Notes

Use of Cognitive Strategies
Engineering students use more of the cognitive strategies. For question 7, “In English study, I _______ make use of various resources to facilitate language learning (e.g. dictionary, encyclopedia)”, only 7% students choose “never”. For question 12, “In English study, I _________ relate new information to other concepts in memory”, only 2% students choose “never”. For question 8, “In English study, I ________ imitate a language mode, including overt practice and silent rehearsal”, 14% students choose “never”. The questions designed here to investigate use of cognitive strategies are not related to specific tasks or language skills. The researchers are more interested in getting a general picture of strategy use. Students’ choices inform the researchers of their preference of learning English language as a cognitive process rather than a social one.
Use of Metacognitive Strategies
As mentioned above, the findings are not out of the researchers’ expectation from their teaching experience. However, the findings of students’ choices of metacognitive strategies are somewhat unexpected. For question 5, “In English study, I ________ check the accuracy of a listening or reading comprehension task”, only 22% students choose “often”. For question 4, “In English study, I _______ set aside some time to practice a language component (e.g. pronunciation or grammar)”, only 32% students choose “often”. For question 3, “In English study, I ________ decide in advance to attend in general to a learning task and to ignore irrelevant distracters”, 40% students choose “often”.