Ma Tesol Student

2011 International Conference on Social Science and Humanity (ICSSH 2011)

Language Learning Strategy Preferences of Iranian EFL Students

Jahanbakhsh Nikoopour

Mohammad Amini Farsani

Jahangir Kashefi Neishabouri

English Translation Studies Dept.
IAU, North Tehran Branch
Tehran, Iran e-mail: [e-mail]

Foreign Languages Dept.
University for Teacher Education
Tehran, Iran e-mail: [e-mail]

Psychology Dept.
University for Teacher Education
Tehran, Iran e-mail: [e-mail]

Abstract—The current study was carried out with the intention of investigating the most preferred strategy used by
EFL students in Iran. The instrument utilized in this study was Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) to assess the learners ' strategy use frequency in language learning. The findings revealed that,in terms of overall strategy use, Iranian EFL learners are, in general, moderate strategy users. The results showed that Iranian EFL learners preferred to use metacognitive as the most frequently used language learning strategy and memory as the least frequently one. Keywords-component: language learning strategies, Iranian
EFL learners

I.

INTRODUCTION

Within the field of education over the last few decades, a gradual but significant shift has taken place, resulting in less emphasis on teachers and teaching and greater stress on learners and learning. The reasonable goal for language teachers is to make their students become less dependent on teachers and reach a level of autonomy [28]. At the same time, a shift of attention has taken place in second language acquisition research from the products of language learning to the processes through which learning takes place [21]. As a result of this change in emphasis, language learning strategies (LLSs) have emerged not only as integral components of various theoretical models of language proficiency [7][2], but also as a means of

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