从主题到主旨:聚焦"学得"

从主题到主旨：聚焦“学得”

——高三英语阅读课教学改进的探索

一、案例背景

《高中英语课程标准》指出，英语教学目标之一是“在进一步发展学生综合语言运用能力的基础上，着重提高学生用英语获取信息、处理信息、分析问题和解决问题的能力”。国家教育部考试中心颁布的《普通高等学校招生全国统一考试英语科说明》，对阅读理解能力测试的第一条要求是：掌握所读材料的主旨和大意，以及用以说明主旨和大意的事实和细节。因此，在英语教学中，围绕“概括文章的主旨大意”，重视培养学生相应的阅读能力与技巧，势在必行。

在英语考试中，我校学生在阅读上的失分现象比较普遍，主旨大意题的错误率尤其高。学生经常反映，不会归纳主旨大意，部分学生不知道什么是主题句，大部分学生在确定主题句时，机械地把主题句定为段首句，或段尾句或中间句，而对于隐含在字里行间的主题信息缺乏思考和分析，因而未能灵活领会大意。同时，由于对归纳篇章的主旨大意，平时训练欠缺或不足，多以试卷中的测试题取而代之，导致学生把握篇章主旨大意的能力较弱。 我校打造“学得课堂”行动，以学生“学得了、学得到、学得好”为追求目标，强调学生对通过自己的实践体验、感悟，或通过归纳、演绎、实验而“学得”的知识，才会理解深刻并能较好运用。基于这一理念，以及针对我校学生的英语学习现状，我上了一堂题为“How to locate the topic sentence and summarize the main idea”的阅读课，试图做些探索和尝试，旨在引导学生通过自主梳理、自行概括，以掌握最基本的归纳主旨的方法，即寻找主题句并能学会用自己的语言来概括主旨。

二、教学过程

这节课的教学进程是：引入话题——寻找主题句（解决位置问题）——辨别主旨（通过语段阅读，做选择题）——尝试自己写段落的主旨——尝试自己写文章的主旨。教学设计的思路是：聚焦“学得”，由易到难，层层递进，环环相扣，让学生在实践探究中获得知识，提高能力。

【教学片断一】

在“寻找主题句Locate the topic sentences”部分，让学生先阅读以下段落，然后找出各自的主题句：

(1)People who live in countries with many doctors and modern hospitals are world’s healthiest people -- right？Not necessarily. Some groups of people who have no doctors or hospitals at all are among the world’s healthiest. For example，people who live on small, faraway islands get very few diseases because there are no outsiders to bring in germs or new illness.

(2)Good manners are important in all countries，but ways of expressing good manners are different from country to country. Americans eat with knives and forks；Japanese eat with chopsticks. Americans say “Hi” when they meet；Japanese bow. Many American men open doors for women；Japanese men do not. On the surface，it appears that good manners in America are not good manners in Japan，and in a way this is true. But in any country，the manners that are important are those involving one person’s behavior toward another person. In all countries it is good manners to behave considerately toward others and bad manners not to. It is only the way of behaving politely that differs from country to country.

(3)An ant can pick up an object more than fifty times its own weight. A bee can pull a load more than one hundred and fifty times its weight. If we were as strong in proportion(比例) to our size，we could pull a five-ton truck. If we had the jumping ability of a grasshopper，we could leap a third the length of a football field！

分析与探讨 作为高三学生，已大都了解什么是主题句，而且非常熟悉主题句常在段首或段末。对此，教师无需再多讲解。但事实上，主题句并不总是处于段首或段末。于是，我列举以上三例，帮助学生认知主题句在段中其他位置的可能性。练习采用学生独立探究、相互讨论的方式，每人通过自主归纳，得出结论。学生在分析、对比和讨论后，发现段落（1）的主题句在本段第三句，它是作者的真正看法，第一、二句是设问及回答，用来引入话题，第四句是具体例子，进一步阐述主题，具有很强的说服力。此外，在段落（2），作者采用了首尾呼应、两次点题的写作手法，将表达同一主题思想的两个主题句分别置于首尾，在句型结构和用词方面，往往不尽相同，而且在内容上，后者也不是前者的简单重复。而段落（3）的主题句则隐含于段落之中，这就要求学生根据段落细节进行分析，即先弄清该段落主要写哪几方面的内容，它们在逻辑上有何联系，然后加以归纳，形成主题。可见，教师在教学中要考虑问题的多面性，以拓展学生思维，提高他们解决具体问题的能力。

【教学片断二】

在“寻找主题句（解决位置问题）——辨别主旨（通过语段阅读，做选择题）”之后，课堂学习进入“尝试自己写段落的主旨Try to write the main idea of each paragraph”这一层，

我尝试着让学生自己写段落的主旨大意，并不时提醒：别忘了先找出该段的主题句！

在这一部分，有以下短文：

Magellan’s men were the first to make the trip around the world. It took them more than two years to do so by ship.

Magellan was from Portugal, but he sailed for the King of Spain. On September 20, 1519, he left Spain with five ships and 240 men. After passing the trip of South America, they reached the Pacific Ocean, on which they sailed more than one year. Very often they could not see a piece of land for months and they suffered greatly from the lack of food and fresh water. Many of them died of hunger and diseases. They even had to live on sawdust. Finally in April 1521, Magellan got to the Philippine Islands, where he was killed. His men fled and continued their voyage across the Indian Ocean. It was with the greatest difficulty that they passed the Cape of Good Hope. By the time they returned to Spain on December 21,1521, seven out of every eight men had died.

Magellan’s voyage proved that men could sail around the world and that our earth is but a huge ball.

同时设计了以下任务：

Try to write the main idea of each paragraph and think of how you can get such main ideas: Para 1:

Para 2:

Para 3:

分析与探讨 经过前期的热身活动，学生初步掌握了分析、概括和归纳段落中心主旨的方法，因此这一环节就选择文章而非段落，试图进一步引导学生提高分析和解决问题的能力。课堂学习仍然采用学生自主探究的方式，教师则注意启发和引导学生，在他们可能碰到困惑时给以点拨。对于Para 1和Para 3的主旨大意，学生运用所学知识进行归纳，一般没有问题。但对于Para 2，则比较困难，因为该段落没有主题句。于是，我引导学生从细节着手，弄清该段主要是描述Magellan在“时间长、路线复杂、缺乏食物、伤病多，死亡多”的环球航海中，最终获得了成功。这样，学生比较容易得出了该段的主旨：the process of Magellan’s long difficult voyage。（这与“教学片断一”的问题——无明显主题句该怎么办，互相映衬）

【教学片断三】

上一环节中，在归纳出有关Magellan短文的每一段主旨后，让学生进一步学习归纳整篇短文的主旨大意。由于已经归纳了每一段的主旨，因此得出全文的主旨应该不难了。

Para 1：Para 2：Para 3：全文的主旨：Magellan’s voyage

有了以上铺垫，可以让学生自行归纳较长篇幅文章的主旨了。以下是2012年上海英语高考的一篇阅读材料，有一道试题即为归纳文章的主旨，学生若采用先归纳每段大意再总结全文大意的思路，则可水到渠成！ Researchers in the psychology department at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) have discovered a major difference in the way men and women respond to stress. This difference may explain why men are more likely to suffer from stress-related disorders.

Until now, psychological research has maintained that both men and women have the same "fight-or-flight" reaction to stress. In other words, individuals either react with aggressive behavior, such as verbal or physical conflict ("fight"), or they react by withdrawing from the stressful situation ("flight"). However, the UCLA research team found that men and women have quite different biological and behavioral responses to stress. While men often react to stress in the fight-or-flight response, women often have another kind of reaction which could be called "tend and befriend." That is, they often react to stressful conditions by protecting and nurturing their young ("tend"), and by looking for social contact and support from others - especially other females(“befriend").

Scientists have long known that in the fight-or-flight reaction to stress, an important role is played by certain hormones(激素) released by the body. The UCLA research team suggests that the female tend-or-befriend response is also based on a hormone. This hormone, called oxytocin, has been studied in the context of childbirth, but now it is being studied for its role in the response of both men and women to stress. The principal investigator, Dr. Shelley E. Taylor, explained that "animals and people with high levels of oxytocin are calmer, more relaxed, more social, and less anxious." While men also secrete(分泌）oxytocin, its effects are reduced by male hormones.

In terms of everyday behavior, the UCLA study found that women are far more likely than men to seek social contact when they are feeling stressed. They may phone relatives or friends, or ask directions if they are lost.

The study also showed how fathers and mothers responded differently when they came home to their family after a stressful day at work. The typical father wanted to be left alone to enjoy some peace and quiet. For a typical mother, coping with a bad day at work meant focusing her attention on her children and their needs.

The differences in responding to stress may explain the fact that women have lower

frequency of stress-related disorders such as high blood pressure or aggressive behavior. The tend-and-befriend regulatory(调节的) system may protect women against stress, and this may

分析与探讨 在这一环节，学生已知道要先寻找主题句，然后归纳段落的主旨，再归纳全文主旨。因此，就不需多提醒，让学生通过合作与讨论，一步一步地自主进行，直至完成目标。

三、教学体会

本节课，先通过寻找主题句，让学生了解常见的主题句在段落中的位置，并强调可以由主题句归纳文章的主旨大意。然后，通过语段阅读等的适当操练，学生具有初步分析、概括和归纳段落中心主旨的能力。之后，再过渡到归纳整篇文章的主旨大意，逐步提升学生分析和解决问题的能力。

在教学安排上，集中针对学生的学习薄弱点，选准切入点，由易到难，层层深入，环环相扣。教学过程的每个环节紧密相联，后一环节是前一环节的延伸与拓展，并鼓励学生通过体验、实践、讨论、合作和探究等方式，调动自己的思维积极性，培养解决问题的能力，这体现了学得了、学得到、学得好的“学得”理念。

诚然，熟练地归纳主旨大意的能力，不是只凭教师的讲解便能获得的。它需要学生不断地探究分析，从阅读实践的积累，阅读技巧和习惯的养成中逐渐自我建构。它是一个需要长期自我探究和体验的过程，教师和学生都不能指望在短期内甚至几节课里就可大功告成。

首先，教师要克服急于求成的心态，努力夯实基础知识的教学。语言能力的培养和发展离不开基础知识，足够的词法知识是语言能力得以提高的保证。因此，英语教学应把握好这个度，学生语言知识的积累不可忽视，但更要把培养学生语言运用能力作为主要教学目标。

其次，要善于分析学情，研究并发现学生的薄弱之处，找准解决问题的切入点。阅读中，学生的困难一方面表现在词汇和长句、难句的理解上，另一方面是解题方法。教师应善于帮助学生形成正确的阅读习惯和阅读方法，以及科学的解题思路，提高学生的解题能力。

再次，增加学生的阅读量，积极拓展阅读途径。教师在教学中，应视学生的情况，适

当从英语报刊、杂志、教学辅导资料和网站中摘录一些具有时代气息的文章。这些文章既应适合学生的现有水平，又能激发学生的学习兴趣，融知识性、趣味性于一体，以拓宽学生的阅读视野，增加英语词汇量，提高学生的阅读理解水平。

最后，充分调动学生参与阅读教学的主动性和积极性，鼓励学生主动探究和思考，通过自主学习、合作学习、探究学习等途径，自主发现问题，寻找解决问题的方法，从而学会学习，进一步促进自身的发展。