Abstract
Learning efficacy can be substantially improved through the frequent use of learning strategies, whose practicality has been confirmed through extensive research. Thus, the purpose of the current study is to contribute to this wealth of research by determining whether learning strategies are significant predictors of students’ achievement in learning English as a foreign language (EFL) as well as by exploring strategy awareness and variations in strategy use by gender, grade level, and overall grade point average (GPA) among 206 high school students. The results indicated that cognitive strategies are significant positive predictors, while memory and affective strategies are significant negative predictors of students’ achievement in foreign language learning. Moreover, the findings revealed a significant impact of overall GPA and an insignificant impact of gender and grade level on the use of strategy subtypes, with the most frequently used strategies being metacognitive and the least frequently used being affective strategies. Furthermore, this research highlights the importance of incorporating strategies-based instruction methods into foreign language curriculums in the Bosnian context and also aims to raise teachers’ awareness of the importance of their application in the classroom milieu.
Highlights
In the last few decades, language education has witnessed a progressive shift of focus from teaching to learning and the responsibility for learning has slowly transferred to the learners themselves, who have become the focal point of both processes and education research
The current study aimed at investigating the grade level, grade point average (GPA), and gender-based differences in the use of language learning strategies, namely memory, cognitive, compensation, metacognitive, affective, and social, by high school students in Bosnia and Herzegovina
The current study participants reported a high use of metacognitive strategies and a moderate use of cognitive, compensation, social, memory, and affective strategies, according to the assessment of strategy usage provided in Oxford and Burry-Stock (1995)
Summary
In the last few decades, language education has witnessed a progressive shift of focus from teaching to learning and the responsibility for learning has slowly transferred to the learners themselves, who have become the focal point of both processes and education research. Language learning strategies, appear to be among the major factors impacting second or foreign language (L2) performance and helping establish how and how well language learners acquire a second or a foreign language (Oxford, 2003). They have captured special research attention, with the findings predominantly pointing to their efficacy across different groups of learners and demonstrating the effectiveness of their practical implementation through adequate strategy instruction. This is so in the EFL context of Bosnia and Herzegovina where English proficiency is deemed indispensable due to the language’s widespread and noticeable presence across different domains (Dubravac et al, 2018)
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