Effects Of Vocabulary Learning Strategies On Seven-year Program Medical Students' Vocabulary Memorization

During the past twenty to thirty years, with the development of cognitive science, we have gained more and more knowledge about the characteristics and rules of human beings'cognitive process. After the memory system theory was proposed, people began to change their static description about the memory process into dynamic observation. The most important contribution of this aspect is the construction of the model of the information processing system. Craik and Lockhart (1972) argued that memory depends on what learners do as they encode new information. That is to say, the way we process the to-be-remembered information influences the quality of our memory. So it is necessary for us to know this theory so as to have a better understanding of the mental process of students'learning and to help them in their learning. Also, many memory strategies with great practical value have been widely used in the teaching and learning processes and are proved to be effective in the aspect of memorizingwords. This shows the necessity of the study of learning strategies. Words constitute a fundamental component of any language. It is regarded as an essential part of English learning for the learners to remember as many new words as possible. The essential role of vocabulary leads to numerous studies by researchers all around the world. During the process of researches, different notions about word acquisition appeared, that is, if vocabulary is something to be naturally acquired or not. Studies carried out by Chinese researchers in recent years show that Chinese students believe that words definitely should be memorized consciously and with effort. The importance of words makes Vocabulary Learning Strategies one of the most important components in learning strategies. As to the application of the Vocabulary Learning Strategies to Chinese students and the applicable environment, there is much left for further investigation.The importance of metacognitive strategies has been emphasized by O'Malley, Chamot, Stewner-Mazanares, Russo, and Kupper (1985). According to Anderson (2002), developing metacognitive awareness in learners may also lead to the development of stronger cognitive skills and much deeper processing.A large body of research supports the positive effects of training on strategies in language learning performance. Cottrell (1999) claims that through practice and instruction learners'use of strategies can be automatized. To ratify this premise, many researches have been carried out in recent years. However, there are few researches into LLST in China. Until now there are few researches on the effects of the training of language learning strategies (metacognitive strategies & cognitive strategies combined ) on vocabulary acquisition.This thesis is intended to set up a comparatively systematic framework for VLS. With Seven-year Program medical students of Jilin University as subjects, through the instruments: questionnaire, V-test paper and VLS training, this research is prospected to improve the awareness of students'vocabulary learning, to provide them with appropriate learning strategies, esp. vocabulary learning strategy training, to guide students to use metacognitive strategies and cognitive strategies combined in the vocabulary mnemonic process in order to improve vocabulary mnemonic ability, to improve students'efficiency of vocabulary memorization.