A Study Of English Learning Styles Of Senior High School Students

With the shift of focus from teaching methodology to learners and learning process in EFL, the issue of how to teach according to personality-related variables draws more and more attention.A learning style refers to an individual's natural, habitual, and preferred ways of absorbing, processing, and retaining new information and skills which persist regardless of teaching methods or content areas (Kinsella, 2002). A learning style is value-neutral; that is, there is no good or bad learning style. Different learners have different learning styles and learning strengths and weaknesses.This thesis gives more details about learning styles from variable angles. In order to help our understanding of the issue under discussion and to locate against what background the present research is carried out, this thesis also summarizes the main and recent researches on this at home.Based on social constructivism theory, the study intends to investigate the learning styles of Chinese English learners in senior high school, with respect to their sensory (visual, auditory, tactile and kinaesthetic modes) and sociological (group and individual modes) preferences, and gender differences in their learning styles. Thus, this thesis attempts to answer the following questions:(1) What are the major, minor, and negative learning style preferences of the senior high school students?(2) What is the relationship between the students'learning styles and academic achievements?(3) Is there any difference between male and female senior high school students'learning style?The sample of the study consists of 163 senior high school students (male: 83; female: 80) from Grade 2 of Senior High School of Mancheng County, Hebei province.The results of the research are: (1) Senior high school students prefer tactile and kinaesthetic most. The individual learning style is the least preference.(2) The high achievers prefer more tactile, visual and individual learning style than low and middle achievers. Middle achievers almost have the balance distributions.(3) In comparison with male students, female students are more tactile, kinaesthetic, group. While male students prefer visual, auditory and individual learning styles to female students'learning styles.In the end, the thesis provides some suggestions and strategies of teaching and learning according to the findings. The research also shows that it is vital for teachers and students to be aware of learning styles, and tend to be flexible in teaching and learning.