BenefitsofAffectiveTeachingfromtheStudents’Perspective

ZhiminZhang

【Abstract】Affective teaching is an effective approach to optimize the teaching effect of listening classes. In this paper， two major benefits of affective teaching from the students perspective have been investigated to improve Business English listening teaching and learning to some extent.

【Key words】benefits； affective teaching； students perspective

1. Introduction

Currently， an increasing number of people become more aware of the significance of applying emotional factors in teaching and the necessity of affective teaching. Business English listening teaching in universities and colleges should also keep in step with the trend of affective teaching.

2. Functions of Affective Teaching

Affective teaching is concerned with the beliefs， feelings and attitudes of students. It is defined as “both teachers and students are in a positive affective state in the process of teaching”. There are five major functions of affective teaching：motive， regulative， signal， migratory and infective. （Andean， J.， 1996） The emotive function of affection can increase students learning enthusiasm and initiative in the process of listening learning. The regulative function of affection means that affection can organize and disintegrate a persons cognitional manipulator activities. The signal function of affection means a persons affection can transfer information through his expression by his gestures and postures. The migratory function of affection means that a persons affection to somebody will migrate to the object that is related to the person. The infective function of affection means that a persons emotion can be affected by another person. （Jiamei Lu， 2002）

3. Benefits of Affective Teaching from the Perspective of Students

It is pity that over the past decades， educators and researchers have regarded students apathy and lack of motivation as serious challenges to maintaining students engagement in teaching and learning of English listening. It is quite apparent that they have neglected the necessity and importance of affective teaching. In order to effectively improve Business English listening teaching and learning， it is wise for the educators to adopt affective teaching method. Pleasantly， some researches have recently probed into the benefits of affective teaching from various perspectives. For lack of space， two major benefits of affective teaching from the students perspective will be investigated in this paper.endprint

3.1 Lessening the Students Anxiety

Generally speaking， anxiety refers to the feeling of being very worried about something. Anxiety is a major hindrance that will affect students listening motivation and effect. It is caused by both subjective and objective factors. Subjectively speaking， students anxiety comes from the students themselves – students poor psychological quality， students unfamiliarity of business technical terms and business context knowledge；objectively speaking， students anxiety comes from their listening teacher. It is found that the Business English students suffer from greater anxiety in the process of business English listening because of the above-mentioned two-sided factors. Thus， in the process of Business English listening teaching， on one hand， the listening teachers should affectively remove the listening obstacles of both vocabulary and background knowledge；on the other hand， they can try to make the students relaxed through games， jokes， music， etc.

3.2 Creating a Relaxed and Harmonious Listening Class Atmosphere

Affective teaching is beneficial to create a relaxed and harmonious class atmosphere. This favorable class atmosphere can not only reduce the students anxiety， but also promote effective communication between the students and the teachers. It‘s believed that the business English listening teachers should apply positive emotions to the students and increase the time to communicate with the students thus to establish a good classroom atmosphere for them. Then the interactive and effective atmosphere between the students and the teachers will make the teaching effect highly optimized.

4. Conclusion

Affective teaching， as an effective approach to optimize the listening teaching effect， is apparently drawing increasing researchers attention and gradually becoming a main research topic in the field of business English listening teaching and learning. It is expected that the investigation in this paper will improve Business English listening teaching and learning to some extent.

References：

[1]Andean，J.Affection in Language Teaching[M].Cambridge： CPU，1996.

[2]安巍.外語教学中情感要素的理论解读[J].黑龙江高教研究， 2008（6）.

[3]卢家楣.教学内容的情感性处理策略[J].教育研究，2002（12）.endprint