A Study On English Readinging Strategies Of Vocational College Art-majors

The use of a complex battery of reading strategies has been found to be obligatory for those who study English as Second Language (ESL) in Vocational College in China. Even though the importance of reading strategies is well-known, little research exists on what English reading strategies can be used by ESL art-majors.This quantitative and qualitative study endeavors to apply the reading strategy to the students mentioned above. By conducting the two reading tests, a questionnaire and an interview,131 Chinese undergraduate ESL art-majorts at Hunan Mass Media Vocational Technical College in Changsha are arranged in two groups participated in a one-term empirical study.Data are obtained from the statistical analysis of questionnaires and individual interviews. The author designs a Modified Reading Strategy Inventory(MRSl) based on Oxford(1990)'s classification.4 high scorers (S1-S10) and 4 low scorers in EG are chosen for the interview with an attempt to give their personal opinions randomly. The findings of the study are summarized as follows:(1) Reading strategy is beneficial to the promotions of reading skills. The students in the EG can improve the reading efficiency, for reading more in a minute and getting more correct answers. (2) The results have showed no significant differences in the reading strategy use between EG and CG. Cognitive strategy is the most popular strategy, meta-cognitive strategy is the least popular strategy that art-majors use. (3) There are differences in the strategy use between females and males, though, both of them using reading strategy not often. (4) The obtained findings through T-test demonstrate that the reading strategy use has a significant effect on reading comprehension achievement of high scorers and low scorers in EG. High scorers can widely use six categories of reading strategies, while low scorers do not often use reading strategies in reading process.As all mentioned above, the study of reading strategy is effective. For reading teaching, the low frequency for reading strategy use of art-majors in Vocational College should be a real concern of college English teachers. They should change their traditional teaching methods, try to be good guiders in English literacy and drive reading strategy training or combine the reading strategy teaching and training into their English teaching practice. For reading learning, the data analysis of males and females, high scorers and low scorers in EG may instruct college art-majors to use the reading strategy appropriately and effectively. As an experimental study, there exist some limitations. However, these limitations provide reference for further studies of English reading teaching (for example, PRETCO) in Vocational College.