A Study On The Relationship Between Students' Language Learning Beliefs And Their Use Of Learning Strategies

Since 1970s, great changes have taken place in second language acquisition (SLA) research. The emphasis of language teaching and learning has changed. Language learning beliefs and language learning strategies have become heatedly discussed topics in recent years. The purpose of the study is to investigate senior high school students' beliefs about language learning and their use of language learning strategies and to find out the relationship between their beliefs about language learning and strategy use.The subjects participating in the study were 288 senior high school students of Grade One from Wenbo Middle School where I work. General data about students' beliefs and their strategy use were derived from a Likert 5-scale questionnaire, composed of Beliefs about Language Learning Inventory (BALLI) and Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL). Furthermore, the subjects' English scores of Basic Competence Test were collected as their English achievement. The data were computed and analyzed by means of descriptive analyses, independent t-tests, and a Pearson's Correlation analysis.The findings of the study are summarized as follows:1. The subjects held various beliefs about language learning. They generally endorsed the concept of foreign language aptitude and most of them were optimistic and highly motivated about learning English.2. The subjects utilized a variety of language learning strategies when they learned English. Among the six strategy categories, they used compensation strategies most frequently and social strategies least often.3. The students' beliefs about language learning were closely related to their use of language learning strategies, especially the motivational beliefs.Based on the results of the study, some pedagogical implications are provided in the following section:1. Teachers should try to understand beliefs about language learning of their own students and to confront their students' unrealistic and erroneous beliefs with new information about language learning.2. Teachers should inform their students of the importance of language learning strategies and provide them with explicit directions about how to apply a certain learning strategy most effectively.3. Teachers can help their students with low English proficiency to learn more successfully by presenting to them the beliefs and strategy use of high proficiency students, and teachers can integrate discussions about language learning and strategy training into their regular courses.4. Teachers should make efforts to motivate their own students to learn English.