A Study On Learning Style Preference Of Uyghur Junior High School Students In Xinjiang

As one of the learners' individual differences,learning style has attracted more and more attention from researchers and teachers.Meanwhile,learning style has been affected by nationality,gender,age and other factors.Minority students in junior high school in Xinjiang have to learn English under the requirements of curriculum plans while they have to study other subjects using Mandarin.Under the previous circumstances,the author carried out the research on the purpose of reducing junior high school students' pressure in English study and helping English teachers to get to know their students and choose the appropriate teaching methods.In this thesis,the research subjects are Uyghur students in junior high school in Xinjiang.The author used Reid's Perceptual Learning Style Survey to investigate the preference on learning styles of Uyghur students of junior high school.In addition,the author combined the results of the questionnaire and English test,then analyzed the correlation between Uyghur students' English achievements and their learning styles using statistic software SPSS.The conclusions are as follows:(1)Uyghur students in junior high school mostly prefer kinesthetic style,tactile style and group-oriented style.(2)The mean values of kinesthetic style and tactile style are over 37 which means they are predominant styles of students and will influence students' behavior in their study process.(3)There's no significant correlation between most of the learning styles and students' English achievements except for group-oriented style which has a negative correlation with English achievement.According to the results,the author gave following suggestions to English teachers:(1)Teachers should be aware of learning styles and attach great importance to learners' learning style preferences;(2)Teachers should help learners to correctly understand and take advantage of their own learning styles;(3)Teachers' classroom teaching should match learners' learning styles;(4)Teachers should pay attention to individualized teaching in teachers' training process and respect Uyghur learners' individual differences.