英语教学法 Top-down approach

  Top-down approach 和bottom—up. 两种教学法，对于同一个水平的接受者都是有可能适用的。主要看阅读及学习材料的难度。 传统的语言构建方法都是bottom up教学法, 即先从小的单位入手,从音素到词根到单词到基本句构建再到长句和复合句, 最后到语篇，此谓从局部到整体。Top-down的教学法则另辟蹊径高屋建瓴，反向地采用从语篇开始，从整体到局部的切入手段。Top-down教学法主要优势在于迅速提高学习者乐趣，如歌曲的学唱，即使学习者一开始并不了解每个单词的意义，但是歌曲本身的完整性和娱乐性能大大刺激学习者的探询热情，如果一开始就花10倍的时间解构每个单词的意思将会极大滞后学习者的学习兴趣和动机，很有可能导致中途放弃。在真实的教学实操中，两种教学法通常也是相辅相成互相递进的，如先从top-down激发兴趣，然后再通过bottom-up逐层解构，最后再回到top-down了解通篇，类似快速扫读-细节精读-通篇回顾的思路，因此说语言的学习过程一定是螺旋式逐级上升的。另外譬如在听力练习中，之所以我们在听之前尽量用warm-up环节中的主题相关图片或者单词来激发联想，甚至通过引导学生预测听力内容，这些其实都是潜移默化地在实践top-down教学法。以下分享这两种教学法的英文原文基本定义和描述以飨读者。                        Effective teaching methods may be  constrained by school curriculum, but educators can still devise instructional approaches based on the needs of their students. Some courses are taught better through lecture, while others may require class participation and direct interaction through laboratory and fieldtrips. Two common teaching methods are known as top-down and bottom-up, which take opposite approaches to providing students with an education.

A top-down teaching style focuses on

providing students a large view of a subject, immersing them in the big picture without explaining the components that make up the subject. For example, in an English as a Second Language class, a top-down approach would begin by immersing students in all aspects of learning English immediately, including writing, reading and pronunciation. Students would not be taught the intricacies of vowels, nouns and pronouns first, instead they would be plunged into the totality of learning English and then gradually learn the building blocks that make up the English language.

Unlike a top-down teaching approach, which takes a macro view of a subject first, a bottom-up teaching approach begins with the component parts of a subject, and gradually builds up to the whole. For example, in an ESL class, a bottom-up approach would begin with things such as phonics, letters, vowels and syllables, which are the building blocks of language. It's only after students have mastered these specific rules and systems that they move on to speaking and reading.

Distinctions

Top-down and bottom-up teaching methods have the same learning objectives but different ways of achieving them.

Top-down teaching is concerned with motivating students to learn through  direct interaction and immersion, and allowing them to find meaning in a subject by applying their own experiences.

Bottom-up teaching is more instructor-driven and focuses on the minutia of a subject as a way of decoding and simplifying each component through repetition and memorization.

Considerations

Because top-down teaching emphasizes instruction through context and relies in part on a student's background and experience to acquire knowledge, it may not provide the same level of specific subject skills as a bottom-up teaching approach. Conversely, though a bottom-up teaching approach will strengthen a student's grasp of a subject's fundamentals, it's lack of emphasis on learning within the context of a larger whole may limit its effectiveness. For example, students who learn the specific meaning of a word may not understand how the meaning of that word changes based on the culture where the word is used.