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Motivation and what we can do about it

French Teachers’ Day �Saturday 5 October 2019

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Rachel Hawkes

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https://twitter.com/Sporf/status/1151144459578617859/video/1

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2019/07/22/departing-gareth-bale-has-found-language-barrier-real-madrid/

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Rachel Hawkes

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Session aims

review (briefly!) the evidence for language learning motivation in England
identify key motivational drivers for students in language learning
explore the pedagogy and classroom factors that improve language learning motivation

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Rachel Hawkes

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Why is language learning motivation important?

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Rachel Hawkes

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With a long-term learning process such as the mastery of a second language, learners' ultimate success will depend heavily on their level of motivation.

(Dörnyei, 2014)

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Rachel Hawkes

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What is the level of motivation for language learning of pupils in England? �(as expressed by the participation rates at KS4 and beyond)

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Rachel Hawkes

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Participation in language learning at KS4 and beyond

< 50% Year 11 pupils takes a GCSE language

and of those, pass rate is approx. 70%

< third of pupils achieved a good language GCSE in 2017

4.4% in more than one language - 2016

Regional disparity

62% in London, 40% in the North East, 29% in Middlesborough

Numbers taking A level language down by 1/3 since 1996

entries heavily skewed towards girls (64%) and independent sector

Tinsley, T. & Doležal, N. (2018). Language Trends Survey

Modern Foreign Language Pedagogy Review (2016)�

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Rachel Hawkes

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Session aims

review (briefly!) the evidence for language learning motivation in England
identify key motivational drivers for students in language learning
explore the pedagogy and classroom factors that improve language learning motivation

Material licensed as CC BY-NC-SA 4.0�

Rachel Hawkes

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What most motivates your students? �How sustained is their motivation? �When are they de-motivated? What do they say?

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Rachel Hawkes

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What influences motivation?

What are the key motivational drivers for students in language learning?

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Rachel Hawkes

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Factors that influence motivation (1): �usually somewhat beyond teachers’ control

Sociocultural / environmental factors�- English is global lingua franca - which language do English-speakers need?�- England’s insularity and rejection of ‘European-ness’�- Disinterest 🡪 xenophobia of the press (Coleman, 2009)�- Negative reputation of British as language learners (Graham & Santos, 2015; Lanvers & Coleman, 2013)
Education policy�- Languages for All 🡪 100% optional 🡪 Ebacc…
Individual learner differences�- gender, ability, personality, anxiety, learner ‘selves’ (Dörnyei, 2005, 2009, 2014)

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Rachel Hawkes

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Language Trends Survey 2019

Examinations
Harsh grading
the ‘Brexit’ effect

When asked specifically whether Brexit has had

an impact on pupils’ attitudes towards language

learning, 25% say that there has been a negative

impact either on motivation to learn a European

language or motivation to learn languages in general. p.15

…schools feel pressure to get results, and achieving a good grade in a language is seen as harder than in other subjects. p.17

Many schools are working hard to maintain take-up at

GCSE and A level but overwhelmingly cite the ‘nature

and content of external exams’ as the major barrier

to increasing numbers. p.18

Cont’d: Factors that influence motivation (1): �usually somewhat beyond teachers’ control

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Rachel Hawkes

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Factors that influence motivation (2): �teachers can often do something about these

Pedagogy and classroom factors�

Teacher, grouping, curriculum, assessment, methods, lack of challenge/meaningful communication

Wingate (2016)

Perceptions of ‘ease’ and sense of ‘achievement following effort’ lead to increased motivation

Graham (2004)

Just telling learners “FLs are useful” does not influence uptake;

perceptions of lessons, ‘ease of learning’ & personal relevance count the most

Taylor & Marsden (2014) OASIS summary

Not being able to ‘sound out’ words is de-motivating

Erler & Macaro (2012) OASIS summary

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Rachel Hawkes

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MFL Pedagogy Review Report November 2016

Research supports the Ofsted finding that factors other than a subject’s ‘usefulness’ or importance for future life or work influence pupil choice. Intrinsic motivation, which comes from a sense of progress, growing knowledge and understanding, and achievement, is a prime factor for pupils when they are asked to exercise choice about subjects to be pursued. That sense of real progress in inextricably linked to the way in which the subject matter of the course is planned, sequenced and taught. (p.7)

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Rachel Hawkes

A good sized body of research shows that a robust and useful kind of motivation is 'intrinsic' - when people feel good about what they are doing, that they are making progress and understand what they are learning - rather than the 'instrumental' kind of motivation - when people do something to obtain something (e.g. a qualification or to please someone else). So, helping learners to notice a sense of their own learning and progression (e.g., when i want to talk about the past, I feel I can) is likely to have a positive effect. There is a risk with the 'this is important for your exam' approach that some learners just end up saying 'but i don't really care about the exam'.

Of course, pupils in all subjects can't always be intrinsically interested in everything!

And of course a mix of both strands of motivation is likely to be best!!! - "it's important for exams AND it's important because it makes a difference to meaning and communication."

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Katherine McKnight, PhD, Pearson

Lacey Graybeal, Jessica Yarbro, & John Graybeal, George Mason University

England: What makes an effective teacher?

60 seconds

Start

60

15

0

45

30

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Rachel Hawkes

Let’s just take a moment and come at this from the angle of a different piece of research, a more general study looking at What makes an effective teacher. �Note: This study focuses on teachers of all subjects, not specifically languages teachers.�Large numbers of participants from three stakeholder groups (teachers, students, parents) were asked, and the results aggregated. It’s a study that was replicated in 50 countries, and there are separate reports for each country’s results.�Perhaps unsurprisingly, there was unanimity about the top 3 responses in all/most of the countries.�Let’s see if you can predict what they are… Talk to the person next to you.

Give 1-2 minutes for discussion.�Then take responses. (3 minutes)�Then look at the answers with them.�As well as the importance of relationships, look also at the importance of subject knowledge and learner knowledge. This leads us into the next point.

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Cognition and affect�A lot of thinking and feeling!

Cognitive

Affective

Engagement & Motivation

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Rachel Hawkes

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Summary findings from language learning motivation research

Beginner language learners tend to be motivated
Perceived difficulty and lack of progress are big demotivators
If pupils attribute success to ‘innate ability’, this is not motivating
Learner motivation can change over time
Classroom experiences are very important for motivation
Certain interventions may have value, e.g., those that strengthen learner ideal selves, normalise difficulty, associate success with effort, provide practical ways to increase learning success, allow learners to experience progress and achievement

See references list for further information

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Rachel Hawkes

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Session aims

review (briefly!) the evidence for language learning motivation in England
identify key motivational drivers for students in language learning
explore the pedagogy and classroom factors that improve language learning motivation

Material licensed as CC BY-NC-SA 4.0�

Rachel Hawkes

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Motivation and knowledge

Students who can decode successfully are more likely to rate themselves as competent, to have positive feelings about the language, and more likely to opt to continue with the subject in the future (Erler & Macaro, 2011).

Motivational power of (a) learning the most useful words (i.e. those that speakers of that language most often use to communicate) and (b) using effective methods to retain and revisit those words, (e.g., revisit in the week, month, term, and year).

Research (into interaction, sentence-processing, and cognitive linguistics) shows benefits of teaching the meaningfulness and function of grammar.

Phonics

Vocabulary

Grammar

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Rachel Hawkes

How are motivation and knowledge interrelated?�Essentially, for high levels of motivation we are looking at the importance of successful pedagogy, i.e., the extent to which learners are learning, making progress, and perceive it. This ties back in to both individual learner and group learning experiences in the classroom, and to the intrinsic motivation that comes from enjoying learning.��Don’t forget that we have noted research that suggests a link between motivation and phonics knowledge (i.e. that students without the ability to decode are demotivated).

Erler, L., & Macaro, E. (2011). Decoding ability in French as a foreign language and language learning motivation. The Modern Language Journal, 95 (4), 496–518. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4781.2011.01238.x

And in terms of vocabulary, it’s important to think about motivational power of a) learning the most useful words (i.e. those that speakers of that language most often use to communicate) and b) using effective methods to retain and revisit those words, (i.e., four-stage strategy – revisit in the week, month, term and year)

And making the grammar matter is at the core of our approach, i.e. making it indispensable for communicating the meaning in any given tasks highlights its importance and the purpose for learning it.

This comes down to increasing the depth of processing that we require learners to do; increasing the challenge (perhaps), but at the same time, making transparent the purpose for everything students learn and giving them tools that enable them ultimately to put language together independently, to use language independently (whether it is reading aloud, taking notes in the target language, recognising meanings in multiple contexts, or creating new sentences. As we’ll look at in the Meaningful Practice II session later today, the PVG pedagogy’s principles of making language task essential; providing desirable difficulty/challenge in the recall, production or application, and deepening knowledge through use of language in multiple contexts, using the full range of word meanings, resonate with the theory of ‘Involvement Load’ and its principles of need (How necessary is it to know this word to complete the task? How much does the learner ‘need’or really choose to do the task?), search (How hard does the learner have to work to find the meaning of the word?) and evaluate (How much does the learner have to think about how to use this word in different contexts or about different aspects of its meaning?)�

Laufer, B. Hulstijn, J. (2001) Incidental vocabulary acquisition in a second language: the construct of task-induced involvement. Applied Linguistics, 22 (1), 1–26, https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/22.1.1

There is plenty of research evidence to support us emphasising to teachers the importance of using activities that foreground the usefulness of grammar (in terms of its meaningfulness and function). That understanding the function of that tiny difference between 'je fais' and 'j'ai fait' and being able to relate this to a moment in life when this just might matter - does benefit learning. There is research by 'interaction' researchers (Long, Mackey, Philp) and sentence processing researchers (VanPatten, Jackson, Henry, Morgan-Short, me, & Rowena!) and cognitive linguists (Cadierno, Tyler) that has provided robust evidence, from different angles.

Making the grammar matter for communication ('simulating' that it matters by helping learners to think of when, in which contexts, it might matter, even if the contexts are a bit crazy or unusual) is likely to be helpful.

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PHONICS

high-frequency ‘source’ words
staged roll out with more intensive practice activities (and systematic revisiting)
much more time for French

Erler, L. and Macaro, E. (2012) ‘Decoding Ability in French as a Foreign Language and Language Learning Motivation’. The Modern Language Journal, 95(4): 496-518.

Porter, A.M. (2014) An early start to French literacy: Learning the spoken and written word simultaneously in English primary schools. PhD thesis, University of Southampton.

Woore, R. (2007) ‘“Weisse Maus in Meinem Haus”: Using Poems and Learner Strategies to Help Learners Decode the Sounds of the L2’. Language Learning Journal, vol. 35, no. 2, pp. 175-188.

Woore, R. (2009) ‘Beginners’ progress in decoding L2 French: some longitudinal evidence from English Modern Foreign Languages classrooms’. Language Learning Journal, vol. 37, no. 1, pp. 3-18.

Woore, R. (2010) ‘Thinking aloud about L2 decoding: an exploration into the strategies used by beginner learners when pronouncing unfamiliar French words’. Language Learning Journal, vol. 38, no. 1, pp. 3-17.

Woore, R. (2011) Investigating and developing beginner learners’ decoding proficiency in second language French: an evaluation of two programmes of instruction. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Oxford.

Woore, R. (2014) ‘Beginner learners’ progress in decoding L2 French: transfer effects in typologically similar L1-L2 writing systems’. Writing Systems Research, volume 4(2): 167-189.

Woore, R (2018) ‘Learners’ pronunciations of familiar and unfamiliar French words: what can they tell us about phonological decoding in an L2?’ The Language Learning Journal, 46(4):456-69.

Woore, R., Graham, S., Porter, A., Courtney, L. and Savory, C. (2018) Foreign Language Education: Unlocking Reading (FLEUR) - A study into the teaching of reading to beginner learners of French in secondary school. https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:4b0cb239-72f0-49e4-8f32-3672625884f0

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Rachel Hawkes

Important to keep flagging the use of research findings (within the UK classroom context, wherever possible) to inform the pedagogy