An Exploratory Study Of English Majors’ Learner Agency In Project-based Chinese EFL Learning Context

The twenty-first century has posed an unparalleled challenge to English language education in China in that traditional methods of teaching English are not in a position to cope with the ever-increasing demands of social and economic development of our country. This calls for reforming the old models of cultivating English language talents, changing old educational ideas as well as adopting new teaching methods. As a relatively mature approach to teaching second/foreign languages, project-based instruction offers us a feasible way to reform traditional EFL instructional mode in China. More recently, some Chinese scholars and practitioners have begun to examine the effects of project-based instruction on Chinese EFL learners.In recent years, the concept of learner agency has gradually engaged the attention of SLA researchers. Some SLA scholars abroad have started to research on it both theoretically and empirically. van Lier (2007,2008) argues that project-based learning has the potential to promote learner agency in language classrooms. Literature search shows that there is yet no systematic empirical study on the development of learner agency in project-based Chinese EFL learning context at the tertiary level.The present study examined English majors’learner agency in project-based Chinese EFL learning context from five aspects:learner beliefs about language learning, language learning strategies, learner autonomy in language learning, language learning motivation and critical thinking skills. Five research questions were formulated and a mixed methods research design was adopted in the present study. Specifically speaking, both quantitative and qualitative methods were employed to investigate the first three research questions while qualitative methods were used to investigate the fourth and fifth research questions. A pretest-posttest design was employed in the quantitative part of the present study.Two groups of participants from a key comprehensive university in North China were used in the present study:the first group of participants, consisting of7students enrolled in "English Through Projects"(ETP) during the first semester of2011/2012academic year, were the main participants in the present study; the second group of participants, consisting of6students enrolled in ETP during the first semesters of2009/2010and2010/2011academic years respectively, were used to provide additional data for the present study. Data were collected mainly through questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and language learning journals.Results from Wilcoxon signed ranks tests and content analyses of collected qualitative data yielded five major findings. First, group project work induced certain changes in the participants’beliefs about language learning. Second, group project work led to the participants’frequent use of metacognitive strategies, compensation strategies and social strategies in English-medium project activities. Third, group project work not only altered the participants’autonomous learning awareness but also enhanced their autonomous learning abilities to some degree. Fourth, group project work improved the participants’language learning motivation to a certain extent. Fifth, group project work resulted in the participants’frequent use of critical thinking, thus contributing toward the improvement of their critical thinking skills. These findings collectively indicate that project-based instruction promoted English majors’learner agency to a certain extent in Chinese EFL learning context.The present study has also identified some affordances for and constraints to learner agency in project-based Chinese EFL learning context. The major affordances for learner agency include choice of project topics, cooperation with other students, help from teaching assistants and teacher guidance whereas the major constraints to learner agency include lack of time, lack of resources, lack of initiatives and the possible influence of traditional instructional mode. In other words, learner agency should be nurtured by creating favorable conditions for English majors even in project-based Chinese EFL learning context.A gap may still exist between what we have actually found and what we had expected with regard to the promotion of learner agency in project-based Chinese EFL learning context. This is hardly surprising because "probably many meaningful interventions to develop language learners would take a long time to see their effects"(Gao, X.,2010, p.159). However, this also points to the need to conduct further research on how to better nativize project-based instruction in order to maximize the benefits of project work including promoting learner agency to the greatest extent in Chinese EFL learning context.