A Study Of Reading Strategies For Non-English Major Students In Higher Vocational-Technical College

English Reading strategy is regarded as one of the main determinants in improving English reading ability. It plays an important role in the whole reading process. Many scholars have researched its influence on the outcomes of English reading and have showed that it is one of the main variables affecting students' reading achievements. On the basis of the previous studies, this paper investigates the features of HVTC students' use of English reading strategies. Especially, the following questions are discussed:1). what is the whole situation of using reading strategies by HVTCs?2).What is the differences between good readers and poor readers in using reading strategies? For the same reading strategies, is there any significant difference between good readers and poor readers?3).What is the relationship between reading strategy use and reading proficiency levels?4). Do subjects of different gender use different English reading strategies?This empirical study is carried out by means of questionnaires. The instruments of the study are the English reading questionnaire and the two reading proficiency tests (PETS2) taken on March and September 2009. Those two kinds of instruments are together implemented to 128 sophomores from two different HVTCs in Shanxi and 106 valid ones are collected at last. The data received are analyzed with T-test and correlation analysis by using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS 13.0). The following are the major findings of the study:1) In terms of reading strategy use, cognitive reading strategies are reported as the most frequently used, followed by meta-cognitive reading strategies and social-affective reading strategies. In addition, among the three reading strategies, the differences of subjects in using them are significant.2) In using meta-cognitive reading strategy and social-affective reading strategy, good readers and poor readers differ significantly. While in using cognitive reading strategy, there is no significant difference between good readers and poor readers. 3) There exist correlations between reading strategy use and reading proficiency level. The correlation order is that:the strongest correlation between meta-cognitive strategy and reading proficiency level. followed between cognitive strategy and reading proficiency level and social-affective strategy and reading proficiency level.4) There exist differences between male and female readers in using reading strategies. There are significant differences in using meta-cognitive strategies between male and female and social-affective strategies between male and female. But no significant difference is found in cognitive strategies between male and female. Female students use reading strategies more often than male.Finally, based on these findings, the author puts forward some ways of furthering the teaching of English reading strategies in HVTCs.