centered learning and gives priority to a more student-centered approach rather than a strong emphasis on teacher control as a content-developer. And over the past decades, numerous attempts have been made to optimize students’ approaches to learning towards deep, meaningful learning by means of implementing student-centered teaching methods. However, these efforts have not always been successful. Inducing a deep approach to learning seems to be quite difficult.

1.4 The Existing Problems in Operating Student-Centered Teaching

It is well known that though it is often noted that students should develop responsibility for their own learning, this can be a more challenging task for teachers. There are a lot of English teachers who have attempted to adopt student-centered teaching model in EFL classroom，and acquire some experience，but some existing problem still impede the operation of student-centered teaching in EFL classroom.

Firstly, the education in China has been afflicted by the examination-oriented system. All the students are assessed according to the same criteria and the single criteria for both teaching and learning is the scores of the students．Only those who get good scores are considered “good” students and will be able to go on for further study in prestigious schools．However, it may come out that these students are only good at declarative knowledge but very weak in the use of the language, that is, communicative competence. Because of the examination-oriented education system，English teachers have to consume time on lecturing to improve the scores on the test paper of students’. Even though the new curriculum standard was issued, the influences of the examination-oriented education system cannot be eliminated entirely.

Secondly, because most of the time in the EFL classroom is devoted to word-for-word explanation, the communication between students and teachers or between classmates is not much. And the class is dominated by the teacher, while the students are only becoming passive recipients. However, face-to- face interaction in EFL classroom is very significant for students. For example: Interaction in group work, provides a basis for language acquisition．It also gives students a chance to practice in communicating and negotiating meanings in establishing positive rapport，in maintaining a conversation with appropriate conventions and，at the same time，allows them to establish how well they can understand and at make themselves understood. In lessons where reading and writing are the focus of communicative activity, work in groups also has substantial value．For example．If students collaborate while revising drafts of writing，they can suggest improvements，correct errors，and generally act as editors while reading each other’s work．