Examining the language learning strategies

Examining the language learning strategies: "Examining the language learning strategies
used by French adult learners
Jane Merrifield
M Sc degree in Teaching English for Specific Purposes
English Studies
Aston University
November 1996

Abstract
Exploring a sample of French adult learners of English, this dissertation attempts to show how culture plays a fundamental role in influencing learning style. My main goals are, firstly, to identify and to develop insights into the characteristics of French cultural learning style by examining the language learning strategies that learners use to improve their progress, and secondly, to suggest ways in which this information can be exploited in the classroom context in order to promote language learning.
The Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) will be used as the basis for my investigations. The SILL, developed by Oxford (1990), contains a recent and comprehensive list of language learning strategies. By a detailed analysis of the use of strategies by French learners, I hope to show certain patterns that appear and reflect the extent to which strategy use is linked to and influenced by both learning style and culture. As culture is such a wide term, attempts will be made to define it carefully. Language learning strategies also mean different things to different people. For this reason, I will give a background to them in order to promote a more concrete understanding of them. "