The Effects Of CBI On The Learning Strategies And English Proficiency Of Chinese Language Learners

Content-based instruction (CBI) is a language teaching method which concentrates on a certain theme or subject . It has been proved effective abroad. CBI is viewed as one of the most representative contributions to contemporary second/foreign language teaching.This study attempts to explore the effect of CBI on Chinese EFL learners'English proficiency and learning strategies in the College English context. In this study, 74 freshmen came from two majors were involved. They were of similar age and English education background. They were divided into two groups according to their major; there were 38 participants in the treatment group and 36 in the control group. The experimental study commenced from Sep.2010 and extended to Jan, 2011. This study adopted a comparative research method. First, a between-group comparison was used, i. e. the comparison of English learning strategies and proficiency between the control group and the treatment group before and after the experiment respectively. Second, a within-group comparison was involved, i.e. the treatment group were further divided into the high proficiency group (the top 27%),the medium proficiency group (the middle 46%) and the low proficiency group (the bottom 27%).In this study, three questions will be answered:1. What is the effect of CBI on the development of Chinese EFL learners'English proficiency in the College English context2. What is the impact of CBI on the development of learners'language learning strategies in the College English context3. What are the participating Chinese EFL learners'responses to the Content-based instructionThe results of the experiment revealed: 1. Both the groups developed their overall English proficiency and the difference between two groups reached the significant point, the treatment group outperformed the control group in listening, reading, cloze and translation, while no difference was found in writing.2. The language learning strategies of both groups were promoted, but the improvement of the control group was not as significant as the treatment group made, especially in memory strategies, metacognitive strategies, affective strategies and social strategies.3. Through diaries and interviews, we concluded CBI has a positive effect on English learners. Most subjects admitted CBI aroused their interests, promoted the English proficiency and broadened their horizons, etc.In conclusion,CBI has a positive impact on developing learners'learning strategies and English proficiency in the College English context,especially to the medium level group, That means CBI promoted the use of learning strategies in most cases.