中学生英语学习动机的干预研究

Chapter One Introduction

1.1 Research Background and Significance
Psychological studies suggest that some sort of motivation is the motives andstrength that inspire people to engage in some certain activities. Foreign languagelearning motivation that directly promotes foreign language learning is the internalmotivation. Foreign language learning motivation is also a learners’ conscious andpositive mental state in the learning activities and it is an important non-intelligencefactors affecting learning outputs. In the 1970s, linguists Jakobson(1960) notes that themain factors affecting language learning are: motivations accounting for 33%, abilitiesaccounting for 33%, intelligence accounting for 20% and others accounting for 14%.Many domestic studies have also demonstrated the importance of learning motivationsthat improve foreign language learners’foreign language proficiency.Yin Bingjiang(殷炳江，2003：103) points out that infants and young childrenappear to be propelled by curiosity, driven by an intense need to explore, interact with,and make sense of their environment. Unfortunately, as the children growing, theirpassion for learning seems to shrink frequently. Learning often becomes associated withdrudgery instead of delight. All the students are present in the classroom but most ofthem are absent-minded; they fail to engage themselves fully in the experience of theirlearning. Zhang Hong(张虹，2009：136) points out that in one way, motivation is wheresomeone(perhaps a team leader) causes someone else (a team member) to act in acertain way. In another way, it appears that motivation is something that someone usesas a motive for doing things. Students’ motivation naturally has to do with students’desire to participate in the learning process. But it also concerns the reasons or goalsthat underlie their involvement or noninvolvement in academic activities.
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1.2 Research Innovation
In the previous studies, the researchers focus more on the sorts and theclassifications of the learners’ English learning motivations. Some researchers find outsome strategies of English teaching for the teachers and English learning for the learners.Most of the researchers theoretically propose some methods of English teaching andlearning. There are not a lot of researchers who pay attention on the empirical study oflearners’ English learning motivations. This thesis does the empirical studies of the middle school students’ English learning motivations and according to the previousstudy and interviews to the students, the author has designed three interventions to seewhether they are effective. From the studies and interviews, the author also gives somesuggestions of English teaching and learning to the teachers and students.
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Chapter Two Literature Review

2.1 StudyAbroad
Many scholars classify motivations and point out their features. In early stages, language learning motivation researches are mostly the studies of Gardner andLambert(1972), and they are also the important scholars who make the greatestcontribution to language learning motivations. To a large extent, a number of otherresearch models are subject to their influence and largely maintain social psychologyperspectives. Gardner(1985) classifies the foreign language learning motivations intotwo parts: instrumental motivation and integrative motivation. The former shows morepractical values such as getting scores or getting jobs, while the latter means that thelearners want to contact more about the culture and people of the target language and beaccepted by them and it is the main concept of Gardner’s theory, which includesmotivation, integrity and learning attitudes.The criticism for Gardner who studied foreign language learning motivationfocuses on three aspects. Firstly, many researchers believe that Gardner’s foreignlanguage learning motivation model is so powerful and perfect that hinder the existenceand development of other models and theories. Secondly, Gardner’s foreign languagelearning motivation model only points out the causal relationship between languagelearning motivation and achievement, but not clearly proves what was causing what.Last, Gardner’s foreign language learning motivation model is mainly considering theinfluence of the social environment of language learning motivation, but not pay enoughattention to foreign language learning motivation under the circumstances of school andclassroom education. Although Gardner and Lambert’s theories are criticized by manypeople, they are undoubtedly the most influential language learning motivationresearches.
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2.2 Study at Home
Chinese scholars have also conducted a number of foreign language learningmotivation researches. Our researches on foreign language learning motivation began inthe 1980s. Hua Huifang(华惠芳，1998：44) thinks that it seems not appropriate enoughor comprehensive enough for Gardner and Lambert to put motivations into instrumentalmotivation and integrative motivation. From the perspective of Chinese languageeducation, she proposes that 80% Chinese learners’ motivation belongs to certificationmotivation that is used to deal with the tests in order to get the certificates for languagelearners in language learning. And they rarely consider the training of communicativeabilities and interpersonal skills, which leading to the result of the students who get thehigh marks but lack of abilities. Ma Ruifang(马瑞芳，2003：46) claims that learners’learning motivations are determined by many factors and what factors affect learningmotivations most is the learners’ attitudes. Attitudes can help learners to reflect onlearning and to some extent, the sense of achievement can improve learners’ learning motivations. Ma Guanghui(马广惠，2005：37) points out that motivation includes themotivation of getting achievement and motivation of avoiding failure and that is,motivation is related to the expectations of success or failure. Wen Qiufang(文秋芳，，2001：105) points out that the relationship between motivation, ideas, strategies is ofhigh stability after making an investigation of the characteristics of English learners.Motivation has influence on ideas and strategies while ideas also affect strategies.
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Chapter Three Research Methodology..... 19
3.1 Research Questions ....... 19
3.2 Subjects........ 19
3.3 Research Methods ......... 20
3.4 Research Procedures...... 20
Chapter Four DataAnalysis of English Learning Motivations........ 23
4.1 Questionnaire..... 23
4.2 Data Processing....... 26
4.3 CorrelationAnalysis...... 34
Chapter Five Research Design of Three Interventions......... 37
5.1 Learning Situations Intervention..... 37
5.2Achievement Intervention ......... 41
5.3 Social Responsibilities Intervention...... 46
5.4 Summary...... 48

Chapter Five Research Design of Three Interventions

According to the data analysis in Chapter Four, it can be concluded that moststudents have the achievement motivations and their main English learning motivationsare the achievement motivations. And also the students who get lower marks show thehigher motivations in achievement motivation. As to learning situation, students whohave the different conditions show a little different in learning motivations. Fewstudents pay attention on the social responsibilities motivations. Interventions of socialresponsibilities may be effective to motivate their sense of social responsibilities. Innermotivation include many factors and it is various and complicated. In other words, it isdifficult to intervene in middle schools students’ inner motivation itself, but maybe it isworkable to intervene other motivations in order to promote inner motivation. Fromthese obvious outcomes in correlation analysis and previous data, the author has made adesign of three interventions from the three aspects: learning situation, achievement,and social responsibilities.To ensure the consistency and the authenticity of the experiment, the same studentsas in the previous research participated in the study of three interventions.

Conclusion

This thesis analyzes five types of English learning motivations of middle schoolstudents in Taiyuan training classes: inner motivation, achievement motivation, learningsituation motivation, social responsibilities motivation and individual developmentmotivation. Results show that different students with different schools, ages, gendersand marks have the different types of motivations. Most students take their achievementmotivations as the main English learning motivations. The students who get lowermarks show the higher motivations in achievement motivation. Most students’ socialresponsibilities motivations are low. As to learning situation, students in differentconditions show a little different in learning motivations. Students who are in goodmiddle school and get high marks show higher inner motivation. As to individualdevelopment motivation, different students show different degrees in it. Following thedata analysis, the author also discusses about how to stimulate students’ Englishmotivations based on the author’s five years of English teaching and the investigation ofmotivation of middle school students’English learning.Correlation Analysis shows that all the five kinds of English motivations influencethe middle school students’ English learning. Learning situations motivation, individualdevelopment motivation and social responsibilities motivation are all correlated to innermotivations. Social responsibilities motivation is not obviously correlated to innermotivation. Learning situations motivation and achievement motivation are the mostcorrelated to inner motivation. Inner motivation is the most related to middle schoolstudents’English learning motivation.
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References (omitted)