生态系统理论下的中国西部地区过渡型双语教学模式研究

【摘要】 在经济全球化的现实需求引领下以及国家教育部相关政策的推动下，全国很多高校开设了多种多样的双语课程。特别是在我国发达地区的各重点高校，开设双语课程，开展双语教学活动成为推动我国高等教育与国际高等教育接轨的重要举措。与发达地区的双语教育实践比较来看，我国西部地区的双语教学效果并不太令人满意。部分高校照搬发达地区重点大学的双语教学模式，使双语教师在实践过程中遇到很多困难，双语教学开展失败的例子也时有发生。于是，人们不禁要问到底哪种双语教学模式才是适合中国西部高校的双语教学模式？我们又要从哪个视角来衡量该双语教学模式是否适合中国西部高校双语教学的开展？根据Bronfenbrenner (1979)的生态系统模型，双语教学可以看成是由宏观、外观、中观、微观四个层面组成的生态系统，而双语课堂教学则是这个生态圈中的微观生态系统。在这个由多因子(老师、学生、教学资源等)组成的微观生态系统中，探索实现双语教学生态平衡的双语教学模式，受到越来越多的学者关注。本文从教育生态学视角，用生态学的整体观、系统观、平衡观等原则，考察适合中国西部学生的双语教学模式。本研究以《国际关系》课程为例，在四川外国语大学国际关系学院开展对过渡型双语教学模式的调查，旨在从教师、学生、教材三个方面入手，研究过渡型双语教学模式在中国西部双语教学课堂中的应用效果。在研究过程中，笔者主要采用了问卷调查法、访谈法以及课堂观察法这三种调查方法。通过对调查结果的分析，发现在目前我国西部的高校双语教学中，过渡型双语教学模式基本符合教师、学生以及教材的要求，保持了双语教学的生态平衡。通过研究过渡型双语教学模式对中国西部双语教学生态环境的适切性，旨在为我国西部高校的双语教学指明方向。本文还分析了目前我国西部高校双语教学中存在的问题，并针对这些问题提出了合理的建议，对今后西部高校的双语教学具有一定的指导意义。
 
【关键词】 双语教学； 生态平衡； 过渡型双语教学模式； 生态系统模型；

Chapter One Introduction

1.1 Research Background

Bilingual education has a long history in many nations and regions, such asCanada, the United States, Germany, Hong Kong and Macau. Bilingual educationincludes all activities of school education, like teaching in classroom, school activities,school environment, contacts between the teacher and students and so on. It is aconcept including a wide range of social, economic, cultural and political factors andthe term bilingual education is just a simple label for a complex phenomenon (Cazden& Snow, 1990). Bilingual instruction is a term originating from bilingual education,referring to a basic means for implementing bilingual education (Huang Chongling,2008, pp. 137-139). Bilingual instruction in China is an exclusive name for the newteaching pattern which refers to teaching content subjects, i.e., mathematics or physics,through the medium of English and Chinese.

Since the policy titled strengthening undergraduate teaching to improve teachingquality in colleges and universities issued by Ministry of Education in China inOctober 2001, many universities began to promote the bilingual courses amongvarious academic disciplines (Gui Shichun, 2004, pp. 47-51). Especially in the field ofinformation technology, biological technology, finance and law, and academicdisciplines which have relatively fixed representations, semantic and terminologies,bilingual courses such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology and computerscience, have been greatly developed (Hu Zhuanglin, 2004, pp. 4-8). In places likeGuangzhou, Changchun and Hangzhou, national bilingual teaching seminars wereheld annually during the last 4 years (Zheng Dahu & Dai Weihua, 2013, pp. 54-61).Researches on bilingual instruction have gained high visibility in certain developed region of China.

Compared with the rapid development in these developed areas, the situation ofbilingual courses in the undeveloped western region of China is lagged behind (2008, pp. 132-135). Liu points out that in the underdeveloped region, bilingualcourses are carried out comparatively late, qualified teachers are not enough and anumber of students have a weak sense of language. Bilingual instruction in the west isin trouble and even in a stagnant situation (Fan Hailong & Shan Yanyan, 2012, pp.156-157). Bilingual teachers encounter many difficulties in practice, and feeldepressed towards the future of bilingual instruction in the west. According to asurvey conducted by the author, most bilingual teachers in western universities feltconfused towards the choice of bilingual instruction modes.

1.2 Significance of the Study

This thesis is of both theoretical and practical significance.

Firstly, the present study views from the perspective of ecological education toexamine the bilingual instruction mode. Previous studies have been done from variousperspectives, taking factors of external environment, the curriculum design and thelinkage to other subjects into consideration. In fact, the choice of a bilingualinstruction mode does not depend on any individual element only, but involvesenvironmental transactions. This enables the present study to see from the perspectiveof Bronfenbrenner’s ecosystem model (1979), which has an appropriate theoreticalbasis for the analysis. Utilizing the nested ecosystem model to analyze bilingualinstruction in the western region of China, the bilingual classroom can be regarded asa microsystem. Factors that involved in the microsystem do not exist isolatedanymore but being integrated into a biological system. This is of great the oretical significance.

Chapter Two Literature Review

This chapter serves as a review of previous studies on bilingual instruction modes.The literature review of the thesis is divided into four parts. The first part is a generalintroduction about bilingual education and bilingual instruction, including the history,definition and practices in foreign countries and in China. The second part presentsdifferent modes of bilingual instruction home and abroad and analyzes existingapplications of bilingual instruction modes in different areas of China. Then in thethird part, educational ecology and Bronfenbrenner’s ecosystem model (1979) isintroduced. The last part makes comments on the limitations of previous studies andfinally draws a summary of the whole.

2.1 A Clarification of Different Concepts

2.1.1 Bilingual Education

To have a better understanding of the meaning and characteristics of bilingualinstruction, it is necessary to clarify what the term bilingual education refers to.

From a historical perspective, bilingual phenomenon occurs because of theexistence of different languages and the practical communication needs of themulti-ethnic society (Cummins, 2006, pp. 64-67). It is a result of the history andreality. After the 1950s, studies on bilingual education began to rise in the academicfield, including the establishment of many national and transnational researchinstitutions and the publication of a large number of related articles and books(Yamashita, 2008, pp. 661-672). One of the most famous institutions is theInternational Bureau of Education (IBE), and there are many world famous scholarsin this institution like Professor W. F. Mackey from Canada and Professor MigualSiguan from Spain. Their publication of the book Education and Bilingualism markedthe birth of bilingual education as a separate academic field and established a basicframework for researches of this field.

Bilingual education is a comprehensive, cross-cultural and interdisciplinary study(Cummins, 2010, pp. 77-79). Bilingual education has a long history in many countriesand regions, such as Canada, theUnited States, Singapore, Malaysia, Luxembourg,South Africa, Finland, India, Switzerland, Germany, Hong Kong and Macau. Incountries like Switzerland, Singapore, Luxembourg and regions like Macao,tri-lingual and four-language education is also on the way.

Colin Baker (2002), one of the most well-known scholars in the field of bilingualeducation, indicates that the meaning for the term bilingual education is ambiguous.On one hand it means the education of those who are already speakers of twolanguages, on the other hand it refers to the education of those who are learningadditional languages.

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