2018 Annual Conference of China English Language Education Association (CELEA2018)

157 / 2018-06-29 17:55:50

A Comparative Study Between Chinese Education and English Education in China: Reflections of “Humanities” in Content Teaching

English teaching; Chinese teaching; Humanities

Plenary track > 中国特色英语教学研究

The ultimate goal of English teaching is the unity of instrumentality and humanities. Instrumentality refers to the mastery and application of language, knowledge and ability. Humanities represent the increase of cultural awareness and the development of emotional attitudes. Humanities in English teaching refers to the cultivation of the mind through various ways of exploring the links between language and culture. The current situation in English education in China is that many teachers tend to pay more attention to instrumentality of English rather than humanities. Another challenge for English teaching in China is that of “localization” with special characteristics including learners and contexts both at the macro and at the micro levels. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen the important role of humanities in teaching. With strong focus of humanities, Chinese teaching can provide beneficial reference for English teaching. This paper is based on the cross-cultural communication theory. A systematic content analysis method was employed to reflect the teaching ideas, teaching contents, teaching methods in English teaching from the views of scene setting, classical text setting, discourse teaching, etc. It is hoped that the comparative analysis can give new pedagogical insights for English teaching in China.