摘 要

近年来，越来越多的国内外专家学者对元认知策略与英语学习之间的关系进行了深入的研究。本文通过实证研究的方法对203名非英语专业的大学生在英语学习过程中元认知策略的运用情况进行调查，结果显示学生在英语学习过程中对于元认知策略的使用存在较大差异，高水平组学生与低水平组学生在元认知策略使用方面存在显著差异，尤其体现在事先计划，自我监控，自我管理和自我评估这四种元认知策略。在上述研究结果的基础上我们就培养元认知模式提出了建议：应当加强学生元认知策略的训练，培养学生良好的学习习惯和能力。

关键词：元认知策略；英语学习；非英语专业学生；建议

Contents

1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………1

2. Literature review……………...………………………………………………….2

2.1 Domestic research…………………………………………………..………….2

2.1.1 Theoretical exploration …………………………………………...................2

2.1.2 Findings on theory with practice……………………………………………..2

2.2 Research overseas…………………………………………………………….....3

3. Methodology……………………………………………………………………...5

3.1 Research questions……………………………………………………………....5

3.2 Participants………………………………………………………………………5

3.3 Data collection…………………………………………………………………...6

3.4 Data analysis……………………………………………………………………..7

4. Results amp; Discussions……………………………………………………………..7

4.1 Classification of metacognitive strategies……………………………………......7

4.2 Analysis of students’ use of metacognitive strategies ……………………….......8

4.2.1 Advance organization ……………………………............................................10

4.2.2 Self-management…………………………………............................................10

4.2.3 Self-assessment……………………………………...........................................10

4.2.4 Self-monitoring…………………………………...............................................11

4.2.5 Selective attention………………………………...............................................12

4.2.6 Directed attention ………………………………...............................................12

4.3 Summary………………………………………………………………………....12

5. Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………13

Works Cited………………………………………………………………………....15

Bibliography………………………………………………………………………...15

A Study of Non-English Majors’ Metacognitive Strategies for English Learning

1. Introduction

Along with the rapid development of technology, English plays an extremely essential role as a media and a tool for the transmission of information, and our country pays much attention to English learning. Therefore, how to learn and how to master English effectively has become a hot issue, which is not only a problem focused on by learners, but also a research subject by scholars. Since the 1970s, educators and researchers have begun to put emphasis on this issue. They found metacognitive strategies were indispensable during the process of second language acquisition and nowadays students must have a self-learning ability to fit current situation.

It has been a long time to study metacognitive strategies. Back to the year of 1976, the American psychologist Flavell (1976) firstly cited the term “metacognition” in his book. Then there were more scholars involved in the study of metacognitive strategies.

In fact, the available research data on metacognitive strategy have been various, but most of the results are based on foreign scholars, not Chinese learners. Because of that, those research findings may not be suitable for Chinese students. What’s more, many researches in China focus on English majors, while little has been done for non-English majors. However, the number of non-English majors is larger than English majors. For non-English majors, there is less spare time for them than English majors to study English. They need to use metacognitive strategies to improve their English learning efficiency more urgently than English majors do.

In a word, it is important to have a right understanding and use of metacognitive strategies in second language acquisitions. The purpose of the study is to investigate the metacognitive strategies adopted by non-English majors and whether high-proficiency students and low-proficiency student perform in a different way in terms of metacognitive strategies, thus helping to provide suggestions for English learning and teaching in the future.

1. Literature review

2.1 Domestic research

2.1.1 Findings on theoretical exploration

Study on metacognition and metacognitive strategies starting from psychology began in the early 90s of the 20^th century in China. In the beginning, it was primarily about the introduction and learning of the existing foreign theories, and it then gradually developed into a study of teaching objects. Wen (1996) first proposed the regulation and control of metacognitive strategy. Liu amp; Xiao (2002) explored the relationship between metacognitive strategy and language learning as well as the metacognitive strategy’s guiding function and practical meaning. Zhang (2005) investigated 101 students in terms of their use of metacognitive strategy from PLA Foreign Language University. The results showed that the frequent use of metacognitive is closely associated with student’s study. According to their findings: there exists a significant difference between high-proficiency and low-proficiency learners on their use of metacognitive strategy.