A Study Of English Majors’ Use Of Oral English Learning Strategies

With the reform of English teaching, learning strategies are widely used in English learning, so the study of learning strategy is still a hot topic. Especially oral English is an important way for language production, which is also a basic language skill. Therefore, there is practical significance in the study of oral English learning strategy (OELS). The dissertation aims to elaborate on the present tendencies of oral English learning strategies (OELSs) used by the English majors, in the hope of shedding some light on oral English teaching and learning.Researches on OELS are conducted in the light of language learning strategy (LLS). With the review of literature on LLS and OELS in second language acquisition, Oxford’s (1990) system of language learning strategy classification is used as a conceptual model which divides OELSs into memory strategy, cognitive strategy, compensation strategy, metacognitive strategy, affective strategy and social strategy. Meanwhile, according to three stages of oral English production identified by Anderson (1985), there are some obstacles existing in construction, transformation and execution. When the students have different study requirements and aims, they should choose different OELSs.A questionnaire and an interview were used in this investigation. It aims to explore the following questions:①Do the English majors use OELS consciously?②What is the most frequent and the least frequent OELS used by English majors?③What aspects in oral expressions will be affected by different learning strategy?Sixty sophomores majored in English in Qingdao University of Science and Technology (QUST) participated in this study. The results of the quantitative analysis reveal:firstly, although all the subjects have the awareness of using OELSs during speaking, they don not use OELSs frequently. Secondly, the frequency sequence of English majors’ use of OELSs in oral English activities is. from high to low, cognitive strategy, memory strategy, metacognitive strategy, compensation strategy, social strategy and affective strategy. Thirdly, qualitative analysis gives a supplementary instruction to the results of quantitative analysis, in order to find out relatively high level subjects have some obstacles in the three stages of oral English production. Furthermore, OELSs can help them overcome the obstacles, such as metacognitive strategy can improve the ability of the first stage; the cognitive strategy can improve the ability of the second stage; the social and affective strategies can improve the ability of the third stage.Finally, based on the findings of this study, some pedagogical implications are presented. The first is teachers should integrate OELS training into oral English activity. The second is students should make use of as many effective ways as possible to improve their oral English proficiency. The third is that a cooperative learning environment should be created in oral English teaching and learning.