Metacognitive Strategy Training And Chinese EFL Learners' Writing: Meta-analysis

Language learning strategies (LLS) analysis began in the late 20th century. Many of the findings demonstrate that the LLS can help learners realize and monitor their cognitive activities, thereby improve their learning efficiency. The analysis on LLS experiences the process from description to analytic research, from theoretical discussion to application analysis. With the deepening of the analysis, scholars begin to reflect on and question the effects of LLS analysis.Metacognitive strategies, as one of the language learning strategies, also receive much attention from the researchers and are analyzed in different perspectives. As higher order executive strategies metacognitive strategies help students monitor and elevate the learning process effectively, organize their learning effectively in order to ultimately make the students learn autonomously and retrospectively.Writing, being one of the four basic skills, should not be neglected for its importance. Greenia once said "Second language writing could facilitate language learning and promote students'thinking ability." However, there exists problem for the students when facing the writing tasks. Sanoff pointed out "In composition, students are usually unaware of what it takes to write even a four to five-page essay every two or three weeks".It can be a countermeasure to combine metacognitive strategies instruction with writing teaching so as to enhance students writing achievement. This topic attracts many researchers' attention but there also exists quite different findings on this topic:most of the researchers demonstrate metacognitive strategies training can improve students writing achievement, a few gain negative effects.Facing many scholars'questioning and the two quite opposite findings on this topic, the thesis attempts to synthesize the existed research data mainly concerning the effects of metacognitive strategies training on Chinese EFL learners'writing achievement by employing meta-analysis approach. To be exactly, the thesis tries to test the effectiveness of metacognitive strategies training on Chinese EFL learners'writing achievement, and also to test the indirect effects of such training on the learners'metacognitive awareness and overall language proficiency; by regression analysis, it also analyzes the influence of research properties on the effect sizes of meta-analysis. After searching the three electronic databases:CNKI, WANGFANG database, and VIP database,719 articles are available. Then 11 ones of the 719 articles are included in the research by applying the inclusion criteria and exclusion criteria of meta-analysis. The results shows that metacognitive strategies training improves the learners'writing achievement to a certain extent; its indirect effect is also obvious, learners'metacognitive awareness and overall language proficiency are enhanced, too; the treatment duration will affect the calculation of effect size of students wring achievement.In short, metacognitive strategies can be introduced to language teaching, to be concretely, to writing teaching, in order to help students recognize and analyze their own learning process, evaluate the learning achievement, and ultimately achieve learning autonomy.