An Interventionist Study On English Learning Strategies For Underachievers In Junior High Schools

During their elementary education period, some intellectually normal students have defects in cognitive skills, resulting in difficulties and low efficiency in learning. They fail to meet the basic requirements set up by the educational department, and they perform badly in their study. Underachievement has become one of the most serious problems in school education. However, with respect to English, a basic subject, due to its unique feature, the number of English underachievers becomes a major concern in China's basic education period.According to All-time Senior High School English Curriculum Standard (Experimental Version, hereinafter called Standard), promulgated by the Ministry of Education in 2001, one of the tasks of English courses in basic education period is to help students form effective learning strategies, raise the awareness of learner autonomy, and develop their language skills, language knowledge, emotional attitude and cultural awareness, etc. Among them, "learning strategy ensures improvement of learning efficiency, and development of learner autonomy." In addition, researches also reveal that the cultivation of learning strategies, especially while combined with cognitive strategy and metacognitive strategy is conducive to motivating their learning desire, optimizing their learning method, enhancing their self-monitoring ability and raising their grades, etc. Moreover, learning strategy training is more helpful to those with worse performance in study.Therefore, the main objective of this study is to examine the defects in learning strategies of junior high school students, and on the basis of the New Century English Textbook used in many junior high schools in Shanghai, explore and introduce an effective teaching mode which is able to help students fundamentally improve their learning strategies. An experiment has been conducted with an attempt to demonstrate the feasibility of this teaching mode which incorporates strategy training into daily teaching activities.Having made a questionnaire among eighth-graders in three schools at Huangpu District in Shanghai, and conducted an interventionist study on learning strategies in a class in Shanghai Huangpu School, the author draws the following conclusions:1. The grade-eight English underachievers participating in the survey indicate an average utilization level below the standard. Some are witnessed low frequency in using the learning strategies, while some others are expected to increase their flexibility in applying. 2. Utilization of learning strategies is one of the main factors affecting students'grade. Fostering the metacognitive strategy for underachiever demands the attention of teachers. Teachers should incorporate cultivating students'strategy into English teaching process, so that students know how to effectively guide, monitor and evaluate their study, improve learning efficiency, cultivate the ability of autonomous learning and eventually satisfy their learning purposes.3. It is feasible and effective to integrate English learning strategy training into daily teaching of Shanghai New Century English Textbook for junior high school students. Training the underachievers of English learning strategies is helpful to improve their English grades and their learning behavior, and further upgrade their English learning ability.This paper is composed of five parts. Part One, the Preface, introduces the background, objective, significance and research method of this study. Part Two, Literature Review, describes both underachievers and English learning strategy, analyzes the relevant academic research results, and defines underachievers and English learning strategy accordingly. Part Three, Research Structure, unveils the current strategy of eighth-grade English underarchievers via a questionnaire study, so as to determine the content of strategy training, and explore the framework of strategy training. Part Four, Interventionist Experiment, deals with the experiment on English learning strategies for junior high school underachievers via the discussions on how to apply listening, vocabulary and reading strategies to the daily teaching activities. Part Five,Conclusion, concludes the findings of this study and tells the limitations.