An Action Study On Promoting College Students' Reflective English Learning

Since it was first formally put forward by Henri Holec in 1981, learner autonomy (henceforth LA) has become a very hot issue in the field of applied linguistics. As autonomy is not an absolute concept, it is an ability, which may be acquired and fostered through special strategy training, the studies on autonomous learner training attract more and more people's interests in LA research. Reflection, as an essential part of autonomous learning ability and also an important way of improving it, began to receive attention since 1990s. Although there are some general studies on reflection in LA research, most of them are from foreign researchers. The domestic research on it, especially an empirical study on Chinese students, is rarely spotted.The present study focused on a teaching practice aimed at promoting learners'reflective learning through two reflective activities: reflective writing and peer-evaluation, to examine whether this instruction was effective in improving Chinese learners'reflective learning. The subjects involved in this study were 31 first year English majors in Hubei University of Technology (HUT). The instruction lasted 12 weeks. During the weeks the students were introduced the concept of reflection and some reflective learning activities, required to finish some reflective assignments under the guidance of the teacher. Reflection questionnaires were distributed to them both before and after the instruction to obtain the students'pre-instruction reflective ability and post-instruction reflective ability. After the instruction, a structured interview was administrated to part of the students for a further investigation into their reflective learning ability and their understanding of reflection.Results of the present study showed that the 12-week reflective learning strategy instruction really had a positive effect on students'reflective learning. There was a significant difference in students'overall reflective ability before and after the instruction. Yet, as to the four individual scales in the Questionnaire, three of them showed significant differences before and after the instruction, whereas no significant difference appeared in the scale"reflection", which might result from a limited time and the students'relatively high reflective ability before the instruction. It was suggested that a long-term similar study among different subjects should be conducted in the future research and more concerns should be shown to the peer-evaluation, and teachers should apply the reflective activities more flexibly.