Resumen de How social strategies affect learning English as a foreign language: a study of EFL students’ social learning attitude
With the development of the educational system and the appearance of new perspectives towards language learning and teaching, more and more social and communicative methods have been incorporated to the language classroom (Krauseet al., 2009; Epsten et al., 2010; Mesoudi, 2011). Consequently, social learning strategies, which are the ones that involve interaction and cooperation, have become an issue for discussion in education and more specifically in the field of English as a Second (ESL) or English as a Foreign Language (EFL), as claimed by Etxebarria, Garay and Romero (2012).
However, very little is known about the effect of social strategies on foreign language development. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to analyse how social learning strategies affect learning English as a Foreign Language; and, second, to explore EFL students’ social learning preference, attitude and behaviour. The sample consisted of twenty EFL students from a secondary school in the city of la Vall de Uxó, in the province of Castellón (Valencian Community, Spain). The participants took a test composed of four English grammar and vocabulary activities. Half of the students (n=10) did it individually, without any interaction or cooperation among themselves, and the other half (n=10) did it in pairs. This test was implemented to compare the effect of the learning strategy used during EFL learning. Furthermore, a questionnaire was also distributed and completed to examine the EFL students’ preference, attitude and behaviour towards social learning strategies. Results obtained reveal that 1) students who employed social strategies had better learning outcomes than learners who worked individually, and 2) EFL learners considered that the use of social strategies was fundamental for language learning, even though they did not apply them frequently.
