| Cooperative learning is a creative teaching theory and strategy widely used in many countries around the world at present. Due to its significant effectiveness, it has been regarded as one of the most effective contemporary educational reforms. Cooperative learning takes students as the center, fully exerting students’subjective role. It changed the past teaching method that teacher plays a dominant role while students are only passive receivers, giving students more opportunities to exchange and cooperate with each other. It enhances students’interest of learning and build confidence and lets students integrate into learning process in depth with joint efforts, which is a creative and effective teaching method. Autonomous learning is a kind of modern learning style corresponding with the traditional receptive learning. Autonomous learning makes students immerse in the learning process and lets them become the master of learning. Students devote themselves to studying consciously and thus the learning initiative is greatly enhanced. This can help students find learning methods suitable for their own, improving their learning efficiency and developing good learning habits. However, there are relatively less researches on cooperative learning in improving college students’English autonomous learning ability in China, and has not yet formed a comparatively influential teaching approach of college English cooperative learning.Based on this research gap, the thesis aims to explore the influence of cooperative learning on college students’English autonomous learning ability through an empirical research. The research attempts to answer two questions:(1) Whether applying cooperative learning can enhance effectively students’English autonomous learning ability; (2) Whether applying cooperative learning can promote students’ English achievement. The subjects were 231 non-English major freshmen who were from four classes of Beijing Forestry University. Two experimental classes were predetermined, and two matching control classes were selected later. The experimental classes applied cooperative learning in English classes, while the control classes mainly adopted teacher-centered teaching method. The research lasted for one year with questionnaire and proficiency tests as its main instruments. The data obtained from the tests, the questionnaires and classroom observations were collected and analyzed. Conclusions can be drawn as follows:cooperative learning applied in college English classroom can enhance students’English autonomous learning ability effectively and promote the students’English achievement to some extent. Meanwhile, cooperative learning can arouse students’interest of learning, boosting integrative motivation, raising the awareness of responsibility for their own study and build a pleasant classroom atmosphere. It improves students’comprehensive capacities gradually.Although there are still some limitations in this study due to some subjective and objective reasons, this experiment has basically proved that cooperative learning has great influence on college students’English autonomous learning ability, which is worthy to be popularized. |
