Language and Science

Introduction

As a new pedagogics in teaching the language of science to second speakers, the content-based instruction has gained great success all over the world. It aims at combining organically the systematic knowledge of a subject with the training of the second language skills. It is considered as an effective pedagogics as it helps improve students’ language skills and study in relevant subjects. The traditional pedagogics in foreign language teaching only lay stress on the training of language skills, lack of the integration with language content such as professional knowledge (Kasper, 2000). With a view to this, this essay gives a detailed elaboration to the teaching concepts, theories, teaching principles, and teaching mode of the content-based pedagogics in teaching the language of science to second speakers. The essay will firstly introduce the teaching concepts of content-based instruction (hereinafter referred as CBI). Then it will give a view of the theory basis of CBI. Following it will explain the teaching principles and the teaching mode of CBI. Altogether the essay will argue from different levels for the significance of the content-based instruction. The content-based instruction conduct the teaching the language of science to second speakers according to the communicative approach teaching principles. Studying second language in real situations not only accords with the language acquisition laws, but also help cultivate students’ competence of language usage. In addition, it can enhance students’ initiative learning capacity. This essay will explain the advantages and feasibility of the content-based instruction in teaching the language of science to second language speakers through the arguments of its concepts, theory basis, principles and modes.

1. The concepts of CBI

Content-based Instruction (CBI) is dated from 1980s in western countries. The reform and innovation in language pedagogics in 1960s to 1980s gave a push to the...