A Study Of English Vocabulary Learning Strategies Of Low Achievers In Rural Junior High School

Vocabulary teaching and learning plays an essential part in English teaching. However, due to lack of vocabulary or the incomplete vocabulary comprehension, language learners especially the low achievers are not able to express their own ideas accurately and fluently. Consequently, the training of students’ comprehensive skills should begin with the improvement of their vocabulary proficiency. Virtually, facing the innumerable vocabularies in English, it is infeasible for students to memorize all English words by rote memorization. Therefore, it is essential to help students master effective vocabulary learning strategies. This is also an important way to improve the quality of English teaching in junior high school. Due to the particularity of students especially the low achievers in rural junior high schools and the special environment in rural areas, it is necessary and urgent to study on the low achievers’vocabulary learning strategies in rural junior high schools.This thesis is going to study and analyze the overall characteristics and vocabulary learning concept of low achievers’ English vocabulary learning strategies in rural junior high school. Based on this, the author organized training of vocabulary learning strategies on low achievers in order to see if vocabulary learning strategies have an effect on low achievers’ English levels and English scores. Some specific and workable suggestions are also given so that teachers in rural junior high school will have some reference to foster low achievers’ vocabulary learning strategies. The thesis are going to answer the following questions:(1)What are the overall characteristics and the vocabulary learning concept of low achievers’English vocabulary learning strategies in rural junior high school?(2)Is there any correlation between low achievers’vocabulary learning strategies and their English scores?(3)Does the training of low achievers’ English vocabulary learning strategies have an effect on their English levels and English scores?The research subjects in this paper are chosen from Wangsi Junior High School and Haojing Junior High School in the rural area of Xi’an. The author has distributed100questionnaires and96questionnaires are valid. This study also randomly chose20low achievers to be interviewed in order to find out the overall characteristics of their vocabulary learning strategies in rural junior high school. In the strategy training part, two classes from Grade Eight were chosen from Wang Junior High School as the experimental class and the control class. After the data was collected, the author used SPSS12.0to analyze the data of valid questionnaires. Through questionnaires, interviews and tests, this research studied English vocabulary learning strategies of low achievers from three aspects:metacognitive, cognitive and social/affective strategies.The research results indicate that:(1)Low achievers in rural junior high school generally adopt a variety of vocabulary learning strategies including metacognitive strategies, cognitive strategies and social/affective strategies. Within the three categories, the most frequently used are cognitive strategies and the social/affective strategies are the least used.(2)This research also finds out that vocabulary learning strategies are positively related to test scores.(3)Influenced by the learning concept, students’ vocabulary learning methods in rural junior high school are mechanical. The frequency of using vocabulary learning strategies by rural junior high school students is not high. In all these strategies, rote repetition is used most frequently.(4)After the training of vocabulary learning strategies, the average English score in the experimental class has increased and the failure rate has declined. Therefore, we can draw the conclusion that the English levels of low achievers in rural junior high school have been improved after the vocabulary strategy training. The training of vocabulary learning strategies is helpful for improving students’ efficiency of vocabulary memorization and would improve students’English academic achievement in a certain extent. It would also promote the development of metacognitive strategies, cognitive strategies and social/affective strategies and then help students form good learning methods.