(LUẬN VĂN THẠC SĨ) Socio-educational factors affecting the students'' motivation in learning English language a case study in Son Thinh Upper Secondary School in Van Chan - Yen Bai

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES VŨ THỊ HIỀN SOCIO-EDUCATIONAL FACTORS AFFECTING THE STUDENTS’ MOTIVATION IN LEARNING ENGLISH LANGUAGE : A CASE STUDY IN SON THINH UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

VŨ THỊ HIỀN

SOCIO-EDUCATIONAL FACTORS AFFECTING THE STUDENTS’ MOTIVATION IN LEARNING ENGLISH LANGUAGE : A CASE STUDY IN SON THINH UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL IN VAN CHAN-

YEN BAI

Yếu tố xã hội- giáo dục ảnh hưởng đến động cơ học Tiếng Anh của học sinh

trường trung học phổ thông Sơn Thịnh- Văn Chấn- Yên Bái

M.A MINOR THESIS

FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY CODE: 60 14 10

HA NOI - 2010

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

VŨ THỊ HIỀN

SOCIO-EDUCATIONAL FACTORS AFFECTING THE STUDENTS’ MOTIVATION IN LEARNING ENGLISH LANGUAGE : A CASE STUDY IN SON THINH UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL IN VAN CHAN-

YEN BAI

Yếu tố xã hội- giáo dục ảnh hưởng đến động cơ học Tiếng Anh của học sinh

trường trung học phổ thông Sơn Thịnh- Văn Chấn- Yên Bái

M.A MINOR THESIS

FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY CODE: 60 14 10

SUPERVISOR: NGUYỄN THỊ THANH HƯƠNG M.A

HA NOI - 2010

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements……… i

Abstract………ii

Table of contents……….iii

List of figures and tables……….vi

Part I: INTRODUCTION……… 1

1.1 Rationale ……… 1

1.2 Objectives of the study ………2

1.3.Research questions……… 2

1.4 Methods of the study……… 2

1 5 Scope of the study……… 2

1.6.Significance of the study……… 3

1.7.Design of the study……… 3

Part II: DEVELOPMENT Chapter I: LITERATURE REVIEW……… 4

1 1 Theoretical background of motivation……… ….4

1.1.1 Definition of motivation………4

1.1 2 Theories of motivation……….5

1.2 Types of motivation……… 12

1.2.1 Integrative motivation……… 13

1.2.2 Instrumental motivation………13

1.2 3 Intrinsic motivation……….13

1.2 4 Extrinsic motivation………14

1 3 The roles of motivation in second language learning………14

1.4 Gardner’s socio-educational model………15

1.5 Social and educational factors affecting motivation……… 16

1.5.1 Social factors……… 16

1 5 2 Educational factors………18

1.5 3 Socio-educational factors affecting motivation……… 19

1.6 Summary………20

Chapter II: CONTEXT OF THE STUDY………21

2.1 Social context………21

2.2 Educational context……… 21

2.3 Summary………22

Chapter III: METHODOLOGY 3 1 The informants……….23

3 2 The data collection instruments………23

3 3 Summary ……….24

Chapter IV: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION……… 25

4 1 Questionnaire……….25

4.1.1 Participants’ Profile……….25

4.1 2 Attitudes towards English……… 26

4.1 3 Participants’ self-evaluation of their learning English ………27

4.1 4 Participants’ investment in learning English……… 27

4.1 5 Participants’ learning strategies……… 28

4.1 6 Participants’ Using Language Opportunities……… 28

4.1 7 Support for Participants’ Learning English at home……… 29

4.1 8 Participants’ Reported Challenges in and Opportunities for

Learning English………30

4 2 The interview……….31

4.2 1 Students’ awareness of the importance of English……… 31

4.2 2 Students’ self-reported difficulties in learning English……… 32

4.2 3 Parents’ attitudes……….32

4.2.4 Conditions for learning English……… 32

4 3 Summary ……….33

Part III : RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION………34

1 Conclusion……… ………34

1.1 On students’ motivation……….34

1.2 On social factors affecting their motivation……….35

1.3 On educational factors affecting their motivation………35

2 Recommendations for teaching………36

3 Limitations of the study………37

4 Suggestion for further study……… 38

References……… 39 Appendices

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

Figure 1: Dornyei's framework of L2 motivation (1994: 78)……… 10

Figure 2: Williams and Burden's (1997) framework of L2 motivation (adapted from Dornyei, 2001: 20)……… 12

Table 1: Participants’ Profile (N= 150)……… 24

Table 2: Participants’ attitudes towards, and purposes of, learning English (N=150) 25

Table 3: Participants’ weekly investment in learning English at home in terms of time 26

Table 4: Participants’ strategies for learning English at home (N=150)………27

Table 5: Using Language Opportunities……….28

Table 6: Support Available to Participants’ Learning English (N=150)……… 28

Table 7: Parents’ Attitudes towards Their Children’s Learning English (N=150)………….29

PART I INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale:

In recent years, Viet Nam has been opening its door to the world and to foreign investment English is considered to play a crucial role in leading the country‟s path to the modernization and industrialization Besides working skills, knowledge, experiences, high English proficiency is extremely needed if people would like to have

a good job in many fields such as economics, politics, cultures, science, technology and tourism It is obvious that English is in a great demand in our society now, and it is made a compulsory subject at all kinds of schools in our country from the secondary schools to universities However, English teaching and learning in Viet Nam is still criticized to be far from satisfaction For example, regarding the students‟ proficiency

in English, only a few people (in big cities) can speak English fluently and use it effectively in their work Most of the students after some years learning English at school do not gain high score in their state exam, especially the students in remote areas The quality of teaching and learning English in Viet Nam is, there for, a big issue that all teachers, researchers and linguistic professors have been concerned about Efforts have been made to find out the solutions to those issues

In process of teaching and learning English, there are many factors affecting the success of a language learner such as learners‟ factors, teachers‟ factors, learning language opportunities, social factors, educational factors… Among those factors, social and educational factors may affect not only the students‟ learning outcome but also their motivation to learn English This issue is more important to disadvantaged areas where both social and educational environments may not be conducive to English language learning and teaching Being a teacher of English in disadvantaged areas I see that the socio-educational factors may affect much on the students‟ quality of English learning Therefore, it is strongly desirable for me to propose an investigation into the influences of socio-educational factors to the students‟ motivation in Son Thinh upper secondary school in Yen Bai The intention in doing this research is to figure out the

motivation of the students in English learning and to examine the influences of the socio-educational factors to their motivation

1.2 Objectives of the study:

This study is aimed to investigate the motivation in learning English among the 10 graders at Son Thinh high school in Van Chan -Yen Bai To be more specific, this

study is aimed to achieve the following objectives:

a To investigate factors affecting students in learning English

b To examine the influence of the social-educational factors to students‟ motivation in learning English

1.4.Research questions:

The study was carried out with the view to finding out the answers to two research questions below:

* What is the students‟ motivation to learn English at Son Thinh high school?

* To what extent is their motivation influenced by the local socio-educational factors?

1.4 Methods of the study:

This is a quantitative and qualitative research To find the answers for the above research questions, the data is collected from the questionnaires and interviews

1 5 Scope of the study:

The main focus of the study is on the investigation of the students‟ motivation and the influences of the local socio-educational factors to the students‟ motivation Given the aim of the study, I limited myself to focus on students in Son Thinh high school, situated in Van Chan (a remote area of Yen Bai mountainous province) The study is conducted with a group of 150 tenth-form students at Son Thinh high school A questionnaire will be administered to this number of students, and then about 10 questionnaire respondents will be chosen according to their willingness for semi-structured interviews

a Significance of the study:

This study is carried out with a hope that language teachers, especially those teaching

in remote areas, may be fully aware of the role and the importance of the educational factors toward students‟ motivation to learn a second language, from the factors affecting Son Thinh students‟ motivation in learning English (especially socio-educational factors), the teachers may find appropriate activities or methods to increase students‟ motivation to learn English better

socio-b Design of the study:

Part A- Introduction: provides rationales, aims of the study, research questions, scope,

and the significance of the study and its design

Part B- Development: consists of four chapters

+ Chapter I: Literature review on theoretical background of motivation and educational factors affecting students‟ motivation in second language learning

socio-+ Chapter II: Context of the study: This chapter introduces the social context and educational context for the study

+ Chapter III: Methodology: this chapter introduces subjects and data collection instruments

+ Chapter IV: Data analysis and discussion

Part C: Conclusion: This part presents conclusions, implications, limitations and

suggestions for further study

PART II: DEVELOPMENT Chapter I: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter reviews some of the most important issues in the theories of motivation for learning and teaching language in general Two mains parts taken into consideration are theoretical background of motivation and socio-educational factors affecting students‟ motivation in second language learning

1 1 Theoretical background of motivation:

1.1.1 Definition of motivation:

The word motivation is coined from the Latin word "movere", which means to move

“Move” means the changes of something, sometimes it happens externally that we can

see; sometimes it occurs internally that no one can see Motivation appears to be simple and easy but so difficult to define It is an abstract concept, and there are various definitions of motivation which have been proposed

Gardner (1985:10) states that “Motivation refers to the combination of effort plus desire to achieve the goal of learning the language plus favorable attitudes towards learning the language” He points out four aspects involving motivation such as a goal,

an effort, a desire to attain he goal and a favorable towards the activity

Littlewood (1998:53) gives his viewpoint of motivation as follows “In second language learning as in every field of human learning, motivation is the crucial force which determines whether a learner embanks on a task at all, how much energy he devotes to it, and how long he perseveres It is a complex phenomenon and includes many components: the individual‟s drive, the need for achievement and success, security, desire for stimulation and new experience, and so on” He emphasizes the components increasing motivation in second language learning, they are individual‟s drive, need for achievement, security and desire for new experience

Another concept of motivation stated by Ellis (1997:75) is that “Motivation involves the attitudes and affective states that influence the degree of effort that learner

make to learn a second language” Generally, he thinks that motivation in second language learning involves the individual‟s desire to do so

In short, there are many viewpoints in defining motivation However, general speaking, motivation is the willingness of a person to reach a particular goal or in other words: motivation is something which gives an individual the desire to perform some activity In second language learning, motivation is one of the major factors contributing to one‟s success “Many researchers consider motivation as one of the main elements that determines success in developing a second or foreign language; it determines the extent of active, personal involvement in second language learning” (Oxford & Shearin: 1994)

a)Need hierarchy theory:

Need hierarchy theory written by psychologist Abraham Maslow is the most widely discussed theory of motivation He saw human needs in the form of hierarchy, ascending from the lowest to the highest, and he thought that when one of those human needs is satisfied, this kind of need ceases to be a motivator

This theory can be summarized as thus:

* Human beings have wants and desires which influence their behavior; only unsatisfied needs can influence behavior, satisfied needs can not

* Since needs are many, they are arranged in order of importance, from the basic to the complex

* The person advances to the next level of needs only after the lower level need is

at least minimally satisfied

* The further progressive up the hierarchy, the more individuality, humanness and psychological health a person will show

The needs, listed from basic (lowest, earliest) to most complex (highest, latest) are

as follows:

* Physiological needs:

Everyone existing in the earth needs these things for sustaining his/her own life such as food, water, sleep, shelter, medicine, education …These are the basic physiological needs of the human If these needs are not satisfied to maintain life, people can not do any thing, and no other motivating factors can work This is the most important primary set that need satisfaction

* Safety or security needs:

When physiological needs are met, one's attention turns to safety and security in order to be free from the threat of physical and emotional harm Such needs might be fulfilled by: living in a safe area, medical insurance, job security, and financial reserves

* Social needs:

Once a person has met the lower level needs, higher level motivators awaken The first level of higher needs is social needs People try to satisfy their need for affection, acceptance and friendship

* Esteem needs:

People always want to be held in esteem both by themselves and by others This kind of needs produces such satisfaction as power, prestige status and self confidence

It includes both internal esteem such as accomplishment, self –respect and external esteem motivators such as recognition, attention and social status

Besides Abraham Maslow, David McClelland‟s achievement motivation theory envisions that a person has a need for three things, but differs in degrees to which the various needs influence their behavior: need for achievement, need for power, and need for affiliation

The above need theories are basic for being applied in many fields in our life, not only

in linguistics

b) Cognitive theory:

There are different cognitive theories of motivation; however three approaches such as attribution theory, self-efficacy theory, and goal theory are focused here Attribution theory has made important contributions to the development of a systematic approach to motivating students in the classroom Self-efficacy has emerged as an extension of attribution theory Our goal is to promote positive learning opportunities

To achieve this goal we must understand how children attribute success or failure and what factors they attribute to their success or failures In knowing this we can change our instruction, methods to motivate students to learn

A first cognitive approach is attribution theory (Heider, 1958; Weiner, 1974) This theory proposes that every individual tries to explain success or failure of self and others by offering certain attributions These attributions are either internal or external and are either under control or not under control The following chart shows the four

attributions that result from a combination of internal or external locus of control and whether or not control is possible

Ability, effort, task difficulty, and luck are shown to be important in student's achievements Ability and effort are internal characteristics Task difficulty and luck are external factors Task difficulty and ability are stable factors, whereas effort and luck change for different situations If the student has an attribution of ability (internal,

no control), he/she will experience some difficulties in the learning process, and with effort his/her learning will become active and soon get the success In contrast, if a student has an external attribution, then he/she will not rely on himself for success, and become passive in learning process In this case teacher‟s tasks are necessary for him to control his learning The task difficulty should be appropriate to student‟s competence

at first and higher level in the later

A second cognitive approach is expectancy theory (Vroom, 1964) which proposes the following equation:

Motivation = Perceived Probability of Success (Expectancy)

Connection of Success and Reward (Instrumentality)

Value of Obtaining Goal (Valance, Value)

Three factors Expectancy, Instrumentality, and Valance or Value are to be multiplied

by each other; a low value in one will result in a low value of motivation Therefore, all three must be present in order for motivation to occur From the perspective of this theory, all three variables must be high in order for motivation and the resulting behavior to be high

A third cognitive approach is goal-setting theory which is based on the notion that individuals sometimes have a drive to reach a clearly defined end state Often, this end state is a reward in itself A goal's efficiency is affected by three features: proximity, difficulty and specificity An ideal goal should present a situation where the time between the initiation of behavior and the end state is close A goal should be moderate, not too hard or too easy to complete and the goal should be objectively defined and intelligible for the individual Douglas Vermeeren (2008) states that unless

an individual can clearly identify their motivating factor or their significant and meaningful reasons why they wish to attain the goal, they will never have the power to attain it

c) New approaches of motivation:

In recent studies of second language learning motivation, one of the most influential theories is Dornyei‟s theory Dornyei (1994) developed an extended, classroom-friendly model in which L2 motivation is conceptualized on three levels as

in the table below:

LANGUAGE LEVEL Integrative motivational subsystem

Instrumental motivational subsystem

Course-Specific Motivational

Components

* Interest

* Modeling

* Task presentation

* Feedback

Goal-orientedness Norm and reward system Group cohesion Classroom goal structure.(cooperative,

competitive or individualistic)

Dornyei's framework of L2 motivation (1994: 78)

From the above table, Dornyei gives a clear construction of L2 motivation in which:

The Language Level addresses the social side of L2 motivation The Learner Level

represents individual characteristics of the learner, and concerns internal desire for

achievement and issues related to self confidence The Learning Situation Level is associated with classroom specific motivational factors: Course-specific, Teacher-

specific, and Group-specific motivational components

Another influential motivational theory was developed by Williams and Burden (1997) from a social-constructivist perspective Motivational factors are divided into

internal and external factors In Williams and Burden's model, some elements were

added to L2 motivation construction to make a new framework of motivation We can see the detail in the table below:

INTERNAL FACTORS Intrinsic interest of activity

● arousal of curiosity

● optimal degree of challenge

Perceived value of activity

● personal relevance

● anticipated value of outcomes

● intrinsic value attributed to the

● awareness of developing skills and

mastery in a chosen area

● parents ● teachers ● peers

The nature of interaction with significant others

● mediated learning experiences ● the nature and amount of feedback ● rewards

● the nature and amount of appropriate praise

● punishments, sanctions

The learning environment

● comfort ● resources ● time of day, week, year ● size of class and school ● class and school ethos

The broader context

● wider family networks

weaknesses in skills required

● personal definitions and

judgments of success and failure

● self-worth concern

● learned helplessness

Attitudes

● to language learning in general

● to the target language

● to the target language community

Williams and Burden's (1997) framework of L2 motivation (adapted from Dornyei,

2001: 20)

To sum up, there are so many theories of motivation; different theories have provided us various views on motivation Not only the internal factors, external factors but also the context concerns much on the L2 motivation My study is much related to social context and educational context which I will discuss later

1.2 Types of motivation

There are various types of motivations that can influence a person, each with a different role Besides two basic types of motivation integrative and instrumental (according to goal/desire perspective), motivation can also be divided into intrinsic and

extrinsic motivation (according to elements affecting or the expression) All these types

of motivation relate to the learner's context of learning a second language

1.2.1 Integrative motivation

According to Gardner, (1985) integrative orientation "involves an interest in learning a second language because of a sincere and personal interest in the people and culture represented by the other language group Integrative motivation on the other hand, is the combination of effort and desire to achieve the goal of learning the language plus favorable attitudes towards learning the language" (Gardner 1985 as cited in Ellis 1994:509)

1.2.2 Instrumental motivation

Another type of motivation associated with second language learning is instrumental motivation Instrumental motivation is the need and desire to achieve the reward for achieving a high level of English

To a great extent, instrumental motivation and orientation involves the situational/cultural context of learning It appears to be much more powerful in other contexts where language learners have little or no interest in the target language culture, if any, to interact with the target language members (Ellis 1994) The social situation helps to determine two things: what types of orientation learners have and what kind is the most important for language learning

1.2 3 Intrinsic motivation

Intrinsic motivation is the type of motivation that occurs when an individual reaches a conclusion that his or her skill level can be challenged and both the challenge and the skill level are relatively high When the level of challenge is too high for an individual

to handle, the outcome is anxiety When the challenge is lower than an individual's ability, the outcome is boredom In other words, intrinsic motivation is what learners bring to the learning environment that is their internal attributes such as attitudes, values, needs, and personality factors

1.2 4 Extrinsic motivation:

Dornyei (2001) stated that extrinsic motivation involves performing a behavior as a means to an end, that is, it originates outside the individual and is concerned with external environmental factors that help shape students‟ behavior (Dornyei, 2001; 27)

In summary, “A learner with instrumental motivation is more interested in how the second language can be a useful instrument towards furthering other goals such as gaining a necessary qualification or improving employment prospects” (Little Wood, 1998:57)

A learner with integrative motivation has a genuine interest in the second language community He wants to learn their language in order to communicate with them more successfully and to gain closer contact with them and their culture

Extrinsic motivation comes from the learner‟s desire to get external reward and avoid punishment While intrinsic motivation comes from the learner‟s internal factors because the learner regards second language learning as a means to acquire knowledge and satisfy his curiosity and interest

1 3 The roles of motivation in second language learning:

From many researches about motivation, it is clear that motivation plays a very important role in our everyday personal and professional life It has the same role in learning and teaching second/foreign language

“Many researchers consider motivation as one of the main elements that determine success in developing a second or foreign language; it determines the extent of active, personal involvement in second language learning.” (Oxford & Shearin 1994)

Gardner (1997) found that greater motivation and attitudes lead to better learning

A uni-directional causal relationship between motivation and learning was established Oxford & Shearin (1996:121-122) also point out that “Motivation is important because it directly influences how students use L2 learning strategies, how much students interact with native speakers, how much input they receive in the language being learnt (the target language), how well they do on curriculum-related tests, how high their general proficiency level becomes, and how long they preserve and maintain L2 skills after language study is over…”

Motivation also promotes the choice of strategies among students in learning a second language or foreign language The fact is that the use of suitable learning strategies and technique in L2 leads to success “The conscious, tailored use of such strategies is related to language achievement and proficiency” and “ more motivated students tend to use more strategies than less motivated students, hence, they tend to be more successful” (Oxford, 1994)

In short, motivation has a great role in teaching and learning a foreign language When we think of the way to teach or to learn a foreign language well, we should consider the way to promote the students‟ motivation: what students need/like, how to encourage the slow students to work harder, how to show the attitudes to students, how

to create attractive learning atmosphere, how to reward the hard-working students, which learning strategies should be applied…

1.4 Gardner’s socio-educational model:

Derived from different theories, models of motivation are also diversified in number and nature; however in this study I only mention the Gardner‟s socio-educational model as it is much more related to my study

Gardner (1985) pointed out the socio-educational model of second language learning He said that the learning of second language involves both ability and a motivational component and that the major basis of this motivation is best viewed from

a social- psychological perspective

In his socio-educational model, firstly, what he proposed is that the motivation to learn

a second language is characterized by three aspects: the desire (or wanting) to learn the language, the motivational intensity (or effort expanded) to learn the language, and the affective reactions (or attitude) toward learning the language All three above elements are necessary to adequately reflect motivation He showed that a motivated individual

is one who desires to achieve a goal, works hard to achieve that goal and enjoys the activity involved

Secondly, socio-educational model postulates that motivation is caused by at least two attitudinal constructs as below:

+ Integrativeness: indicates that it reflects an open or willing perspective with respect to other ethnic group and the target language group specifically To measure various aspects of integrativeness, Gardner suggested using assessments of attitudes toward the language community, an interest in learning the language to permit integration or socialization with the other community, a general openness to other ethnic groups and languages

+ Attitudes toward the learning situation: Gardner said that the major opportunity to learn a second language is a classroom environment It seems reasonable to propose that evaluative reactions to the language teacher, toward the language course, toward the materials…will influence the students‟ levels of motivation to learn the language Gardner emphasized that both socially relevant attitudes and educationally relevant attitudes are viewed as important in motivating students

1.5 Social and educational factors affecting motivation

1.5.1 Social factors:

According to Ellis (1994:201) there are four specific social factors that tend to be of importance for the degree of success in learning/acquiring a second language, namely

age, gender, social class and ethnic identity These four social factors interact with

each other in many ways, but they will still be discussed separately in the following four subsections

* Gender:

Edlund et al (2007:56-60) state that women and men tend to use their linguistic knowledge differently According to Ellis (1994:202-204), it has been shown that female learners do better than men because they are more open to new linguistic forms Ellis states that women usually have a more positive attitude towards learning a second language, which has a huge impact on their way of learning (ibid 202-204)

* Social class:

Ellis (1994:204-206) claims that social classes are usually based on level of education, income and occupation It has been shown that there are interesting connections between social class and L2 achievement Students from middle-class homes regularly outperform those from lower- and working-class homes Ellis (1994:204-206) argues that L2 learning is connected to different attitudes based on the learners‟ will to learn Working-class students usually drop their language earlier than middle class students, for instance more middle-class students tend to continue studying it at the university (ibid 204-206)

* Ethnic identity:

Ellis (1994:207-210) states that an ethnic group is a group of people that has the same native language, the same nationality and in most cases the same religion Learners who are ethnically close to the target-language culture are likely to outperform those who are more distant (ibid 207-210)

How fast ethnic group learns a new language depends on the learners‟ motivation If the learners are motivated to learn the new language and feel that it is usable they will learn it better than those who do not think that they need it Some may think that they

do not need the new language, which means that they can use their native language in most everyday situations Another reason for some learners not to learn the second language is that their parents may think that they do not need to learn it

Spolsky (1989) proposes a number of social conditions for language learning such as:

+ Number of speaker‟s condition: the number of people who speak a language as a first or foreign language influences the desire of others to learn it

+ Official use condition: prefer to teach or learn a language which is officially used

The educational factors refer generally to the educational system in which the student

is registered, and specifically to the immediate classroom situation When considering the educational context, we focus on the expectations of the system, the quality of the program, the interest, enthusiasm, and skills of the teacher, the adequacy of the materials, the curriculum, the class atmosphere, etc All of these can influence the student‟s level of motivation in any school subject More particularly, here are some factors which have more to do with the classroom and all provide potential or constraint For example:

+ The hours available for teaching and the distribution of those hours

+ The existence of classroom policies for such things as marking or homework and the flexibility of these

+ The physical constraints of the classroom

+ The class size

+ The sources available in the classroom

+ The cohesion that exists among English teachers and the degree to which it fosters team work

+The statue of the teachers in the hierarchy and their involvement in book selection, policy development…

+ The interest of management in continuing professional development through service sessions, projects in materials design…

in-+ Whether classes are monolingual or multilingual

Among the above factors, physical conditions of the classroom have considerable effect on the quality of learning Physical conditions are classroom size, chairs, desks, tables, lights, boards and bulletin boards When learning takes place in a closed physical space, a single classroom, controlled acoustics, it is possible to hear better; a comfortable physical surroundings make concentration possible; the classroom can be turn into foreign culture by judicious decoration… Moreover, the learning process will

be more effective when students satisfy their psychological environment in the class such as posters, flowers, funny objects…which influence strongly the classroom

atmosphere

1.5 3 Socio-educational factors affecting motivation:

In addition to two major types of motivation, i.e extrinsic/instrumental motivation and intrinsic/integrative motivation, Warden and Lin (2000) studied the motivation of Taiwanese EFL students and they found that these students appeared to be motivated

by requirements rather than either an interest in integration or any clear instrumental

yield They labeled this type of motivation required motivation In the same Chinese

cultural setting, Warden (2000) found EFL writing students responded better to objective error correction than more process-oriented instructional approaches Social expectations emphasizing standardized requirements and de-emphasizing the individual, the norm in Chinese culture, raise the likelihood that requirements are potentially motivating in some circumstances Chen, Warden, and Chang (2005) conducted an on-line survey with 567 Taiwanese EFL students Their findings support Warden and Lin‟s study that these students are motivated to learn English by requirements They argue that “within the EFL context in the current Chinese cultural environment, integration may not be a significant factor in motivating language learning effort” (p 622) This echoes what Norton and Toohey (2001) claim that language learners need to be understood within complex and inequitable social

structures because learners perceive their efforts within the context of symbolic and material resources that can be obtained in return for their investment

1.6.Summary

This literature review reveals a serious gap in motivation research in the field of foreign language education While there have been numerous studies on L2 learner motivation, little has been conducted in Vietnamese contexts, especially in the context

of high schools in the mountainous areas Most of the studies on language learners‟ motivation take a psychological perspective except for the studies conducted by Warden and Lin (2000), Warden (2000), Norton and Toohey (2001), and Chan, et al (2005), which view motivation more from a social and educational perspective The present study is an attempt to fill this gap

Chapter II: CONTEXT OF THE STUDY

This chapter discusses the contextual conditions that determine the study of motivation

I will describe the situation where the study was conducted

2.1 Social context:

The study is carried out in Son Thinh upper secondary school It is located in Van Chan district, a mountainous district of Yen Bai province Van Chan, 80km far from Yen Bai city, is a poor and backward district with the population of over 17 millions The population in this area includes a variety of ethnic groups such as Tay, H‟Mong, Thai, Muong, Dao, Day In this area, there are some administrative offices, and some family businesses, some private tea companies There are not any foreign companies or joint-ventured factories

.2.2 Educational context:

Son Thinh is a new upper secondary school in this district; it has been established for 10 years so there are not enough teachers and facilities for students to have a good learning condition There is not library for students to borrow and read books, no laboratory for them to do experiments, and no multimedia room to learn foreign language There are about 45 teachers in my school They are very young, three of them have been teaching for 20 years, and most of them have been teaching below 10 years, some others have just graduated from university Therefore, most of the teachers

in this school are not very experienced

Half of the students in Son Thinh School belong to the ethnic groups, the other half come from King Group The students live surround the school, within 12km radiant Most students live in the farmer families with poor living conditions

Most of the students in Son Thinh upper secondary school have low marks in the upper secondary entrance exams, about 25% above average, and the rest are under average The rate of the students who are above average in the final state exam is about 40% From that number, it is clear that the quality of teaching and learning in Son Thinh upper secondary school is limited There are many reasons for this fact such as: inexperienced teachers, students‟ ability, and school facilities

There are 16 classes in this school: 6 classes in grade ten, 5 classes in grade eleven, and 5 classes in grade twelve The number of the students in each class is about 40 to 45

2.3 Summary

I have described the socio-educational context of this area One notable contextual feature of the study is that Van Chan is a very poor- disadvataged district with low quality of education in Yen Bai province The people there belong to many different ethnic groups with different ethnic cultures, for the students there Vietnamese is their second language and English is their third language It is not easy for them to master two languages at the same time The socio-educational context of this area in some extent may affect much on the students‟ motivation in learning English language

Chapter III: METHODOLOTY

This chapter introduces the informants involved in the study Then, different methods

of data collection are also discussed in details

3 1 The informants:

My study is much concerned with the tenth- form students, I choose them for the informants of my study because they are the beginners, and they might be strange with the new learning and teaching environment at high school The tenth-form students in

my school are studying the text book “English 10” (old edition) They have three English lessons per week Each unit lasts about 3 or 4 periods depending on the requirement of the curriculum Each unit consists of a dialogue, three practices and homework

There are two samples of informants in this study: informants for the questionnaire surveys and informants for the interview

The informants for the questionnaire survey (n=150) are the students in Grade 10 in

Son Thinh upper secondary school Their age varied from 15 to17 and they come from different background, some are living in the town centre, and most are living in the disadvantaged areas

The informants for the interview (n=10) was based on the survey data from the questionnaire respondents with the view to having for more in-depth information which mainly focused on the attitudes towards English learning and opportunities for them to learn English

3 2 The data collection instruments:

a The questionnaire completed by the students

The questionnaire was designed with two main parts Part one was about the students‟ background information which included the student‟s age, sex, ethnic group, living places, number of years they had been learning English, and their marks in English in the upper secondary school entrance exams