| At present, with the rapid development of economy and society, languageteaching has converted into more and more communication-oriented tendency, whichmakes the traditional classroom teaching mode encounter huge challenges. Under the“students-centered†classroom teaching mode, the focus of teaching has shifted fromteachers to students, which means the students must assume more responsibility fortheir own learning.The survey is conducted by means of questionnaire and interview. The subjectsare the300students from Hongzhi Class, Key Class, and Regular Class in the MiddleSchool Attached to Yuncheng University in Shanxi province. By summarizing andanalyzing the data, the study attempts to answer the following questions:1) What are the general beliefs held by students in senior middle school relatedto learner autonomy in language learning?2) Are there any significant differences existing in the beliefs concerninglearner autonomy among the classes of different levels?3) Why do these differences generate?The data collected from the questionnaires has been analyzed by SPSS16.0. Inorder to provide answers to the questions above, descriptive statistics and independent T-test have been employed in the study. As the study indicates, the senior students’autonomous beliefs towards English learning are weak on the whole, which showsspecifically as follows: their learning motivation and sense of self-efficacy are usuallynot strong, and they don’t tend to set goals and make plans for themselves. Besides,they also seem weak and insufficient towards self-monitoring and self-evaluation intheir learning. Therefore, most students are not ready enough for learner autonomy.In addition, among the students surveyed, the students in Hongzhi Class whoare with a higher motivation keep a certain control to their learning, while those inKey Class hold a relatively weaker learning motivation. But it is encouraged to seethat the latter is also more initiative in learning compared with those in Regular Class.For example, they prefer to preview and review before and after class, what’s more,they always make plans out of class, etc. However, students in Regular Class are lackin autonomous concepts in general. They not only lack a strong learning motivation,but seldom make plans and set goals which can account for their blind state inlearning. By the interview to some students, the author finds out that the reasonsleading to the differences:1) family economical background;2) educationbackground;3) influences from their parents (parents’ professions, their educateddegree and the time they spend on their children).The findings above suggest some implications for promoting learner autonomyin English teaching and learning. First of all, the students should try to cultivate andform active and positive attitudes towards English learning and broaden their learningstyles, furthermore, keep diary every day and sign learning contracts with theirteachers in order to monitor and evaluate their own learning. In addition, it isindispensable for the teachers to cultivate the students’ ability on learner autonomy.They should assist to motivate the students’ interests in English learning, train thestudents to master some effective learning strategies and help them perform well incooperative learning so as to foster the students’ autonomous ability. |
