A Survey Of Application Of English Reading Strategies For English-majors At Jiangsu University Of Technology

Reading is by far the most important of the four skills in a second language formany students, especially in English as a second or foreign language (Carrell,1988:1). English reading is an important means of access to English language knowledge,understanding external information and improving the practical ability of English.English reading highlights its important position, while reading strategies areconsidered as very important in English learning. In recent years, somepsycholinguists and cognitive linguists have carried out the study on reading strategiesactively. However, there are only a few of researches on reading strategies forEnglish-majors. This thesis attempts to improve on this aspect.The thesis aims to study the application of English reading strategies forEnglish-majors from the perspective of their reading scores. The scores of one readingtest and teachers’ evaluation are collected and calculated as the measurement for thestudents’ reading levels. The reading test consists of6passages. The first and secondpassages are chosen from CET-4(June,2011and June,2012). The rest of fourpassages are chosen from TEM-4(2007and2010). There are25multiple choices. Thescores of one reading test are collected and used as the reference indicating thedifferent levels of their reading ability.This survey is to investigate reading strategies used by English-major collegestudents and the relationship between the application of reading strategies and readingscores. The research mainly puts forward the following research questions:(1) What types of reading strategies do college students usually use?(2) What types of reading strategies do facilitate reading process?(3) Why are these strategies to facilitate reading process? While why are thosestrategies to impede reading process?(4) What are the differences between successful readers (those with high readingscores) and unsuccessful readers (those with lower reading scores) in using readingstrategies?In the survey, the subjects are170sophomores of English majors at JiangsuUniversity of Technology. The survey collects data from one questionnaire and onereading test. Descriptive analysis, correlation analysis and Independent Samples T-testare adopted to analyze the data. This thesis adopts a face-to-face interview to getfirsthand materials in order to supply the former survey.The three major findings are concluded in this survey: (1) English-major college students can apply English reading strategiesmoderately in their reading.(2) Reading strategies correlate with reading scores.(3) There are some differences in the application of reading strategies betweensuccessful readers and unsuccessful readers.The three meanings of this survey are as follows:(1) It provides useful guidance for the further study of application of readingstrategies for English-major college students in China.(2) It is good for urging teachers to cultivate and instruct students using readingstrategies.(3) For college students, it is beneficial to master the usage of reading strategiesand improve their reading efficiency.