摘要：本文论述了在新课程标准的指导下，通过开展英语辩论赛这种活动形式，具体贯彻《课标》精神，在教学中，以学生可持续性发展为目的，力求做到让学生在学习中具有：主动性，独立性，体验性，合作性。并以一堂具体的英语辩论赛为案例，强调此种活动对促进英语教学的积极作用。

关键字：新课标教学理念   英语辩论赛   具体案例   形式   体验   反思

 

笔者在从事高中英语的多年教学中，尤其是近几年新教材的实用过程中，深刻地体会到引导学生用英语组织辩论赛，对其英语口语及语用能力的提高，有着举足轻重的地位。下面我就以下几个方面谈谈活动实施的必要性。

一 、开展英语辩论赛的现实意义

在几年的摸索过程中，使我觉得就以下几个方面来说，辩论赛的在高中英语教学中具有可行性的依据。

1.符合新《课标》的教学理念

《高中英语课程标准》在总目标中，强调根据高中学生认知和发展的特点和学业发展的需求，在进一步发展学生语用能力的基础上，着重提高学生用英语获取信息，处理信息的能力；分析问题和解决问题的能力。特别注重提高学生用英语进行思维和表达的能力，而一场辩论赛从选题，组织到实施每一步都吻合上述要求。在选题上要多渠道地用英语获取，处理信息。组织过程中要涉及到用英语分析和解决问题，实施辩论的过程无一不体现用英语进行思维和表达，为学生创造真实的语境，提供用语言交际的实践的机会，打下坚实的基础。

２.符合中学生身心发展特点和个性需求

当代中学生敢拼，善闯，勇于进取，却又标新立异，善于张扬个性，接受新生事物较快，头脑灵活，不愿墨守成规，而在这日新月异的时代背景下，获取信息和展示自我的途径很多，等等这些都为当代中学生的发展提供了广阔的空间，就他们学英语来说，用英语开展辩论赛为他们展示个人风采，语用能力，思维反应，团队协作等无疑提供了一个充满挑战和刺激的阵地。

 

二 、怎样实施英语辩论赛

1．选题要科学

辩论是源于讨论而又高于讨论的一种形式，它对学生的思维能力，口头表达能力，知识视野有更高的要求，在课堂教学中适当组织一些辩论赛，有利于学生自主学习。要想让辩论赛有效地开展，话题的选择是重点，所选择的话题最好来源于教材，来源于生活，让学生有熟悉感，有话可说，避免学生的畏难情绪。这样才能为学生提供运用所学语言的机会并能达到提高语言技能的目的，同时，确保每一次的辩论赛后，学生能陶冶情操，增强环保意识或社会责任感等。

2．指导要到位

一场辩论总要围绕一个什么中心，同时要达到一个什么目的，作为教师此时的任务是指导得当，既要提供辩论赛的组织模式，又要引导他们搜寻什么范畴的材料；既要放手让他们通过多种途径查询资料，又要确保辩论的过程能控制自如，学生是主体，教师是起引导的作用，应引导学生在围绕话题进一步探索或进行辨证思考。通过话题面上的扩展，主观意义上的深入或不同观点的对比，激发学生主动探索，深入学习和勇于创新的意识，同时，在引导学生在准备和组织的过程中，自觉不自觉地运用语言知识，在真实的语言环境下练习和巩固已有的语言技能，从而达到形式是为内容服务的，辩论只是语言运用的载体。从而培养他们用什么工具学习，通过什么途径去收集有价值资料的能力。

3．时间要充裕

一场辩论赛要想得于展开并顺利进行，逻辑严密的内容阐述至关重要，而现在高中生普遍感到时间紧，课业繁多。可内容的准备涉及到查阅大量的资料，有去阅览室查阅相关报刊杂志，有去图书馆借阅相应的图书资料，有上网查寻，再到材料的整理和制作，因有的同学为了确保辩论的质量制作了图片展，制作了幻灯片，所以一个辩题通常要提前两个星期布置，确保达到预期的目的。

4．分工要明确

选好正反方各一名代表，可以是一辩，由他们把全班分成正，反方，再从正反方选出另三名辩手，正反方所有的人都参与准备组织材料，辩手负责收集整理，并把整理后的材料再进一步明确给自己所在方的所有成员，让大家做到知己知彼，百战不殆。

5．要有评委

相对于学生来说，年龄特征决定他们具有很强的好胜心理，一场辩论后总希望能决一雌雄，而胜负的决夺又能促进他们运用英语的欲望，从而又能增长他们学英语的兴趣，所以评委的权威性同时也是促进兴趣的一个保障，因此通常邀请教研组，备课组的老师，和高年极的同学参与。条件允许的话偶尔也邀请政教处的领导参与从而保证评委的真实和权威。让学生有被肯定的，被认可的成就感。

6．要有评价尺度

评委选好后，通过什么尺度来批判，让学生感到公平，公正。建立科学而行之有效的评分杠杆也很重要。我在实施和操作的过程中摸索出一些评价标准，如下图所示：

 

 

三、一场具体的辩论赛案例：

 Moot：  Which is more important?  Developing economy or protecting the environment.

１.    Aims:

(1) To encourage students to open their mouths in class to change the tranditional “Dumb English Study Method of the students”

(2) To change their studying in a passive way into an active way.

(3) To improve their skills in English speaking especially to develop their rebuttal capabilities in English.

(4) To help students to build up the sense of cooperation and learn by themselves out of class.

2.  Place:  The medium classroom

Debater:  class 6 senior 2

Time:     Nov. 11 2005

Chairman: Hou  Wenjing,  a student in charge of  English study

list of  Debaters:

 

Debaters	Affirmative	Negative
1	Ma Ling	Zhang  Changshuai
2	Li  Haiyan	Wang Kai
3	Zhou Jie	Xu Kai
4	Bi Yungui	Znou  Yuan

 

 Judges:  Cheng  Guoping,  Xu Ning,

 Yu Cheng,  Ma  Qing.

3. Procedures:

The students get information needed ahead from the school library PC or other medias. The teacher comes into the classroom and gives a brief introduction to the moot: which is more important? Developing economy or protecting the environment? as a prologue.

T: Hello, boys and girls, As is known to all, with the development of economy in our country more and more factories have been built but at the same time more and more wastes have been poured out, the environment has been polluted already, so someone says developing  economy is important: someone says protecting the environment is more important.  We will have a debate on it.

Now let’ s welcome our chairman: Miss Hou Wenjing

Chairman: Good afternoon, everyone! It’s my great honour to host this debate. Developing economy is very important in our country, but the environment protecting is also important. For our country and all over the world, here I won’t make any personal comments on which is more important or how to balance each other, because there are two teams who are going to have a debate on it and you will, of course, get a reasonable and satisfactory answer. Ok, I would like to introduce the debaters of two sides. Ma Ling the Affimative leader, seated on the left will star the debate followed by Li Haiyan, Zhou Jie, Bi Yungui, on the right, sit Wang Kai,Xu Kai, Zhong Yuan, Zhang Changshuai, who are the leader ,the 2nd  3rd and fourth debater respectively of the  Negative. The judges are: Mr Xuning, Mr Cheng Guoping, Miss Fu Ying, Miss Yu Cheng ,Mr Zhang Ning will help to record the debate, well, I declare the debate begins. First, Ma Ling , please state your view.(Ma Ling stands up and states his view)

Ｍa Ling: Good afternoon, as we know , what is the most important thing in our life? It is “health”. If we are in poor health, everything has no meaning; If we want to have good health, we must protect the environment. In modern society, people make money heart ant soul, more and more people are rich but they may not be happy, because the environment is bad for their health. Though they have a lot of money, they can not buy health back. So, we must protect the environment first. Developing economy is important, but protecting the environment is more important. For example, acid rain, green house and so on make the earth worse and worse. Harmful gas into the land，too many kinds of animals die. In a word, protecting the environment is more important than developing economy.

Chairman: Good, The “Negative” leader, Zhang Changshuai, please state your opinion.

Zhang Changshuai: Economy is more important for our modern life, with the development of economy, we can spend more money in protecting the environment. All people in our time think we should develop economy first, the reasons are: Happiness lies first in health. If we want to keep our bodies healthy, we should study medicine, we should do the experiment, trying to find something to cure diseases, all these need money, without it, we can’t do anything，if it is when we do something to develop economy, we pollute the environment at the same time, we feel sorry, but if we have enough money, we can do something to protect the environment, to do something to make the surrounding more beautiful, more comfortable for us to live. You know, if you want to make people have knowledge about protecting the environment, they should be educated, but education needs money too. So we think we should first develop economy. Developing economy is more important than protecting the environment. If a country has no money, it means that she’s poor, she will have no international position. There will be diseases, wars, voilence there.

Chairman: Well, now, there are two different opinions on developing economy or protecting the environment. Now it’s time for the two sides to ask questions each other freely.

Li Haiyan: (possitive): Excuse me, In order to broaden selling and make more money, some businessman would rather destroy the environment, they cut down lots of trees, destroy animal’s home, which makes the environment unbalance, human bings will also lose their homes. How do your think it is more important to develop economy ?

Wang Kai ( Negative): This problem is surely serious, but when we develop economy, we’ll try our best to avoid damaging the environment, if we have enough money, we could do something to prevent the pollution, we’ll spend more money in doing experiment. You know, the developed countries, they’re rich, they can spend more money protecting the environment for example, America, Switssland...

Zhou Jie (positive): Once water is polluted, it will lead too many diseases. You know, if the disease spread out, it will destroy people’s lives. Healthy body is the base of everything. If you’re infected disease, you’ll face to die, how can you develop economy?

XuKai (Negative): I’ll ask you, why in some African countries, more people get disease, more people lost their lives? We think, because they are poor, they have no money to do something to keep their people to cure disease, they have no money to help people get education to form good habit,so, here, at the moment, we still think developing economy is more important.

Bi Yinggui ( Positive): I want to ask you a question, why so many countries in the world spend much money improving the environment. You know, in our country, Nan Jing, our government, spent more than 200,000,000yuan in dealing with the polluted Qing Huai river, Why? Let me tell you, because if the environment was polluted badly, we can’t develop economy for a long time, you have to stop because of lacking something helpful for developing. For example: materials, powers, and so on.

Zhongyuan (Negative) Ya! you say, we spend200,000,000yuan in dealing with the polluted Qinghuai river, it’s great, if we have no money, if the water polluted by people’s bad daily life habit, if we have no money to do this, you know, in poor areas, pollution also exists, but they can’t deal with it ,they have to get along with it ,so people get disease and die. If we have money, we can invite the best scientist to work out the methods to do with something about polluting the environment, because we have money, we can let the water in Qing Huai river be clean and more people want to visit there. This will help to develop the tourism, if the tourism is developing, more people will find jobs, people around the city will have a rich and comfortable life.

Chairman; Now, the debaters of each other have stated their opinions already, but because we are in class, we want more students take active part in this debate. Now, let’s ask questions to the other group.

Questions in positive group are:

1.As we know, blood made a lot of people die, Why ? When we develop economy, we don’t protect the environment. So, today, we lost more than we get. So, I think protecting the environment is the first.

2.Japan is a developed country, in Japan, protecting the environment is the most important thing, they protect the environment all the time, so they get richer and richer. They also have a good environment, people in their country are rich and healthy, the environment is better, how do you think?

3.The environment, the biggest thing of it may be all of the earth. The earth, which gives us life but it can also let us disappear from it. If you’re facing to get disease, facing to die, how can you develop economy?

The statements in Negative group are:

Why in the 1930s, Japan captured our country and cause millions of people die, because we were poor.

 It’s known to all, China belongs to the third world, why? America belongs to the first world, why? What are the differences between the first world and the third world?

 Do you agree on that if we want to protect the environment, we must have enough money, without money, how to protect the environment in a scientific way?

 (In each group, more students take an active part in this debate, they’re excited, they can’t help stating because they want their group win. In this time, they’re very active. Here, I only give some questions and examples ).

Chairman: We are unexpected that you debate so excitedly. How time flies! Now it’s time for both sides to conclude your opinions.

Li Haiyan (positive): The environment is a place that we live in. In other words, it is a part of our lives, economy is to human beings what the fruits are to a tree, but environment is to human beings what roots are to a tree. If we have a good and beautiful environment, economy will be developed fast, if it is polluted, on the contrary, we can’t develop economy. Petrol, coal and natural gas come from nature and they play an important role in developing economy. In other side, if we pay no more attention to economy than the environment, the environment will be polluted, such as, air pollution, water pollution and so on. It’s said that air pollution causes more than 2.7 million deaths in the world every year. As we know, the smoke in London, the government spent much more money in cleaning the air. So if we want to make the economy develop, we must take care of the environment. Environment is more important, let’s build a better society in harmony with nature. We will have a better tomorrow. That’s all. Thank you!

Wang Kai (Negative): We still believe that money can make our life better, we can’t live without money. If we have no money, we can’t protect the environment better, money can improve people’s education, then people’s minds of protecting the environment will be improved. It can also improve the international status of a country, it can also keep a society stable. The military affairs are based on economy too. The theme today is peace and developing in modern society, so developing economy is more important than protecting the environment, but with the development of economy, we should find out a scientific way in harmony with the environment.

Chairman: After a heated debate on the moot, the result comes out that the winner is the “positive” and Xu Kai is the best debater, congratulations. Now, Miss Song, our English teacher, please give some remarks on today’s debate as a conclusion.

T: First, let me congratulate to the winners. I’m very pleased to see all the debaters performed very well, and all the students take an active part in it. You search for information after class, which shows that all of you have the sense of cooperation, so you may also enjoy and share the process of the debate. No matter who win, both of you debate fiercely, I think the theme of the English debate contest in this class have already shown: You’re self-confident, you have the sense of cooperation, but you also find some shortages, sometimes you have the ideas, but you can’t express them freely in English, so, you must practise spoken English after class, and broaden your vocabulary, this debate is successful. After this class, you will see the table for marks, you’ll make yourself perfect next time.( That’s all)

四、关于在高中英语教学中开展辩论塞的几点思考

几个学期实验下来，每当我回忆起一场场成功的辩论场景和学生们意气风发，激扬文字的精神面貌时，笔者深深地感受到在教学中应该开展这项活动。

1．符合《新课标》对高中生能力培养的要求

《新课标》要求在教学实施过程中，培养学生①用英语获取和处理信息的能力②用英语分析问题和解决问题的能力以及批评性思维的能力③在人际交往中得体地使用语言的能力。英语辩论赛的开展都能具体地体现这些能力。

2．以活动为载体，激发了学生学习英语的兴趣

在每次的辩论赛中教师都能有意外的惊喜，最让我难于忘却的是每当进行到让双方组员自由提问和辩论时，学生们的热情可谓是空前高涨和激烈，英语基础好的同学思想深刻，语言流畅优美，思维敏捷；基础薄弱的同学，要想听懂，就得高度地集中注意力并不断请教同学，并用中文为组员出谋划策，为不能张显自我而遗憾，为下次能慷慨激扬而卯足了劲。为了能够让本组获胜，为了让自己的论点论据深刻，他们是如此地团结，如此地协作，让作为教师的我感到：一个活动的开展，既增强了他们的自信，协作的意识，同时也促进了他们想学英语尤其想用英语进行交际的愿望，对英语的教学开展具有一定的反拨作用。

3．对教师的要求

在整个辩论赛的准备，组织和实施的过程中，教师不是简单的知识传播者，而是设计者，指导者，参与和评价者，从而对教师的自身素质要求较高，对我们教师也是一个挑战，要接受这个挑战，教师应做到：

u    拥有丰富而又多元的背景知识。

u    能有自如而又流畅的语言驾驭能力。

u    要有很强的组织，指导能力。

u    不断提升自身人格魅力，陶冶自身情操。

u    驾轻就熟的多媒体使用能力。

u    要能建立合理的奖励机制，让辩论和奖励有机地结合。

一场成功的辩论凝聚着众人的汗水，体现了团队协作精神和团结互助的意识，同时也激发了学生的求知欲望，锻炼了他们解决问题，分析问题的能力，为了激励他们更好地完成辩论，通常一场辩论赛后，我都有一定的奖励形式，最常用的是欣赏原版英文影片，让他们感受英语的使用语境，从而更好地促进他们了解英美文化，培养他们得体使用英语的能力。

总之，在英语教学中，合理而又恰当地穿插几场辩论赛，既符合《新课标》的要求，同时又能提高教师的综合能力，又能巩固所学语言知识，更能激发学生应用英语的强烈欲望，从而真正达到用英语进行交际的目标。

                          

    参考文献：教育部《2004英语课程标准（实验）》人民教育出版社