Investigating High School English Learners’ Role Models From A Social Learning Theory Perspective

The curriculum plan and curriculum standards of basic education in the new era are dedicated to cultivating new generations with ideals,skills,and responsibilities,with the fundamental task of fostering virtue through education.As a spiritual power,role models help shape students’ correct values,essential character,and key competencies.There is no doubt that learning from role models is of great value in developing students’ core competencies.In the past decade,researchers at home and abroad have begun to attach importance to the study of role models,involving many disciplines.However,in the field of foreign language pedagogy,very few studies have been conducted on role models,and hardly focusing on role models in English learning for high school students.In view of the above situation,a mixed-methods study combining quantitative and qualitative approaches was adopted from the social learning theory perspective.A total of 715 Grade Two students,including 429 junior high school students and 286 senior high school students,were investigated to answer the following four research questions: 1)Who are high school English learners’ role models? 2)Is there any systematic variation in choosing their role models? 3)How do high school students construct their role models in English learning? 4)To what extent do role models promote English learning and individual growth? Data were collected by means of questionnaires and interviews,supplemented by some documents.The first two research questions were analyzed with the help of statistical software SPSS 26.0,and the data analysis methods included descriptive statistics,cross-tabulation chi-square test,and one-sample t-test.For the latter two research questions,thematic analysis was used in interview transcripts according to the observational learning process in social learning theory(Bandura,1977)and core competencies.The results are achieved as follows: 1)Over six in ten high school students do have role models in English learning.And the main categories of role models are various,including classmates,teachers,relatives,actors,singers,etc.2)Age,English academic performance,and mother’s academic background have significant effects on whether high school English learners have role models or not,specifically: younger students are more likely to have role models than older students;students who with moderate and above-average scores tend to have role models;and those whose mothers have received higher education are more inclined to have role models.In addition,the verbal and non-verbal qualities of role models are both important for students to consider.3)The construction processes for role models of high school English learners go through four stages: attention,retention,reinforcement,and motivation.4)Role models have different degrees of influence on the development of high school English learners’ core competencies.Role models have a strong influence on the enhancement of students’ language ability and the development of their learning ability.And a certain impact is on the cultivation of cultural awareness.However,it is not obvious in the promotion of high school English learners’ thinking capacity.The above research findings to some extent demonstrate the status quo,construction stages,and influence of role models of high school English learners in the new era,which has important enlightenment for English teachers to carry out English education with role models better.It also has reference value for promoting the implementation of a new round of basic education curriculum standards and effectively developing students’ core competencies.Due to conditions,this study may have limitations in research sampling and data analysis.Subsequent researchers can make attempts to do longitudinal multi-case study to obtain more in-depth and detailed empirical data,so as to provide more targeted guidance for the integration of role model education into high school English teaching practice.