help them. In few words, things were developing very differently from what we had
expected. It seemed to me that I needed to know more about autonomy and in what
conditions it was achieved.
In Chapter 2 (p. 24), it was stated that autonomy was the ability to take charge of
one's own learning. In different words but along the same lines, many researchers have also
defined autonomy emphasising the necessity of creating an appropriate internal state that
allows the individual to take control of her own learning. Thus, Dickinson defines autonomy
as "an attitude to language learning" (1993,330) and also states that there are five abilities
(ability to identify contents, formulate objectives, implement strategies, monitor them and
self-evaluate) which autonomous learners need to acquire. The right attitude Dickinson
talks about plays the same role of Holec's awareness: the feasibility of self-directed learning.
Elsewhere, Dickinson relates the two elements, attitude and ability, in one sentence and says
that successful learning autonomy is "a combination of attitudes to learning and learning
skills" (1994,39), where the attitude is "a favourable attitude towards independence in
learning" and the ability is "learning skills". He also adds a third component: motivation. For
other authors, this component is considered part of the right attitude towards learning in
general, towards autonomous learning, towards language learning, and towards the target
language. Cotterall, for instance, talks about "the ability to use a set of tactics for taking
control" (1995,195) but refers to the right attitude when she adds that part of the reason for
using these tactics in different degrees is the result of "differences in learner beliefs about
language learners". In this sense, learner's beliefs account for the attitude that make possible
the ability to self-leam. Wenden's comment on this topic is very clear:
Without an internal change in consciousness to accompany expertise in the use of
self-instructional techniques, true autonomy is not achieved. (1991,49)
In short, autonomy seems to be made up of two main elements. On the one hand,
there are attitudes, beliefs, awareness, all of them playing an essential role in autonomous
learning for they create this internal context that enables self-learning to take place. On the
other hand researchers talk about abilities, skills, techniques, or tactics. To use Holec's
terms, the former belongs to the psychological aspect of autonomy whereas the latter make
up the methodological side of it (1980). In Little’s terms
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