An Empirical Study On Metacognitive Strategy In College English Writing Instruction

This research project aims to explore new approaches of English writing teaching by the effective use of metacognitive strategy in order to improve college students’ English writing proficiency effectively.The experimental study was undertaken in Liaoning University of Science and Engineering, Jinzhou City, Liaoning Province, China, from September 2014 to January 2015. Sixty-three sophomore students in Information and Technology Department, selected as research participants, consisted of the experimental class and the control class. Thirty-five students in the experimental class took the metacognitive strategy instruction while twenty-eight students in the control class received the regular traditional instruction continuously. Research instruments in the research included questionnaires, tests and so on. All the data were analyzed by using qualitative and quantitative techniques. SPSS(Statistical Package for the Social Science) was used for statistical analysis of the experimental results.The experiment demonstrates that English writing teaching with the guidance of metacognitive strategy instruction can improve students’ metacognitive awareness and enhance students’ English writing proficiency. Therefore, applying metacognitive strategy to college English writing teaching is feasible. It is expected that college English teachers can attain enlightenment on the result of the study for the purpose of improving students’ English writing proficiency efficiently. In terms of the enlightenment for the further research on English learning and teaching, this study is of great significance, particularly in the current situation of English writing teaching in China. In the final part of the thesis, pedagogical implications of the study are discussed and some suggestions on the further research are presented.