A Look at EFL Technical Students’ Use of Learning Strategies in Taiwan

Abstract

253 freshmen taking Freshman English from a university of technology in the central Taiwan participated in this study. The purposes of this research were to explore what learning strategy was used more frequently by college students and to investigate the variance of using learning strategies among students of different English proficiency levels. The results indicated that the most frequently used strategy in learning English was Compensation and followed by Affective, Social, Memory, Metacognitive, and Cognitive strategies respectively. High proficiency students used these six learning strategies more frequently than low proficiency ones. All the six learning strategies existed positive correlation with English academic achievement individually. It is suggested that teachers should explore a variety of different learning strategies with their students, and think carefully about which strategies offer the greatest prospect for improvement for students within a specific educational environment. Instructing learning strategies in class by EFL teachers will also promote students’ motivation in learning English and enhance their learning effectiveness and efficiency.