A STUDY ON THE MISMATCH

BETWEEN PREFERRED LEARNING

STYLES AND DOMINANT LEARNING

STRATEGIES TO ENHANCE THE

ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT FOR

ENGLISH STUDENTS AT THE

UNIVERSITY OF PEOPLE’S SECURITY

 LE THI NGUYET, M.AUNIVERSITY OF PEOPLE’S SECURITY

IntroductionSuccess or failure in learning a foreign language is due to a variety of factors, among which learning strategies and styles play very significant roles in helping learners develop their language competence. building and matching suitable learning styles and strategies are important 

LANGUAGE LEARNING STYLES

Learning styles are “tendencies for approaching learning tasks and processing information in particular ways”.                               Akiba and Alkins (2010, p.64)Learning style  are  “the  ways  in  which  an  individual  characteristically  acquires,  retains  and retrieves  information”. Felder and Henriques (1995, p.21)

LANGUAGE LEARNING STYLES

1. visual learningread explanations, instructions, pre-read new

lessons, extra materials, newspapers, stories, movie subtitles…

2. auditory learninglisten to instructions, lectures, news, movies,

songs, tapes, pronunciation of new words, group discussions, content of lessons…

3. kinaesthetic learningtake part in class activities: games, role plays,

interviews, speaking clubs, present ideas in front of the class…

LANGUAGE LEARNING STYLES

4. tactile learningdo assignments, draw sth, use body language, make real objects, write new words, write letters or reports or learning diary…5. group learningtake part in group activities, do homework with friends, ask for help from friends, practice speaking with group members…6. individual learninganswer or present ideas individually, do homework alone, learn online by themselves, self-study… Reid (1987)

Learning strategy is “the implementation of a set of procedures for accomplishing something” and “a sequence of procedures for accomplishing learning”

Schemeck (1988, p.5) Learning strategies are defined as “the techniques or devices, which a learner may use to acquire knowledge”

Rubin (1975, p.43) Learning strategies as “specific actions taken by the learner to make learning easier, faster, more enjoyable, more self-directed and more transferable to new situations.” Oxford (1990, p.8)

LANGUAGE LEARNING STRATEGIES

2 broad categories:

1. Strategies that directly affect learning, such as clarification/verification, monitoring, memorisation, guessing/inductive reasoning, deductive reasoning and practice.2. Strategies that indirectly affect learning, such as creating opportunities to use and practice the language, and using production tricks such as communication strategies. Rubin (1981)

LANGUAGE LEARNING STRATEGIES

Direct strategies1. Memory strategies 2. Cognitive strategies 3. Compensation strategies

Indirect strategies 1. Metacognitive strategies2. Affective strategies 3. Social strategies (Oxford, 1990, p.17)

LANGUAGE LEARNING STRATEGIES

The author’s classifications of her students’ learning strategies

1. reading-based2. listening-based3. physically movement-based4. “hands-on” learning-based5. group learning-based6. individual learning-based

Learning goals

Learning styles

Learning strategies

Academic achievements

matched

matched

Correllation between language learning styles, learning strategies and academic

achievements

- identify their learning aims: know what they

want to learn and how to learn

- become much more satisfied with the

environment they interact with

- apply different ways to better their learning

autonomously take the responsibility for

their own learning make learning more

efficient and effective (Oxford and Crookall

(1989)

Hypothesis1. Learning styles and learning strategies have a close correlation with each other and with academic achievements in English learning.2. There is a mismatch between preferred learning styles and dominant learning strategies of pre-intermediate English students at the University of People’s Security.

Research Questions1.  What are preferred learning styles and dominant learning strategies of pre-intermediate English students at the University of People’s Security?2.  Is there a mismatch between preferred learning styles and dominant learning strategies of those English students?3. What are some corollaries of that mismatch?4.  What pedagogical implications should be provided to enhance the academic achievements for English students at the University of People’s Security? 

Research Methodology

1. Research Designdescriptive qualitative  2. Research instrumentsa. Two sets of questionnaire to English studentsb. Pocket interviews to English teachersc. Class observationsd. One-month class experiment

2. Research instrumentsa. Two sets of questionnaire to 104 English students- a set of 30-item questionnaire: the Perceptual Learning Style Preference Questionnaire designed by Joy Reid (1984). find out what learning styles are preferred by pre-intermediate English students at the University of People’s Security - a set of 37- item questionnaire : the Strategy Inventory for Language Learning designed by the author herself and the questions were arranged into six groups which were correlative to Reid’s learning styles investigate what learning strategies are mostly-used by those students at the University of People’s Security

2. Research instrumentsb. Pocket interviews to English teachers- conducted after 2 sets of questionnaire were collected- participants : 5 teachers of English: at least 6 years of teaching experience + Master’s degree in TESOL. - the questions were asked directly to those teachers one by one. - their answers were taken notes carefully and then analysed to serve the study purposes.

2. Research instruments

c. One-month class experiment- conducted after identifying what learning styles were preferred and what learning strategies were mostly used by those students - conducted in four GE classes four times in March 2013 to check whether students could increase their frequency of using effective strategies that matched their preferred learning styles or not. - changed her teaching styles + selected activities + designed materials + combined teaching methods/ approaches

2. Research instruments

d. Class observations

The experiment was observed and its results were presented in a checklist after the some class observations by the author. The results were rated with a scale showing the frequency of the students’ use of strategies after the experiment: 5- always; 4- usually; 3- sometimes; 2- seldom; 1-never

FINDINGS & DISCUSSIONS Of six learning styles Reid (1995) classified, students prefered five styles arranged in the following order of preference: auditory, kinaesthetic, group, visual, and tactile, whereas their individual style is negligible. students’ learning styles match the learning goals which help students improve their English skills, especially communication skills.

Table 2: Students’ learning style preference

Discussions Some of students’ learning strategies didn’t match their learning styles. For example, with visual style, students learn best when they do a lot of reading activities. However, after the survey, many students seldom or never read the content of new lessons in the coursebooks before class. They didn’t read extra documents and reference books for wide-open learning. They almost never read English written newspapers, stories, magazines, etc. or English subtitles of movies.

Discussions With auditory style, students learn best when they hear audiotapes, lectures, and class discussion. However, a few students listened to the content of the lessons in the coursebooks after class to consoliadate what they have learnt. Beside, they didn’t usually listen to the news on TV, internet or radio and listen to the actors or actresses in international movies to understand their meanings. With kinaesthetic style, students learn best when they can actively participate in activities, field trips, and role-playing, etc. in the classroom. However, they should have joined the class-level or university-level English speaking clubs to improve their speaking skills. 

DiscussionsWith tactile style, students learn best when they have opportunities to do  “hands-on” experiences with  new  materials, for example,  working  on  experiments  in  laboratory,  handling and  building models, and touching and working with new materials. However, they didn’t use some practical activities to better their English learning such as drawing pictures, outline or diagrams related to the lessons to remember the content more easily, making flashcards, real objects, etc. to learn new words, writing messages, letters or reports in English and writing their own diaries of learning English. Moreover, they didn’t often use gestures or facial expressions in speaking or when they lacked vocabulary. 

Discussions With group style, students learn more easily when they study with at least one other student, and they will be more successful completing work well when they work with others. In fact, students practiced speaking English with other classmates, but this number should be higher. There were many students who sometimes or seldom asked for help from friends who were better at English or asked their friends to correct their English pronunciation because they felt shy or afraid of losing their faces. Most of students didn’t do homework with other friends after class though they said that they liked group work.

Discussions The only style that was negligible was individual style. This style seems ineffective in English learning because it doesn’t facilitate students’ interaction and communication competence. However, many students still did homework alone or didn’t cooperate well with other classmates to do class activities.

As a result, the students could not learn best when there was a mismatch between their learning strategies and styles. 

CONCLUSIONS Recent research (Oxford & Ehrman, 1988) suggests that learning style has a significant influence on students’ choice of learning strategies, and that both styles and strategies affect learning outcomes. Teachers of English have to find different ways to create a match between learners’ strategies and styles.

Pedagogical implications - take over the role of a researcher as well in order to identify students’ current learning strategies and learning styles. They can do this by using quizzes, survey questionnaire, interviews, games, etc. - encourage students to apply balanced learning styles consisting of auditory, kinaesthetic, group, visual, and tactile styles to achieve their learning targets. - provide some adaptation or adjustments in many aspects to help students rebuild more suitable and effective strategies in their learning. - get a deep understanding of what learning styles and learning strategies that can make their students more successful, importantly, consider differences in learners’ motivation, learning styles, and other factors that affect learning strategy choice and use.

Pedagogical implications- find ways to enhance students’ awareness of the importance of English learning styles and learning strategies. Awareness of their preferred learning styles and mostly-used learning strategies may help to explain why some aspects of language learning seem to come easier than others or are more enjoyable. - hold a discussion forum for some students who use inappropriate strategies to share and express their opinions about their difficultites in their learning or raise any queries related to their learning styles and learning strategies. - have students report on their use of the strategy outside of class. Whenever teachers introduce a new material and make assignments, teachers need to remind students about using a learning strategy that helps them get good outcomes.

Pedagogical implications- teach the strategy in conjunction with a typical class activity, such as listening comprehension, pronunciation drills, grammar practice, or reading and writing lessons. Before asking students to use a strategy, they have to describe, model and give examples of how to use it effectively. - find ways to integrate strategies into everyday class teaching, explicitly and implicitly embedding them into the language tasks to provide for contextualized strategy practice. - show students how to evaluate their successful or unsuccessful use of the strategy, including suggestions for fixing up or replacing the strategy.

Pedagogical implications- combine technology in English teaching to make class activites more effective and more interesting, which can enhance students’ motivation and attract their attention in learning. For example, they can use electronic textbooks, facebook groups, webquests or online softwares to raise the effectiveness of the teaching as well as to require students to adopt suitable styles or strategies in their learning.

Pedagogical implications- use a variety of teaching methods or techniques to adjust students’ learning styles and strategies. For example, to exploit the advantages of visual style in reading class, teachers can use videos and films with sub-titles, written materials with lots of graphics, English newspapers, English stories, etc. - adopt some principles of checking homework. When students are asked to read the content of the new lessons before class, they will do that regularly if their teachers have a check afterwards. - Along with checking, provide careful instructions for all assignments. If teachers want students to read more extra materials, they ought to tell carefully about what documents, books or websites that students have to read, how students deal with their reading, etc. - often carry out communicative activities in English class to help students enhance their English competence with their “hands-on” learning-based, physically movement-based and group learning-based strategies.

Pedagogical implications- change their teaching strategies or techniques whenever they realize a mismatch between students’ learning strategies and learning styles or between students’ strategies and learning targets. Thanks to that change, the mismatch will disappear, which helps to improve students’ learning achievements.