Language Learning Strategy use by Prospective English Language Teachers in Indonesia

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to explore Language Learning Strategies (LLS) as used by prospective English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers when learning English within the Indonesian context. Specifically the aim of this study is to explore the profile of strategy use as enabled by prospective English language teachers and to examine the strategies used by them at different language proficiency levels (high, medium, low). This study is urgently needed to improve classroom practice and to provide the learners with appropriate strategy use, especially those learners who have low proficiency levels. This study employed a Convergent Parallel Design (CPD) as part of a mixed method approach in which both quantitative data via a questionnaire and qualitative data from interviews were collected concurrently. Two hundred and eighty four prospective English language teachers, studying in a university in Indonesia, participated. They agreed to complete the Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) as designed by Oxford (1990). In addition, the participants were agreeable to being classified in accord with their proficiency levels (high, medium, and low) as determined by their achievement results. To validate the quantitative findings, eighteen out of the 284 participants were randomly selected from these three proficiency levels and invited to participate in an interview process. The results demonstrated that the participants employed many of the SILL strategies at a high frequency. Interestingly, during their interviews, they also reported using many new strategies. This high frequency of strategy use in relation to the questionnaire was most evident in the metacognitive category. Also of interest was the revelation that the interview data likewise demonstrated a propensity for metacognitive strategy use. These findings indicated that the participants in this study tended to manage their own learning and they also attempted to be better language learners by employing a lot of additional strategies, very frequently, in their English learning, with examples such as working to be better learners, practising, asking for help from others, using the internet and watching tv/movies. There were also many other strategies that were employed by diverse participants which demonstrated individual variations via approaches that were specifically aimed at improving language proficiency. The findings also demonstrated that there was a linear relationship between strategy use and proficiency levels in which the higher the proficiency level, the higher the number of strategies employed. Furthermore, it was also found from both the questionnaire and interview analyses that high proficiency level learners tended to choose metacognitive strategies. Accordingly, this included conscientious planning, monitoring and evaluating their own learning thereby indicating that they were autonomous learners. Such positive attention to effective learning strategies could well filter through and provide a pathway to assisting less successful learners. Finally, the findings of this study seem set to provide a promising contribution to the further development of existing global theories about language learner strategies, especially given that the study was conducted in Indonesia because there are very few studies on LLS within the Indonesia context that can be located in the literature. [Author abstract]