5.2 The Main problems of the Application of Phonics 12

5.3 Some Suggestions for the Application of Phonics 12

6. Conclusion 14

References 15

1. Introduction

1.1 The Background of the Research 

Nowadays, in China, IPA (International Phonetic Alphabets) instruction and phonics instruction are two main pronunciation teaching instructions adopted in English classroom. At the turning of 20th and 21st century, English course began to be set up in primary school education. The first most wildly-used method for teaching English pronunciation is teaching phonetic symbols from IPA. This instruction has played a significant role in pronunciation teaching for a long time in China. However, IPA instruction has its own limitations. Many students have problems to master this complex phonetic system. Even though, IPA instruction is still the most welcomed and widely-used method used to develop students’ abilities of reading and spelling in China at present. After the curriculum reform, the new English teaching materials contain more contents and vocabulary than the old materials. This brings some difficulties to the English teaching and learning. In primary schools, English vocabulary teaching focuses on its listening, speaking, reading, and writing. In the preliminary stage, teachers spend most of time in training and cultivating students’ capacities of listening and speaking as well as arousing students’ interests in English learning. On the contrary, the importance of students’ capacities of reading and writing are not attached to at that time. Students are required to spell and write the words and sentences when they are in higher grades. However, they don’t have adequate abilities to distinguish the pronunciation and to spell the words. Many students found it difficult to remember the vocabulary because they can’t make full use of IPA. Therefore, a lot of students rely on rote memorizing, but it turn out to be ineffective. In the long term, students lose their interests and self-confidence in English learning more or less. These negative emotions thereby affect their learning effectiveness and it becomes a vicious circle. Many teachers and researchers are trying to find a way to break this logjam. At that time, IPA instruction has been challenged by another instruction, phonics instruction. It is an approach that teaches the sound-letter correspondences of English words and has played its part in the U. K. and U. S. A. in the past few years. And it turns out to be much easier for students to acquire. However, there still is a controversial question among the discussion, that is, whether the application of phonics in literacy teaching facilitates students’ learning to read and write or not. In this paper, this question will be discussed and I hope it can offer some referential value in promoting primary school English teaching and learning.

1.2 The Significance of Researching in Phonics Teaching

The research concentrates on the phonics that is related to the theory and its application. Phonics allows students to read what is written and recognize what is read. It is a novel instruction in teaching pronunciation, and has its significant meanings. Carrying out this study may be beneficial in following aspects: First of all, there are some key researches about phonics at home and abroad. Conducting the study may make a little contribution to a new area concerning its application. Secondly, this research paper aims to discuss whether phonics can improve students’ pronunciation, which may shed light on primary school English teaching. Thirdly, the role that “affection” plays in promoting English teaching and learning will also be discussed in this research paper. Using phonics to arouse students’ interest and make them more active in learning English. All in all, the research hopes to provide primary school English teachers with some useful referential opinions in teaching pronunciation and spelling.