An Investigation On English Listening Strategies Used By Grade One Students In Senior High Schools

Of the commonly accepted four language skills, listening, speaking, reading and writing, listening is perhaps the most frequently used skill in daily life. It is estimated that we listen twice as much as we speak, four times as much as we read and five times as much as we write. On the other hand, listening is probably the least explicit of the four skills, thus making it a big headache to most L2 or EFL language teachers and students. Listening strategies are mental operations or processes that learners consciously select when they accomplish listening tasks. The listening effect of Chinese senior high school is not satisfying; meanwhile, the first grade of senior high school is the period of transition between middle school and senior high school which affects eternity. This study explores the learning strategies for listening employed by first grade students of senior high school and analyzes the usage condition of their listening strategies to offer guidance to the listening teaching of first grade students.This thesis has five aims. Firstly, it is to get a general understanding of the level of their English listening learning. Secondly, it is to make a survey about the usage condition of their listening strategies. Thirdly, it is to verify whether there are some differences in the listening strategies usage between grils and boys. Fourthly, it is to verify whether listening strategies have substantive relationships with listening comprehension achievement. Lastly, it is to verify whether more proficient students use listening strategies more frequently than less proficient students.The subjects are 178 students of two classes in first grade from a high school of Nong An. Two investigation tools were used including a questionnaire and a listening test. The questionnaire is designed according to O'Malley & Chamot'theory, and some strategies from Oxford(1990). SPSS 17.0 was used to analyze the data.The main conclusions are as follows: (1) The listening strategies usage condition of senior one student is satisfying. (2) All three listening strategies are metacognitive strategies, cognitive strategies and social/affective strategies which were found significantly related to the learners'listening achievement. (3) The students of high-score group were found to employ the listening strategies more frequently than the students of the low-score group. (4) There are some differences of listening strategies usages between girls and boys.Finally, this thesis provides some suggestions for teaching and learning of English listening strategies of first grade of senior high school.