Cognitive Strategies for Dual Imperatives: EFL Listening and Speaking in Chinese Universities

Strategic development of oral communication skills (i.e., listening and speaking) in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in China is fraught with difficulties, including lack of contexts for authentic language use, examination-oriented pedagogy, and tacit educational practices. The quantitative study reported here was designed around a research question of how extensively three specific cognitive strategies – translation, deduction, and contextualisation – are used when students are listening and speaking in class. It was conducted with a large sample (N = 1,440) of Chinese EFL learners at the tertiary level who were learning in class to speak and listen in English. Findings indicate all three strategies are used extensively in both modalities, but significantly more so in speaking. These findings are interpreted in relation to instructional objectives of preparing students for oral communication beyond the classroom and for passing the listening test in the College English Test Band 4 (CET-4). The development of oral communication (listening and speaking) skills as opposed to the development of literacy (reading and writing) for English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners in mainland China has been a slow and cumbersome process for both learners and teachers. Whilst factors such as limitations on access to resources and upgrading teachers’ qualifications are constraining variables, most difficulties stem from lack of authentic contexts and purposes for oral language use, together with use of pedagogy which is culturally inappropriate within the Chinese educational tradition (see Anderson, 1993; Harvey, 1985; Rao, 2002; Y. Wang, 1991). Multilingual communities usually present pragmatic reasons for authentic use of oral English as a medium of intracommunity communication. However, in non-English monolingual contexts such as China, typically there is no need for intracommunity communication in oral English. As a result, Language Education in Asia, 2014, 5(1), 46-65. http://dx.doi.org/10.5746/LEiA/14/V5/I1/A05/Liyanage_Bartlett_Tao Language Education in Asia, Volume 5, Issue 1, 2014 Liyanage, Bartlett, and Tao Page 47 use of oral English has been limited mainly to language classrooms where learners are prepared for end-of-course examinations rather than for out-of-class contexts. Examination-oriented instruction also calls for heavy reliance on textbook-contrived linguistic accuracy. Hence, major focus has been on explicitly teaching and learning grammar (Rao, 2002). The present study is one of several in a large ongoing research project between Australian and Chinese universities to examine the use of language learning strategies (LLS) by Chinese learners of English. The current research stems from one of the studies (Liyanage, Bartlett, Birch, & Tao, 2012) which explored usefulness of strategies in developing listening and speaking skills as perceived by Chinese EFL learners. The authors extended the focus of that study by revisiting its data with specific interest in three language learning behaviours that are used typically by Chinese learners of English in developing oral communication skills in class. The three behaviours are relying on translation to and from Chinese in mediating meaning in oral English, attending to rules of grammar to deduce meaning when engaging in the use of oral English, and using context as an aid to meaning in the comprehension and production of oral English (see Barlow & Lowe, 1985; Harvey, 1985; Maley, 1983; Scovel, 1983). These behaviours are well represented in the literature – for example, they correspond to the cognitive strategies of translation, deduction, and contextualisation respectively, as described by O’Malley and Chamot (1990, p. 137), and were used in their language learning strategy inventory. In the current study, use of these three cognitive strategies by Chinese EFL learners in university settings was investigated. How these strategies are realised in listening / speaking lessons for a regular class of freshmen and the effect of the use of these strategies on the College English Test Band 4 (CET-4) preparation classes is described in detail.