Integrating Chinese Culture into English Teaching: A Case Study of Oxford English for Junior High Schools

Abstract

The Compulsory Education English Curriculum Standard (2011 edition) pointed out that cultural awareness is one of five major curriculum objectives of the English subject. Learners of foreign language not only can decode the cultural connotation of the target language, but also can proficiently express the contents in their mother language using a foreign language.  Textbooks as the major source for students to gain culture-related knowledge matter much for the cultivation of culture awareness. This paper selected Oxford English for Junior High Schools (Jiangsu Edition) as the research subject, using literature research method, and quantitative analysis method to tackle the following questions:What Chinese culture is involved in the unit topics and contents of Oxford English for Junior High Schools (Jiangsu Edition)? Which cultural teaching methods can be applied to classroom teaching? How to apply cultural teaching methods to English teaching? Research findings show that the Chinese culture in this textbook has a high frequency of appearance and is rich in topics, which has a certain role in cultivating students’ cross-cultural identity and communication skills. However, there are inadequate complete passages about Chinese culture, and the presentation of Chinese culture is superficial. Thus, the author proposed three specific cultural teaching strategies: cultural introduction, cultural integration and cultural contrast, so as to better integrate Chinese culture into the Junior High Schools English class.