Strategy instruction and good language learners

Abstract

An aspect of teaching/learning methodology which has attracted a great deal of debate over the years is the issue of strategy instruction. A major premise of the research on the strategies of “good” language learners initiated by Rubin (1975) is that the strategies used by successful learners of languages can be taught to students who are struggling to learn a new language, thus making them better language learners. In the 30 years since Rubin's article, the effectiveness of strategy instruction has been questioned (for instance, Vann and Abraham, 1990). Nevertheless, others have developed well-recognised strategy instruction models (such as Chamot, Barnhardt, El-Dinary and Robbins, 1999; Cohen, 1998; and Grenfell and Harris, 1999), and research has shown that, under the right conditions, strategy instruction can be effective (for instance, Nunan, 1997; O'Malley, 1987). Thirty years ago, it was commonly believed that “good” language learners used learning strategies while “bad” language learners did not. This fallacy was exposed by studies that compared effective and less effective language learners and found that both used learning strategies, often the less effective learners using as many strategies as the more successful language learners (O'Malley and Chamot, 1990). Further research examined the quality of learning strategy use and found that strategic learners have metacognitive knowledge about their own thinking and learning approaches, a good understanding of what a task entails, and the ability to orchestrate the strategies that best meet both the task demands and their own learning strengths (see Anderson, this volume).