Profiling strategy use of upper elementary vs. junior secondary minority school children learning English as a second language

Abstract

The present study, which is the first largescale (N=1584) study with a sample of Minority Schools in Greece, reports on the descriptive statistics of the data collected within the frame of Thales project 379335 entitled “ADJUSTMENT OF S.I.L.L IN GREEK AND TURKISH AND STRATEGIC PROFILING OF PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SCHOOL LEARNERS AND TEACHERS-S.I.L.L.G.T” by using the validated for school-aged children (Petrogiannis Gavriilidou 2015) Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) version 7 (Oxford 1990), the most widely used instrument for measuring the frequency of language learning strategies (LLS). In the present study the instrument was implemented in order to identify and define individual LLS used by students of upper elementary and junior secondary Greek schools who learn English as a foreign language. It was found that both upper elementary and junior secondary students use more metacognitive strategies while they rarely employ cognitive strategies. However, the individual strategies used are different among the two age groups. The findings of this study suggest a number of implications for classroom activities promoting language learning strategy use