Cultivating Learner's Autonomy In English Listening In The Vocational College

Since last century, Henri Holec put forward the concept of learner autonomy, for decades; it has gained numerous attentions in China and abroad. Combining learner autonomy with the English education is of great concern for both linguistics and educators. This new pattern requires the change from teacher-centered mode to learner-centered pattern and learners should be responsible for their own study, their awareness should also be enhanced.On the basis of leaner autonomy and its relevant theoretical basis, combining with the characters of English listening and teacher's roles in the new context, the thesis aims to make a teaching experiment on promoting learner autonomy in English listening in Vocational College .This experiment chooses the students of Daqing Petroleum Institute, Qinhuangdao Branch as the subjects and altogether 90 students are involved. The study is intended to discuss the following three questions in the thesis:1. What is the present situation about Vocational College students'autonomous learning?2. Does autonomous learning program help students develop a good habit of listening and improve their academic performance?3. How does the teacher's role shift under the autonomous listening environment?The author firstly designed a questionnaire to investigate the subjects'current autonomy level. The results showed that the autonomy level was not satisfactory. On this basis, an experiment was carried out. Before the experiment, a pretest is adopted for both the experimental class and the control class. The scores revealed that there was no obvious difference between them. For the experimental class, the teacher encouraged students to listen and speak more, practicing listening strategies, asking the students to keep listening diaries as their daily homework. The communication tools such as QQ group and E-mails were all put into use for the timely instruction and efficient supervision. For the control class, no extra instruction was applied. After the experiment, another listening test was conducted to prove whether there was improvement for the listening proficiency. The experiment combined the questionnaires, listening tests, listening diary and the interview as the instruments. A mixed method of both quantitative and qualitative research was put into use. The software of SPSS17.0.was also introduced for the accuracy and reliability of the data analysis obtained from the questionnaires and listening tests.The results of the experiment show that under the instruction of learner autonomy, the listening scores of experimental class students'have improved significantly compared with that of the control class. The awareness and competence of learner autonomy is enforced. The new teacher's role functions considerably than before. So, it is obvious that cultivating learner autonomy in Vocational College is necessary.This thesis still requires more improvement. Hope this research can of some help for English listening teaching in Vocational College.