A Study On The Use Of Meta-cognitive Strategies By Nine Grade Students

Since the1960s, English learning strategies have been a popular topic in the fieldof linguistics research because of the development of cognitive psychology, so more andmore researchers began to pay attention on this area. With the development of societyand English education reform, autonomous learning ability become one of the criticalability for English learners. Among others, metacognitive strategy become a key factorin the study on English learning strategies.Peviously, the researches of metacognitive strategy are mostly focused on that ofcollege students, high school students, seven and eight grade students and pupils,leaving the research of previous metacognitive strategy for nine grade studentsunattended. Therefore, this thesis is based on research on the ability of usingmetacognitive strategy of the Grade Nine students in their English acquisition withquestionnaire and interview to the213students of Jinjiang Nanqu Middle school.Computer software such Excel and SPSS17.0are applied to analyze the data acquired inthe research The research content includes the following: the applying situation ofmetacognitive strategy from all dimensions; the different use of metacognitive strategybetween high scoring and low scoring students; the ability of using metacognitivestrategy and the co-relation with the academic scores; the difference in the application ofmetacognitive strategy between boys and girls.Research conclusions are as follows:1. Most of the students have an insufficient knowledge about the meta-cognitivestrategy.2. Students of lower score on the meta-cognitive monitoring dimension tend to developa lower ability of planning, evaluation and method of adjustment.3. The high scoring students are more often to apply meta-cognitive strategies thanthose low scoring students. 4. There is a positive correlation between the use ability of meta-cognitive strategy andthe students’ English scores.5. There is a significant difference in using metacognitive strategy between boys andgirls. The girls use more metacognitive strategy than boysThrough the analysis of several aspects of the research，two suggestions havebeen put forward. One is that both teachers and students should change their roles. Theother one includes:1. Enrich students’ meta-cognitive knowledge and cultivate their abilities of makingmeta-cognitive plans;2. Strengthen learning strategies training, cultivate students’ of self-monitoringawareness and enhance meta-cognitive experience;3. Improve the habit of self-reflections and the abilities of self-evaluation.