Abstract
This study elicited Arabic students’ perceptions regarding their language-learning strategy preferences (LLSPs). A sample of 120 undergraduate Arabic students participated. Data were collected through a questionnaire and interviews. The findings reveal that students tend to adopt a holistic view of the learning task and relate it to real-life, personal experience. Participants selected interaction with the teacher, speaking, and flashcards as their most preferred application-directed learning strategies. These selections demonstrate that Arabic students desire to be proactive in order to make the language more concrete for them, to enhance their performance, and to develop language skills that will last a lifetime. Whereas advanced level participants preferred interaction with the teacher, speaking, flashcards, and working individually, beginner level participants preferred learning grammar and group work. The empirical evidence from this study could have implications regarding theoretical models of effective Arabic language instruction, Arabic teacher education programs, and curriculum development.
Highlights
Since the mid-1970s, a substantial amount of research in second language acquisition (SLA) attempts to explain how best to teach and learn a foreign language, what factors make learners successful at learning a foreign language, and why some learners are more successful than others
Our understanding of cognitive processes and learning is relatively limited due to little research performed; the empirical evidence provided by this study can indicate only goal-oriented behavior regarding Arabic language-learning strategy preferences (LLSPs)
The principal result from this study indicated that undergraduate Arabic students who study the language in order to be able to use it for communication with native speakers, concentrated on strategies that help them become autonomous learners (Oxford, 2017) and move them toward the end goal of their learning: speaking for communication
Summary
Since the mid-1970s, a substantial amount of research in second language acquisition (SLA) attempts to explain how best to teach and learn a foreign language, what factors make learners successful at learning a foreign language, and why some learners are more successful than others. Student-centered instruction has given learners more autonomy and responsibility for their learning and has reduced their dependency on instructors (Cohen, 1984; Oxford, 1990, 2003; Pashler, McDaniel, Rohrer, & Bjork, 2008). This change in teaching philosophy has increased the need to investigate the learning strategies that language students apply both inside and outside the classroom. Identifying, describing, and classifying these strategies and the ways learners apply them can help explain and predict students’ behavior when learning an L2 and the level of success they reach (Kamińska, 2014; Oxford, 1990, 2003)
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