A Study On The Learning Styles Of English Learners In Senior High School Guided By Multiple Intelligence Theory

In recent years,the focus of teaching researches has been shifted from how to teach to how to learn.In foreign language teaching,student-centered teaching concept has gradually appeared and dominated.Because of this new teaching concept,scholars have begun to pay more attention to the differences of individual learners.Learning style,one of the factors indicating individual differences,has been increasingly favored by the researchers.Western scholars have done a lot of investigative researches and formed different theories towards learning styles.While in China,research on learning styles is restricted to theory inquiry stage,lack of enough investigative research,especially on the learning styles of senior high school's students.Therefore,this thesis studies the learning styles of English learners in senior high school.In addition,this thesis has a new perspective,that is,it links learning styles and Multiple Intelligence theory which advocates that teachers should respect students'individual differences and individual development and attach more importance to the development of students' multiple intelligences.Especially,when this theory is combined with learning styles,both advantages are brought into full play.This study selects 47 senior high school students(male:21;female:26)as the subjects.They are from Class 4,Grade 1,No.2 Senior High School of Panjin City,Liaoning Province.The author modified Reid's(1987)Perceptual Learning Style Preference Questionnaire because of cultural differences and then used it.Statistical analysis is applied to analyze the data collected.Classroom observation and interview are also adopted.The study aims to inquire the general learning style preferences of English learners in senior high school,the differences between male and female students' learning styles and the correlation between learning styles and their English learning achievement.The research results show that:1.English learners in senior high school prefer six kinds of learning styles including visual,auditory,kinesthetic,tactile,individual and group learning style,among which kinesthetic,tactile and group learning are the most preferred learning styles,followed by auditory learning style while visual and individual learning style rank last.2.There are differences between male and female students' learning styles.Compared with boys,girls prefer two learning styles,that is,auditory learning style and group learning style.While compared with girls,boys prefer individual learning style.Females are a little more tactile and kinesthetic than males.3.There is no correlation between English learning achievement and certain single learning style.Senior high school students tend to use multiple learning styles to learn.Among the six learning styles,high achievers prefer visual,auditory and individual learning style,while middle and low achievers prefer kinesthetic,tactile and group learning style.According to the research results,this thesis puts forward suggestions for teachers and learners in using learning styles in senior high school and points out limitations of this study.