Language Learning Strategies and Foreign Language Achievement

Abstract

This paper investigates the relationship between language learning strategies and foreign language achievement. Language learning strategies were measured by the Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL, 7.0 ESL/EFL Version), and the foreign language achievement was determined using the mid-semester course grade averages for 21 ELT students attending the English Preparatory class of the ELT Department. The findings of the study are: (1) the relationship between language learning strategies and foreign language achievement was linear, (2) among the categories included in the inventory only compensation for missing knowledge and the total language learning strategies were significantly correlated with the foreign language achievement as measured by the mid-semester course grade averages and (3) among the categories only compensating for the missing knowledge was predictive of the foreign language achievement accounting for 21 percent of the total variation in the achievement scores.