A Three Dimensional Study On Autonomous Learning Of English Vocabulary In Senior High School

With the arrival of information society and knowledge economy era, there's a shift from knowledge-centeredness to person-centeredness in today's education. In the future, the illiterate are not those who have no knowledge, but those who have not mastered ways of learning. This is where the idea of lifelong learning comes. The ability of autonomous learning, essential for lifelong learning, has thus been highly valued. This point can be best demonstrated by the new teaching reform, one of whose goals is to cultivate students'autonomous learning ability and to help students learn how to learn. Therefore, teachers are expected to make necessary changes to traditional teaching styles, to attach greater importance to the cultivation of learning strategies for students and to help students develop the ability of autonomous learning in the new English curriculum criteria.It is widely accepted that vocabulary is a basic element for language learning and the mastery of vocabulary is an essential but difficult aspect of second and foreign language learning. One cannot expect to master a language without the learning of vocabulary. However, in senior high schools so far, the teaching and learning of English vocabulary does not seem to lead to the expected results, and both teachers and learners feel discouraged in one way or another. More and more teachers and educators have realized that for vocabulary learning it is far from enough to rely on teachers'instructions in class and students'rote learning. How to learn vocabulary more effectively has drawn the concern of high school English education. The author considers it the best solution to allow and help students to share their responsibilities and to improve vocabulary learning with learners'autonomous learning strategies and efforts. Therefore, to arouse students'awareness of autonomous learning and to improve their learning ability in foreign language development merits the educational wisdom and exploration of all foreign language teachers.Learner autonomy has been a buzzword in foreign language teaching in the last 20 years. Autonomous learning involves three dimensions, namely the attitude dimension, the capacity dimension, and the environment dimension. This paper is an attempt to explore the possibility of successful English vocabulary learning by the development of students'autonomy in learning from these three dimensional considerations.Firstly, the thesis gives an introduction to the definitions and nature of autonomous learning and autonomous learning in foreign language learning, followed by a discussion on autonomous English vocabulary learning, as well as its functions and theoretical rationale.Secondly, three dimensions of autonomous vocabulary learning are discussed and elaborated. The"attitude"dimension refers to the notion, motivation, interest and will involved in vocabulary learning; the"capacity"dimension is related to cognitive strategies and meta-cognitive strategies; and the"environment"dimension is linked to teacher's roles, learning materials and resources, as well as the atmosphere of classroom and students'cooperation.Thirdly, approaches to three dimensions of autonomous vocabulary learning are explored in teaching practice. A detailed description and elaboration is given as to how to develop students'active attitudes in vocabulary learning, how to foster students'autonomous learning capacities and how to provide better environments for students to learn vocabulary.Fourthly, an experimental study on autonomous vocabulary learning is carried out. At the beginning, a survey that is conducted by means of a questionnaire is presented, followed by an analysis aiming to investigate the current situation of learner autonomy in vocabulary learning among senior high school students. Then an experiment is performed on two classes of students. At the last stage of the experiment, students are interviewed to learn more about their autonomous vocabulary learning. After a one-semester investigation and study, the author is able to conclude that autonomous vocabulary learning is effective in improving vocabulary learning for high school students and upgrading students'academic records.Finally, the author sums up the major research findings in favour of autonomous learning strategies, and at the same time suggestions are made as to where the research can be improved.It is the sincere hope of the author that the major findings of this thesis will be helpful to senior high school teachers in both their vocabulary teaching efforts and the cultivation of learner autonomy in foreign language learning and teaching as a whole.