Learning Strategies And Their Relationship To Learning Achievement In Listening Comprehension

Many studies of learning strategies have been carried out to investigate their effects on learners' overall language achievement. This thesis further explores the relationship between the use of learning strategies by Chinese EFL college students of non-English majors and the learning achievement of the said students in listening comprehension. The writer attempts to answer the following research questions:(1) How frequently do Chinese EFL learners adopt practice-oriented learning strategies in the study? (2) Do efficient listeners and inefficient listeners differ in their use of practice-oriented strategies? If yes, then(3) How do efficient listeners and inefficient listeners differ in their use of these strategies?(4) Which strategy or strategies have predicting power in relation to the students' achievement in listening comprehension test? These research questions were explored through an English learning strategy questionnaire and a listening comprehension test. The subjects were 129 second-year EFL college undergraduates randomly selected from Chongqing University. The statistical results showed that the highest frequency of strategy use was for reading practice and the lowest was for speaking practice. Efficient listeners and inefficient listeners displayed significant differences in the use of certain strategies. Functional practice, listening practice and reading practice emerged as the significant predictor variables, which indicates that functional practice if appropriately employed could enhance the subjects' ability in listening comprehension, and their listening comprehension ability was supported not only by listening practice but by reading practice as well. The study in the thesis hopes to provide insight into relationship between learning strategies and one of language skill areas - listening, and to help teachers guide students to improve their listening comprehension ability through active and self-directed practice. Since the subjects involved are confined to one college, the results yielded from this study are not generalizable enough. Therefore, they will only serve as hypotheses to be tested in the future.