A Study On Vocabulary Learning Strategies By Chinese College EFL Vocational Learners

With the urgent need for adapting ourselves to the explosive times of knowledge and information, the major objective of modern education is now experiencing a shift from the teacher' mere knowledge delivery to helping the learners to acquire the ways to learn This shift also finds its expression in teaching English as a foreign Language (EFL). English teachers have started to concern about helping the learners to develop not only English skills but also English learning strategies.English vocabulary is a great obstacle in English teaching and learning. There were, however, fewer researches on English vocabulary learning strategies at home and abroad. In China, few studies focus on the English vocabulary learning strategies used by Chinese learners for learning English as a foreign language (EFL). To most of the Chinese undergraduates, learning vocabulary is the main problem in the process of learning English, especially for the vocational undergraduates. So, it is worth exploring vocabulary learning strategies used by Chinese EFL learners. The study is developed from O' Malley & Chamot's framework of learning strategies, in which metacognitive strategies, cognitive strategies and social/affective strategies are included. Metacognitive strategies are higher order executive skills and used for learners to oversee, regulate, or self-direct their language learning. Cognitive strategies refer to the mental processes they use to acquire, sort, remember, and use information;social/affective strategies refer to participating in the language learning and affective adjustment.The present research attempts to explore the overall pattern of English vocabulary learning strategies used by some Chinese vocational college students. In addition, both similarities and differences in English vocabulary strategies used between the good language learners and the poor language learners, and both similarities and differences in English vocabulary strategies used between students of the arts and students of sciences are explored as well. 105 non-English vocational college sophomores from Yangtze University participated in a vocabulary test, band3 and a questionnaire. The questionnaire is used to investigate students who used English vocabulary learning strategies (EVLS) at metacognitive, cognitive andsocial/affective level.In order to examine whether EVLS used by GL are different from those used by PL, 28 GL and 28PL were chosen according to their scores on both vocabulary amount tests and English proficiency tests. T-tests were employed to compare the differences between the two groups. And in order to examine whether EVLS used by students of the arts are different from those used by students of sciences, 32 students of the arts and 32 students are chosen at random from 105 participants. T-tests were employed to compare the differences between the two groups. SPSS is used to analyze the collected data. The results show: (1) Chinese vocational college students used a variety of English vocabulary learning strategies in vocabulary learning, including metacognitive, cognitive and social/affective strategies.(2) There are significant differences in using EVLS at metacognitive, cognitive levels between GL and PL. (3)Some of the same EVLS are used by students of the arts and students of the sciences, but there is no significant difference in using EVLS between two groups.