The vocabulary learning strategies of high school efl learners

In all schools in Turkey, from primary school until university, English is a compulsory subject for students. Therefore, English is taught for at least two hours a week depending on the school or grade the students are studying at. In spite of this long language education period, the success in terms of being able to speak, write or understand the language is still insufficient to be accepted as an optimal level. In the last two decades, technology has improved, opportunities have increased but the success of learning a language efficiently has not reached to a high level correlatively. Since vocabulary is a generally accepted important aspect of learning a language, the purpose of this study was to investigate the vocabulary learning strategies adopted by 9th grade students, to find which vocabulary learning strategies they used mostly and which ones they used the least. Another purpose of this study was to find whether there were any differences between male and female learners in terms of using these strategies. In the light of these aims, 172 9th grade students took part in this study and they were asked to fill in a questionnaire of 25 vocabulary learning strategy items. Also, a semi-structured interview with ten students was held. After the data was collected, an analysis was made by using frequency, percentages, and means. As a result of the data analysis, it has been found that the mostly used strategies by the students are Social (Discovery) Strategy and Determination Strategy. The least used strategies are Social (Consolidation) Strategy and Metacognitive Strategy. In terms of gender, there was generally no significant difference of strategy use between female and male students. However, when the strategy items are looked into individually, there are some slight differences. It is expected that the findings of this study will contribute the teachers in terms of improving themselves and their students about the instruction of VLSs and by taking the results of this study into account, it will also help the teachers to select more appropriate course books and materials related with the strategy use of their students.