VIỆC SỬ DỤNG CÁC PHƯƠNG PHÁP TẠO ĐỘNG LỰC TRONG LỚP TIẾNG ANH CHO MỤC ĐÍCH XÃ HỘI CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM NHẤT THUỘC HỆ ĐẠI TRÀ KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH, TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ, ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA

Motivational strategies are important to apply in foreign language classes as well as the fact that new approach of teaching English in FELTE, HULIS, VNU has raisednew challenge for both

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITIES OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION

GRADUATION PAPER

THE USE OF MOTIVATIONAL STRATEGIES IN SOCIAL ENGLISH CLASS OF FIRST YEAR

MAINSTREAM STUDENTS AT FELTE, HULIS, VNU

Supervisor: Vũ Tường Vi, M.A.

Student: Lưu Ngọc Lan Year of enrolment: QH2009

Ha Noi, May 2013

ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH

KHOÁ LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP

VIỆC SỬ DỤNG CÁC PHƯƠNG PHÁP TẠO ĐỘNG LỰC TRONG LỚP TIẾNG ANH CHO MỤC ĐÍCH XÃ HỘI CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM NHẤT THUỘC HỆ ĐẠI TRÀ KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH, TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ, ĐẠI

HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI

Giáo viên hướng dẫn: Th.S Vũ Tường Vi

Sinh viên:Lưu Ngọc Lan

Khoá: QH2009

HÀ NỘI - NĂM 2013

I hereby state that I: Lưu Ngọc Lan, QH2009 F1 E1, being a candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts ( TEFL) accept the requirements of the University relating to the retention and use of Bachelor’s Graduation Paper deposited in the library

In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan or reproduction of the paper.

Signature

April 14th 2013

First of all, I would like to express my deep gratitude and love to my supervisor,

Ms Vũ Tường Vi, MA for her guidance, comments, and especially her sympathythroughout the whole research process

I am indebted to Ms Trần Đức Phương Anh for her helpful suggestions duringthis study I am also grateful to Ms Phạm Thị Hạnh whose lectures and guidance havecontributed to my understanding of the research methodology and led to the completion

of this thesis

Especially, I wish to express my appreciation to the participants including theteachers and first- year mainstream students who spent their time helping me to collectvaluable data for the research paper

Last but not least, I would also like to take this opportunity to send my love to mybest friends and my family who have been encouraging and supporting me whole-heartedly

Motivational strategies are important to apply in foreign language classes as well

as the fact that new approach of teaching English in FELTE, HULIS, VNU has raisednew challenge for both teachers and first-year students have become a great drive for theresearcher to conduct this research The study aims at investigating into the mostfrequently and the most effective strategies used in social English class of first-yearmainstream students in FELTE, HULIS, VNU, as perceived by both the students and theteachers

In order to achieve these aims, 9 teachers and 223 students from 9 classes wereinvolved in completing the questionnaires Besides, observations and interviews wereemployed to triangulate the data from various aspects and hence ensure the validity aswell as reliability of the research

Based on the data collected, Elicitation of self or peer correction, Establishingrelevance, Scaffolding, Personalization, Promoting cooperation and Inconsistentgroup/pair work are considered the most frequently motivational strategies Additionally,according to the teachers, Team competition, Establishing relevance, Elicitation of self orpeer correction, Scaffolding, Effective praise and Personalization are the most effectivetechniques On the other hands, from the students’ perception, Elicitation of self or peercorrection, Establishing relevance, Effective praise, Inconsistent group/ pair work are themost effective motivational strategies

Based on these findings, implications were made for teachers and classroomteaching Among many, three motivational strategies, namely Elicitation of self or peercorrection, Establishing relevance and Effective praise were highly evaluated by both thestudents and the teachers As a result, these four strategies might be recommended as themost outstanding strategies for the teachers to apply in their class

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACCEPTANCE i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

LIST OF TABLES viii

LIST OF FIGURES ix

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS x

PART I: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Statement of research problem and rationale for the study 1 2 Aims and objectives of the study 2 3 Scope of the study 3 4 Significance of the study 3 5 Organization of the paper 4 PART II: DEVELOPMENT 5

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

1 Definition of terms and related terminologies 5 1.1 Motivation 5

1.1.1 Definition of motivation 5

1.1.2 Motivational theories and constructs 6

1.1.2.1 Goal orientation theory 6

1.1.2.2 Self- determination theory (SDT) 6

1.1.3 Motivation in second language learning (L2) 7

1.1.4 The importance of motivation in English Language Teaching (ELT) 7

1.1.5 Motivational strategies frameworks 8

1.1.6 Framework of motivational strategies in this study 10

2 The context of teaching social English to first-year mainstream students at FELTE,

2.1 The context 12

2.2 Communicative Language Teaching approach 12

3 Related studies 13 3.1 Overview of related studies worldwide 13

3.2 Overview of related studies in Vietnam 14

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 16

1 Research design 16 2 Participants and settings 16 2.1 Participants 16

2.2 Research settings 17

3 Data collection instruments18 3.1 Observation 18

3.1.1 Reasons for choosing observation 18

3.1.2 Observation scheme 18

3.2 Questionnaires 19

3.2.1 Reasons for choosing questionnaires 19

3.2.2 Questionnaire format and content 20

3.3 Interviews 21

3.3.1 Reasons for choosing interviews 21

3.3.2 Interview format and content 22

4 Data collection procedure 23 5 Data analysis procedure 25 CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 26

1 Research question 1: What motivational strategies are most frequently used by teachers at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons of first-year mainstream students, from the perception of both the students and the teachers? 26

2 Research question 2: What motivational strategies are most effective for first-year mainstream students at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons, from the perception of the teachers? 29

3 Research questions 3: What motivational strategies are most effective for first-year mainstream students at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons, from the perception of the students? 38

PART III: CONCLUSION 43

1 Summary of the findings 43 2 Pedagogical implications of the study 44 3 Limitations of the study 45 4 Recommendation for further research 45 REFERENCES 46

APPENDICES 50

Appendix 1 Motivational variables and their description 50 Appendix 2: Observation checklist 53 Appendix 3: Questionnaires for teachers 56

Appendix 4: Questionnaires for first-year students 60 Appendix 5: Interview guiding questions for teachers 64 Appendix 6: Interview guiding questions for first-year students 65 Appendix 7: Teacher T1’s interview transcript 66 Appendix 8: Teacher T2’s interview transcript 68

Appendix 9: Teacher T3’s interview transcript 71 Appendix 10: Teacher T4’s interview transcript 73 Appendix 11: Teacher T5’s interview transcript 74 Appendix 12: Teacher T6’s interview transcript 76 Appendix 13: Teacher T7’s interview transcript 77 Appendix 14: Teacher T8’s interview transcript 78 Appendix 15: Teacher T9’s interview transcript 80 Appendix 16: Student S1’s interview transcript 82

Appendix 17: Student S2’s interview transcript 83

Appendix 18: Student S3’s interview transcript 84

Appendix 19: Student S4’s interview transcript 85

Appendix 20: Student S5’s interview transcript 86

Appendix 21: Student S6’s interview transcript 87

Appendix 22: Student S7’s interview transcript 88

Appendix 23: Student S8’s interview transcript 89

Appendix 24: Student S9’s interview transcript 90

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Observational variables measuring learner’s motivated behavior 19

Figure 5: Frequency of using motivational strategies, perceived by 27the first-year students and the teachers

Figure 6: The effectiveness of using motivational strategies, perceived 30

by the teachers

Figure 7: The effectiveness of team competition, perceived by the teachers 31

Figure 8: Effectiveness of Establishing relevance, perceived by the 32teachers

Figure 9: Effectiveness of Elicitation of self or peer correction, perceived 33

by teachers

Figure 10: Effectiveness of Scaffolding, perceived by teachers 35

Figure 11: Effectiveness of Effective praise, perceived by teachers 36

Figure 12: Effectiveness of Personalization, perceived by teachers 37

Figure 13: The effectiveness of using motivational strategies, 38perceived by students

Figure 14: Effectiveness of Elicitation of self or peer correction, 39 perceived by the students

Figure 15: Effectiveness of Establishing relevance, perceived by the 40students

Figure 16: Effectiveness of Effective praise, perceived by the students 40

Figure 17: Effectiveness of Inconsistent group/pair work, perceived by 41the students

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

1 Statement of research problem and rationale for the study

According to Dörnyei (1998), researchers and teachers from all over the worldhave agreed that motivation is one of the determinants for the success of second language(L2) studying process Therefore, motivational strategies should be seen as the key forsuccessful L2 classes In the world, motivational strategies have been appliedsuccessfully in many English as second language (ESL) classes, which have brought

about many advantages For example, the study The Use of Motivational Strategies in

Language Instruction: The Case of EFL Teaching in Taiwan (Dörnyei & Cheng 2007,

p.169) has shown three advantages of using motivational strategies in ESL classes, whichare: “Promoting leaner autonomy, creating interesting classes, and recognizing students’effort and hard work” However, motivational strategies have not been widely applied inVietnam, especially at high school Grammar-Translation is still the most popularmethod used in classes at high school in Vietnam due to the pressure of the universityentrance exam containing no communicative skill Therefore, students in high schoolstudy English by learning by heart the rules and few motivational strategies have beenused by the teachers in high school context This fact leads to the passive and ineffectiveway of learning of most students in L2 classes in Vietnam

In HULIS ( Hanoi University of languages and international studies) context, thestudents have chance to approach completely different method of teaching, which isCommunicative Language Teaching (CLT) This method requires them to be moreactive, to be the class center Unfortunately, most of the students, especially the first-yearones have the habit of passive learning for too long period of time and find it extremelyhard to get acquaintance to the new method In this situation, the duties of the teachersare emphasized Motivational strategies should be applied successfully by the teachers to

help students change their learning method as soon as possible to adapt with thecurriculum

However, it is not an easy task for teachers to apply successfully motivationalstrategies because “often a complex and difficult task that involves a multiplicity ofpsycho- sociological and linguistic factors” (Dörnyei 1998, 2010a cited in Bahous 2011,p.33) In addition, “Motivation is, without question, the most complex and challengingissue facing teachers today” (Scheidecker & Freeman 1999, p.116 cited in Dörnyei 2001,p.1)

Recently, there have been some research papers studying about the effects ofmotivational strategies, for example Nguyen (2011) and Tran (2012) However, the fact

is 2012-2013 academic year is the first time the course outline for first-year studentswitness a big change While all the previous research papers focus on separated skill, thenew program this year focuses on integrated-skill lessons Therefore, no previous studyhas investigated into the use of motivational strategies in social English class in whichintegrated skills are taught

The above facts have raised the need of the researcher to conduct a studyinvestigating into the frequency and the effectiveness of using motivational strategies insocial English class of first-year mainstream students, from the perception of both the

students and the teachers The study is entitled: The use of motivational strategies in social English class of first-year mainstream students at FELTE, HULIS, VNU

2 Aims and objectives of the study

This study aims at exploring the frequency and the effectiveness of usingmotivational strategies in social English class of first-year mainstream students atFELTE, HULIS, VNU, from the perception of both students and teachers In order toachieve this aim, the researcher would like to shed light on the following matters Firstly,the study is conducted to examine what are the most frequently used motivationalstrategies in social English class Secondly, the researcher would like to find out the mosteffective motivational strategies in social English class, as perceived by the teachers andthe students

In sum, the aims of the study can be summarized into three following researchquestions:

i. What motivational strategies are most frequently used by teachers at FELTE,HULIS, VNU in social English lessons of first-year mainstream students, from theperception of both the students and the teachers?

ii. What motivational strategies are most effective for first-year mainstream students

at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons, from the perception of the

teachers?

iii. What motivational strategies are most effective for first-year mainstream students

at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons, from the perception of the

students?

3 Scope of the study

Participants are teachers of social English stream for first-year student at FELTE,ULIS, VNU and first-year mainstream students who are studying the class of theparticipant teachers Besides, this research aims at investigating into motivationalstrategies that can be applied in social English class The reason is that in the academicEnglish lessons or economic English lessons, if the students are not motivated, classroomactivities can still be carried out to some extent However, in social English class inwhich CLT approach is central to enhancing students’ language knowledge and skills(course outline of QH.2012, 2012-2013 academic year), motivational strategies areunquestionably necessary to help students, especially shy ones, to raise their voice inclass

4 Significance of the study

When the study is completed, it would be beneficial for the teachers, first-yearmainstream students and other researchers who share the same interest in this topic Inthe first place, since this is the first time that social English is taught at FELTE, HULIS,VNU, the researcher hopes that this study would be a useful source of reference for theteachers in the future Specifically, the teachers can identify which are the most effectivemotivational strategies and can have best choices for their classes Moreover, thisresearch could also be considered a reference for English Language Teaching (ELT)teachers to make changes to the course so that they could use motivational strategiesmore effectively Accordingly, students will be more motivated in social English lessonswhich can help them improve their motivation to learn English and eventually, their

English skills would be improved faster Last but not least, researchers who are alsointerested in the same topic can refer to this paper as a source of updated and reliableinformation.

5 Organization of the paper

The rest of the paper includes two parts:

Part II – Development is comprised of three chapters:

Chapter 1 - Literature - provides the background of the study, consisting of

definitions and descriptions of key concepts and related studies, both inside and outside

of Vietnam

Chapter 2 – Methodology – describes in details the research setting, participants,

instruments of data collection as well as the procedure employed to carry out dataanalysis

Chapter 3 –Findings and Discussion– presents the findings together with

in-depth analysis and discussion of the findings – gives answers to the three researchquestions proposed at the introduction part

Part III - Conclusion - summarizes the major findings of the paper, the

implication of the study, the limitations of the research and offers suggestions for furtherstudies

The References and Appendices include a list of references that the researcher

used for the study, samples of questionnaires, observation scheme, guided questions forinterviews and interview transcripts

PART II: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter, as its name suggested, provides a brief review of the literature related to this study and lays the solid foundation for the development of subsequent parts of the paper Initially, key terms such as motivation, motivational theories and constructs, motivation in L2 and ELT will be reviewed Secondly, considerable efforts will be focused on reviewing various approaches of researching motivation in the second language field and the framework the researcher is going to follow Finally, overview of related studies worldwide and in Vietnam will be discussed

1 Definition of terms and related terminologies

Additionally, a simple definition is provided by Keller (1983), which has shownthat motivation indicates the options of experiences or purposes and the degree of effortpeople will put in that respect (cited in Crookes and Schmidt, 1991, p.481) On the otherhand, in Pintrich and Schunk's view, “Motivation is the process whereby goal-directedactivity is instigated and sustained” (1996, p.4 cited in Dörnyei 1998, p.118) Likewise,Dörnyei (1998) suggests that motivation is “a process hereby a certain amount ofinstigation force arises” He emphasizes that “certain amount of instigation force” couldstart the human’s action, prevent other force appearing, negatively affect the action oreven cease it, and insist on the action until the results had come out

The researcher particularly favors the definition provided by Maehr & Meyer(1997), in which motivation is considered as “a theoretical construct used to explain theinitiation, direction, intensity, persistence, and quality of behavior, especially goal-directed behavior” (cited in Brophy 2004, p 3)

In conclusion, from these definitions above, motivation can be understood as animportant phenomenon in human’s activities, which can be the cause of human’s actions,direct their choices, and maintain the process with a directed goal Among all thedefinitions, the one from Maehr & Meyer (1997) would be used as the key directionthroughout this research paper because in the researcher’s opinion, this definition canbest describe the meaning of motivation with brief and concise language

1.1.2 Motivational theories and constructs

1.1.2.1 Goal orientation theory

Recent studies outlined by Elliot & Thrash (2001) suggest that there is noagreement among all the researchers for the definition of goal orientation (cited inGuilloteaux 2007) Guilloteaux (2007, p.43) considers goal orientations as “constructsthat were specifically developed to explain achievement motivation” On the other hand,Dörnyei (2001) emphasizes that goal orientation theory could help to show “therelationship between students’ learning and performance” when it was carried out inclassroom context

In the 1980s and early 1990s, goal orientations have differentiated two types of

goals: performance goals and mastery goals, in which the former goals are considered to

be less adaptive than the latter ones (Guilloteax 2007)

1.1.2.2 Self- determination theory (SDT)

According to Guilloteaux (2007), SDT is one of the most popular theories inmotivational psychology, which concerns the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsicmotivations Similarly, Deci and Ryan (1985) have classified motivation into two types:intrinsic and extrinsic motivation On one hand, intrinsic motivation refers to “doingsomething because it is inherently interesting or enjoyable” (Deci & Ryan 2000, p.55).Moreover, this kind of motivation is considered as a significant phenomenon foreducators It is described as “a natural wellspring of learning and achievement that can besystematically catalyzed or undermined by parent and teacher practices” (Ryan & Stiller

1991 cited in Deci & Ryan 2000, p.55) On the other hand, the behaviors in which peopleperform with the aim of getting some extrinsic reward or avoiding punishment are calledextrinsically motivated behaviors (Dörnyei 1994) Sharing the same line, Deci and Ryan(2000, p.55) consider extrinsic motivation as the action results from the need to “a

separable outcome” Specifically, Deci and Ryan (1985, 2002) assert that in SDT, thereare three basic psychological needs that all individuals are likely to satisfy in theiractions: the need for competence, which implies the need to interact with socialenvironment and show the abilities in a confident and effective way, the need forrelatedness, which refers to the feeling of belonging, care, respect and connection withothers, and the need for autonomy, involving joining in an activity with a sense ofunpressured willingness (cited in Guilloteaux 2007, p.49)

In summary, SDT is the theory about two sources of motivation which relatedirectly to the educating process However, in this study, intrinsic motivation will not bementioned Throughout this research, extrinsic motivation will be discussed as a keydirection

1.1.3 Motivation in second language learning (L2)

Motivation has been mentioned much in L2 field Gardner (1985, p.10) definesmotivation as “a term which is often used with respect to second language learning as asimple explanation of achievement” Additionally, in his point of view, motivationcomprises four aspects: “a goal, effortful behavior, a desire to obtain the goal andfavorable attitudes toward the activity in question.”

In a like manner, Crookes and Schmidt (1991) propose motivation to learning asecond language is “the learner’s orientation toward the goal of learning a secondlanguage” Similarly, Dörnyei (1998) classifies three elements of motivation in languagelearning, which are motivational intensity, desire to learn the language and an attitudetowards the act of learning the language Based on these viewpoints, it could be inferredthat motivation in L2 field is related to setting a goal in language learning, having adesire to maintain the goal and a positive attitude toward language learning process

1.1.4 The importance of motivation in English Language Teaching (ELT)

The importance of motivation in English Language Teaching has beenemphasized by many authors In his words, Dörnyei (1994, p.273) states that:

Motivation is one of the main determinants of second/foreign language(L2) learning achievement and, accordingly, the last three decades have seen aconsiderable amount of research that investigates the nature and role ofmotivation in the L2 learning process (Dörnyei 1994, p.273)

Specifically, some researchers such as Gardner (1985), Svanes (1987), Clement,Dörnyei and Noels (1994) have pointed out that “the motivation from social-psychological orientation in which attitudes play a significant role is deliberately anaffective variable of second language proficiency and behavior”(cited in Celik 2004,p.34) Sharing the same line, Dörnyei and Guilloteaux (2008) emphasize the importance

of motivation in ELT by clarifying that motivation firstly helps start the second languagelearning process and secondly, maintain that long and tiresome process They alsoindicate the irreplaceable value of motivation by claiming that even if there are peoplewho have the most outstanding capabilities, with insufficient motivation, they cannotachieve long term goals

To conclude, acknowledging the unquestionable significance of motivation inELT, it is the teachers’ responsibility to apply suitable motivational strategies to increasethe enthusiasm of the students to initiate and persist the language learning process In thenext section, some motivational strategies frameworks will be presented

1.1.5 Motivational strategies frameworks

Motivational strategy is so well known that there have been many frameworks ofthis field constructed by researchers First of all, there is a construct made by Dörnyei in

1994 There have been three levels in this framework: the Language Level, the LearnerLevel, and the Learning Situation Level According to Dörnyei (2001, p.18), thisframework “is a good example of “education approach” because it emphasizes on theperception of classroom

Figure 1: Components of Foreign Language Learning Motivation (Dörnyei 1994)

Williams and Burden (1997 cited in Dörnyei 2001, p.18) offer another detailedframework of motivational components Discussing about this one, Dörnyei (2001, p.19)argues that these authors also consider L2 motivation to be “a complex, multi-dimensional construct”, however, they do not group and organize the elements of theframeworks like the construct of Dörnyei (1994) Their construct includes internal andexternal factors

Figure 2: Williams and Burden (1997)’s framework of motivational components

Another framework is from Dörnyei in 2001, which comprises three stages:prectional stage, actional stage ad postactional stage

Figure 3: A process model of learning motivation in the L2 classroom (Dörnyei 2001)

This framework has been based on the principles of a “more general and elaboratemodel” (Dörnyei 2001, p.19) He claims that this construct has a new element: process-oriented approach, i.e “a dynamic view of motivation” that can deal with the “changes ofmotivation over time” (Dörnyei 2001, p.19)

1.1.6 Framework of motivational strategies in this study

As a matter of fact, Dörnyei (2001) asserts that motivational strategies refer to

“instructional interventions” that the teachers can use to motivate their students and regulating strategies” that each student can apply purposefully to control the degree oftheir motivation

The frameworks discussed in the previous part concern much about regulating strategies”, however, the motivational strategies discussed in this researchbelong to “instructional interventions applied by the teacher” Fortunately, there is aframework which can suit the situation of this research In the recent research outlined byGuilloteaux (2007), he points out that there are many researchers studied on this fieldwith the lack of a “theory-based framework”, except for the situation of Dörnyei (2001).His construct is a system with four main dimensions:

“self- Creating the basic motivational conditions

 Generating initial motivation

 Maintaining and protecting motivation

 Encouraging positive retrospective self-evaluation

Figure 4: Dörnyei (2001)’s motivational teaching practice

In conclusion, as an exceptional theory-based framework discussing instructionalstrategies used by the teachers, Dörnyei (2001)’s framework of a motivational teachingpractice is the most suitable one to serve as the theoretical background for the designedquestionnaires and classroom observation instruments in this research

2 The context of teaching social English to first-year mainstream students at FELTE, HULIS, VNU

2.1 The context

The research took place during the second semester of school year 2012-2013,among the first-year mainstream ELT students of QH2012 at FELTE, HULIS, VNU andtheir teachers This is the first time the course has been divided into two streams: socialEnglish and academic English or economic English This study was carried out in thesocial English class The reason is while in the academic English or economic Englishlessons, if students are not motivated, classroom activities can still be complemented tosome extent However, in social English class in which CLT (Communicative languageteaching) approach is central to enhancing students’ language knowledge and skills(course outline 2012), motivational strategies are unquestionably necessary to helpstudents, especially shy ones, to raise their voice in class In the following part, moredetailed analysis of CLT will be discussed

2.2 Communicative Language Teaching approach

Communicative Language Teaching approach is highlighted in the course ofEnglish for social purposes in FELTE, HULIS, VNU (Course outline of FELTE, HULIS,2012-2013)

According to Richards (2006, p.2), Communicative Language Teaching can beseen as a set of principles of language teaching goals, learning methods, classroomactivities, teachers and learners’ role in the class

CLT sets as its goal the teaching of communicative competence Celce-Murcia et

al (1995, p.13 cited in To et al 2012, p.29) states that communicative competenceincludes: discourse competence, linguistic competence, actional competence, social-cultural competence and strategic competence

Moreover, Richards (2005) claims that: “one of the goals of CLT is to developfluency in language use” (cited in To et al 2012, p.34) In CLT, teachers and students donot focus on “mastery of different items of grammar and practice through controlledactivities such as memorization of dialogs and drills” but pay for attention tocommunicative activities such as pair work, role plays, group work and project work.(Richards 2006)

Additionally, the roles of teachers and students are also considered in CLT.Learners have to join in classroom activities in pairs or groups rather than individually.

On the other hand, teachers have the role of facilitator and monitor instead of being amodel (Richards 2006)

3 Related studies

3.1 Overview of related studies worldwide

Based on the responses of two hundred Hungarian teachers, Dörnyei and Csizer(1998) have complied a set of ten motivational macrostrategies in their research named:

“Ten commandments for motivating language learners: results of an empirical study” Inaddition, the study also shows that there is no motivational strategy that has “absoluteand general” result because it depends on the learning contexts also to determine theeffectiveness of the strategies

Another research on this field has been carried out by Guilloteaux (2007), which

is named “Motivating language learners: a classroom-oriented investigation of teachers’motivational practices and students’ motivation” The study aims at finding out whetherL2 teachers’ motivational practices linked to student motivation The results of the studyindicate that students’ motivation level could be changed by language teachers if theyapply various motivational strategies Therefore, in English language teaching, it should

be the teachers’ responsibilities to using motivational strategies to elicit their students’enthusiasm to learn

Similar attempts to Guilloteaux (2007) have been made by Dörnyei andGuilloteaux (2008), based on a large-scale investigation of ESOL classrooms in SouthKorea with 27 teachers and more than 1,300 learners, they conclude that the languageteachers’ motivational strategies have association with increased levels of the learner’smotivated learning behavior, even stronger than that of students’ self-regulatedmotivation

In conclusion, all the above three research papers carried out by famous authors inmotivation field show that there is a strong relationship between the use of teacher’smotivational strategies and students’ L2 learning motivation Moreover, in each context,the level of effectiveness of motivational strategies is different (Dörnyei and Csizer1998) This result highly encourages the researcher to investigate into the use of

motivational strategies in social English class in the learning context of FELTE, HULIS,VNU.

3.2 Overview of related studies in Vietnam

In Vietnam, there have been some researchers touching upon the topic ofmotivational strategies Especially for University of languages and international studies,some research papers have been carried out basing on the framework and construct ofmotivational teaching strategies of Dörnyei (2001a) and Dörnyei & Guilloteaux (2008)

First, Nguyen (2009) in her graduation papers for the Bachelor of Art in EnglishLanguage Teaching has attempted to examine the issue of motivational strategiesexploited in teaching speaking to first-year mainstream students, HULIS, VNU With theassistance students’ questionnaires and classroom observation scheme, Nguyen (2009)has found out the answer for most frequently used motivational techniques and someuseful strategies However, the limitation is that the findings of this research are merelyfrom the perception of the students and no interview session is carried out Theinstruments are questionnaires for the students and observation On the other hand,

Nguyen (2011) has conducted a study about Teacher’s use of motivational strategies in

speaking classes for second year mainstream ELT students at FELTE-ULIS in Correlation with teaching experience Also mentioning about speaking classes, this

research approaches the problem in different angle from Nguyen (2009): the teachers’angle The instruments used are interviews, observation and questionnaires, which canmake triangulation for the research However, the limitation of this study is that it merelylooks at the motivational strategies used in class from the teachers’ perception Students’perception is ignored Talking about the same issue, Tran (2012) also places her focus onthe use of motivational strategies in teaching speaking The subjects of this study arefourth-year students who had their teaching practicum at English Division I, Faculty ofEnglish Language and International Studies, Vietnam National University This paperaims at exploring how the fourth-year students exploit the motivational strategies inteaching speaking to the first-year students In the findings, Tran (2012) indicates the

most frequently use strategies are social chat, promoting cooperation, fixed group/pair,

promoting instrumental values, individual competition, team competition, class, applause, arousing curiosity or attention, scaffolding, neutral feedback and signposting.

The limitation of this study is that the scope of participants is too small Tran (2012,p.54) agrees that: “The more participants the study could involve, the more applicable thefindings could be”

Although the results of the three researchers are valuable and could be applied inreality, the changes of the course outline in the academic year 2012-2013 create someobstacles to apply these findings All the three research papers focus on separated skillonly, especially speaking one On the other hand, the new learning program in FELTE,HULIS focuses on integrated-skill lessons The fact is, when being asked, most of thestudents shared that they had some difficulties with the new approach of studying,especially with the workload of the program This leads to the situation that the studentsmay feel more stressful and tired in class Therefore, the teachers might have to put moreefforts in motivating their students to learn Additionally, as this is the new change, noresearcher has conducted any study on this field

This limitation prompted the researcher to conduct this study to further investigatethe issue, as well as to bridge the gap about motivational strategies used by teachers inteaching integrated skills in social English class for first-year students at FELTE, HULIS,VNU

Summary: This chapter has highlighted the key issues related to the study:

motivation, motivational theories and constructs, motivation in L2 and ELT, motivational strategies frameworks, communicative language teaching approach The literature review shows that motivation is undoubtedly an important factor in English language teaching Therefore, motivational strategies are necessary to apply to encourage students to learn A thorough review of frameworks of motivational strategies and related studies worldwide and in Vietnam strongly supports the hypothesis that the use of motivational strategies can make certain positive effects for the learning process

of students With this theoretical background, it is hoped that the study would yield satisfactory results.

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

The previous chapter has just provided a theoretical basis for the whole paper through the overview of the literature on the research topic In this chapter, the researchers will describe and justify the methodology in carrying out the paper, including the collection of sample, the data collection instruments, the procedure of data collection together with data analysis method.

1 Research design

The design of this research is a survey, which possesses numerous benefits.Brown et al (2003, p.262) have listed three advantages of survey research Firstly, thesurvey research can “produce data based on real-world observations” Secondly, theyclaim that thanks to the “breadth of coverage” of a lot of people or events, surveyresearch might be more capable to collect data based on a representative sample togeneralize a population, rather than many other designs Last but not least, a largenumber of data could be produced in a short period of time, with a quite low cost insurvey research More specifically, in this research, a survey study is chosen since theresearcher attempts to collect the empirical data with the limit of time of both theresearchers and the participants

The combination of interview, questionnaire and observation was employedduring the process of data collection because of the following reasons Firstly, the firsttwo instruments enabled the researchers to collect students’ self-report on their ownopinions of motivation strategies Moreover, the interview can help the researchercollected deeper data for the issue Last but not least, to help enhance the validity andreliability of the information, to make methodological triangulation for the data and toavoid biased information of self-reports, the researcher decided to use observation as thethird instrument for the research design

2 Participants and settings

2.1 Participants

The process of data collection involved the participants of both the first-yearstudents and the teachers from mainstream group, FELTE, HULIS, VNU.

2.1.1 Teachers

The population of the research was 18 teachers who are teaching social Englishfor first-year mainstream students at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in the second semester of2012-2013 school year Due to the time limit of both the researchers and the teachers,only half of the population was asked to participate in the research Additionally, simplerandom sampling was employed A set of questionnaires was given to these 9 teachers tomeasure their self-report of motivational strategies After that, all of the teachers wereinterviewed to evaluate the frequency and effectiveness of the motivational strategies andexpress their own opinions about the effective and most frequently used strategies.Additionally, they were also observed in class to figure out the motivational strategiesthey used in their lesson

2.1.2 Students

A set of questionnaires was given to 223 students from 9 classes of the 9 selectedteachers to measure their self-reported course-related motivation Those students are thefirst-year ones, who have experienced one semester in FELTE, HULIS, VNU Some ofthem are studying English teaching major, some are studying English interpreting majorand the rest are studying economic English major However, in the first two years atuniversity, they have the same studying program with social English The level of theirEnglish proficiency is around Pre-intermediate since there are some students whose levelare above and some students whose level are below this range Those students wereobserved in class to evaluate their motivational state and actual classroom behaviors.Moreover, due to the time limit of both the researchers and the first-year students, in eachclass, the researcher chose one student randomly to take part in the interview session.Therefore, 9 students out of the sample were interviewed to provide deeper informationfor the research

2.2 Research settings

The study was conducted at FELTE, HULIS, VNU, with the first-year mainstreamclasses In the previous years, students at FELTE, HULIS, VNU used to learn separatedskills, which were listening, speaking, reading and writing They used to study English

for 6 semesters However, starting from the academic year 2012-2013, the students haveintensive proficiency course for only 4 semesters, expecting the same results with theprevious generations Moreover, they are learning social and academic English oreconomic English, and in each lesson, four skills are integrated These changes havebrought many challenges for both students and teachers Students can find it difficult toachieve the proficiency level of the skills required by the program after each semesterand teachers may find it challenging to motivate their students to learn more Therefore,the use of motivational strategies by the teachers is unquestionably essential

3 Data collection instruments

3.1 Observation

3.1.1 Reasons for choosing observation

Mason (1996) provides a definition of observation, which refers to a method ofgenerating data, in which the researcher is involved in a research setting, observingdimensions of that setting for example: interactions, relationships, actions, events or thelike (p 60 cited in Mackey and Grass 2005) Besides, through observation, according toMackey and Grass (2005, p.175), researchers can get large amounts of rich data on the

“participants’ behavior and actions within a particular context” This advantage can meetthe need of the researcher to get the information from the behavior of the students whenthe teachers were applying motivational strategies in their lessons

3.1.2 Observation scheme

The observation scheme of this study was adapted from two components in themotivation orientation of language teaching (MOLT) proposed by Guilloteaux andDörnyei (2008) The MOLT classroom observation scheme combines two establishedschemes or frameworks: Dörnyei’s (2001) system of motivational teaching practice andSpada and Fröhlich’s (1995) class-room observation scheme, the communicationorientation of language teaching (COLT) The content categories included in the MOLTconcerned features of the learners’ motivated behavior and the teacher’s motivationalteaching practice The learners’ motivated behavior involved the observer’s assessment

of the learners’ level of motivated behavior in terms of the proportion of students whopaid attention or actively participated during the class and who eagerly volunteeredduring the activities Table 1 presents the description of the three variables A three level-

scale was used: very low = a few students, low = one third to two thirds of the students,and high = more than two thirds of the students.

Table 1: Observational variables measuring learner’s motivated behavior

Variable Description

Attention Students appear to be paying: They are not displaying any inattentive or disruptive

behavior: they are looking at the teacher and following his or her movements, looking

at visual stimuli, turning to watch another student who is contributing to the task, following the text being read or making appropriate nonverbal responses

Participation Students are actively taking part in classroom interaction or working on assigned

activity They are also volunteering without the teacher having to coax them in any way

The aspects of the teacher’s motivated teaching practice included in the MOLTwere based on the Dörnyei’s (2001) model of motivational teaching practice Twenty-five clearly definable and observable motivational variables were select and presented inAppendix 1

The observation coding scheme consisted of two main parts: the class profile involving general information about the teacher, date and the class and a checklist of different motivational strategies that are proposed by Guilloteaux and Dörnyei (2008) The two items to check these strategies are frequency of use and student’s motivated behavior For further details about the observation checklist, please see Appendix 2

The data collected from observations is used to answer the all the three researchquestions

In sum, the construction of observation scheme involved a number of phases:

Table 2: Procedures for Observation Scheme Development

1 Review relevant literature and previous related research.

2 Develop the draft observation scheme; adapt the observation scheme from motivation

orientation of language teaching (MOLT) proposed by Guilloteaux and Dörnyei (2008)

3 Submit to the supervisor for first-stage pilot.

4 Pilot on another sample of equal English proficiency.

5 Revise the observation scheme carefully and complete the final version.

3.2 Questionnaires

3.2.1 Reasons for choosing questionnaires

According to Brown (2001 cited in Mackey & Gass 2005, p.92), questionnaire isdefined as any written instruments that include a series of questions or statements In theseries, the participants have to respond either by writing out the answers or choose themamong the existing options

This is one of the most well-known instruments, which has many advantages.James (1997) claims that there are three major strengths of questionnaires, which are

“economy, uniformity of questions and standardization” Moreover, by usingquestionnaires, researcher can save time to collect data from large number of people.Thanks to these above advantages, questionnaires were employed as the second datacollection instrument

3.2.2 Questionnaire format and content

The sets of questionnaire were also adapted from Dörnyei (2001)’s model ofmotivational teaching practice with the twenty-five items of motivational strategies

There are two sets of questionnaires, one for the students and one for the teachers.Both of the sets of questionnaire began with a brief overview of the research title, thepurpose of carrying out the questionnaire survey and a desire for cooperation fromrespondents Confidentiality of shared information was also emphasized

There were two parts in both the two sets:

 Section 1: Questions in this section were solely designed in the form of numericalrating scale Teachers and students were required to rate the frequency andeffectiveness of using motivational strategies in their social English lessons Whenrating the frequency, they were asked to rate on a scale from 1 to 5 with 1 being

“Never” and 5 being “Usually” Additionally, when rating the effectiveness, theywere required to rate on a scale from 1 to 5 with 1 being “totally ineffective” and 5being “extremely effective”

 Section 2: This section sought for personal information of their name and theirgroup

The set of questionnaires for teachers aimed at answering the research questions 1and 2:

i. What motivational strategies are most frequently used by teachers at FELTE,HULIS, VNU in social English lessons of first-year mainstream students from theperception of both the teachers and the students?

ii. What motivational strategies are most effective for first-year mainstream students

at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons, from the perception of the

iii What motivational strategies are most effective for first-year mainstream students

at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons, from the perception of the

students?

In sum, the construction of the questionnaire involved a number of phases:

Table 3: Procedures for Questionnaire Development

Phases Procedures

1 Review relevant literature and previous related research.

2 Develop the draft questionnaire; adapt the questionnaire from Dörnyei’s (2001) model

of motivational teaching practice

3 Submit to the supervisor for first-stage pilot.

4 Pilot on another sample of equal English proficiency.

5 Revise the questionnaire carefully and complete the final version.

3.3 Interviews

3.3.1 Reasons for choosing interviews

Cannel and Kahn (1968) define research interview as “a two-person conversation initiated by the interviewer for the specific purpose of obtaining research-relevant information, and focused by him on content specified by research objectives and systematic description, prediction, or explanation” Additionally, many advantages of questionnaires were pointed out by James (1997)

 Allows the interviewer to clarify questions

 Can be used with young children and illiterates

 Allows the informants to respond in any manner they see fit.

 Allows the interviewers to observe verbal and non-verbal behavior of therespondents

 Means of obtaining personal information, attitudes, perceptions, and beliefs

 Reduces anxiety so that potentially threatening topics can be studied

Moreover, Mackey and Grass (2005, p.173) point out another advantage of theinterview that it can help the researcher encourage the participants to provideinformation, those participants are the ones who are “not comfortable in other modes”.These features are in great accordance with the intention of the researchers since theultimate goal of the interviews was to follow up and provide an insight into theeffectiveness of motivational strategies perceived by the teachers and the students

3.3.2 Interview format and content

Semi-structured interview was utilized to yield the wanted data since it is widelyknown that semi-constructed interviews offer interviewers plenty of flexibility whileproviding interviewees with adequate power and control over the course of the interview(Mackey & Gass, 2005, p.173) Two different sets of guided questions to elicit answersand further explanations from interviewees were carefully prepared in advance Thequestions for the teachers and the first-year students were mainly based on the researchquestions with reference to specific aspects of the use of motivational strategies in socialEnglish classes The interview aimed at finding the deeper answers for the participants’choices in their questionnaires, especially for the research questions 2 and 3:

ii What motivational strategies are most effective for first-year mainstreamstudents at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons, from the perception of

2010, p.52) In addition, all the interviews were conducted face to-face and wererecorded for further interpretation and investigation

In sum, the construction of interview involved a number of phases:

Table 4: Procedures for Interview Development

1 Review relevant literature and previous related research.

2 Design guided questions for semi-structured interview based on the framework and the

real situation of the research

3 Submit to the supervisor for first-stage pilot.

4 Pilot on another sample of equal English proficiency.

5 Revise the interview guideline questions carefully and complete the final version.

4 Data collection procedure

The data collection procedure consisted of three phrases, each of which was taken according to a designed timeline The three phases are listed as follows:

Table 5: Data collection procedure

1 Preparation Designing questionnaires, observation scheme and interview guiding

Delivering and collecting questionnaires from the first-year students 2 weeks

Delivering and collecting questionnaires from the teachers 1 week

Interviewing the teachers and the first-year students 1 week

3 Grouping the

data

Transcribing observation and videos 1 week

Phase 1: Preparation

Initially, observation scheme, questionnaires, interview guiding questions forteachers and students were carefully designed After that, questionnaires were piloted.Piloting is a very important step in carrying out a research paper Talking about theimportance of piloting, Baker (1994 p.182) said that: “a pilot study can also be the pre-testing or trying out of a particular research instrument” Pilot study can bring aboutmany advantages One of the advantages, according to these two authors, is that it cangive the researcher “advance warning” of the problems of the research or whether the

instruments are suitable or not Pilot is so important that De Vaus (1993, p.54) warnedresearchers: “Do not take the risk Pilot test first”

Therefore, the main study was preceded by the piloting phase whereby thequestionnaire was tested in the sample of two classes of first-year students Each classhas about 20 students The classes of students randomly chosen representedcharacteristics similar to those of the main study sample but were not included in themain study They filled in the first version of the questionnaire and based on the itemanalysis, the wording of the items had been modified before the final version wasdelivered Observation scheme was also piloted in these two classes After that, interviewquestions were piloted by two teachers and two students with the same characteristics ofthe sample, but they were not in the sample

Phase 2: Implementation

a Observation procedure

One week before starting to collect data for the study, the researcher contacted theteachers and invited them to join as participants in the research paper After gettingpermission for class observation from the teachers, the researcher met the first-yearstudents that these teachers were teaching to invite them to join in the study asparticipants The researcher conducted 9 observation sessions, in which each teacher hadone session observed Notes of motivational strategies used in these sessions andbehaviors of students towards those strategies were written down carefully as theevidence for this study Additionally, the researcher asked and was permitted to videotapethe teachers’ performance and students’ reaction in class This way could help theresearchers watch the videos many times to have deeper information in the matters of thestudy

b Questionnaire procedure

The questionnaires were delivered to the students and the teachers to get moreinformation of what had happened in class during the teaching process Thequestionnaires were delivered to the students and teachers in hard-copied form

c Interview procedure

The researcher conducted 9 interview sessions for the chosen teachers Besides,the researchers conducted interview sessions for 9 students These students were chosen

randomly in each class, one student in one class The researcher recorded the interviewwith the permission of the participants

Phase 3: Grouping the data

After collecting data from class observation, questionnaires and interviews, a planfor synthesizing and analyzing these data was carefully designed by the researcher

5 Data analysis procedure

Answers from questionnaires from students and teachers were coded andconverted into bar charts 9 semi-structured interviews of teachers and 9 of students weretranscribed and carefully analyzed The information from the interviews was also used to

be interpreted and quoted to explain some results Notes from observations wereanalyzed and compared with results from interviews and questionnaires Consequently,results from the three data collection instruments helped to give reliable answers to thethree research questions

Summary: So far, this chapter has justified the methodology applied in this paper

by elaborating the setting and the two groups of participants involved in the process of data collection, namely 9 teachers and 223 first-year students Furthermore, the combination of three data collection instruments was also clarified in the three-phase process of data collection and the process of data analysis in this chapter These justifications of the methodology would help make the way for the findings and discussion in the next chapter.

CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

In this chapter, all the data collected from the instruments (i.e observation, questionnaire and interview) will be revealed and discussed in detail, which will be integrated to support each other all in forms of answers to the three research questions.

1 Research question 1: What motivational strategies are most frequently used by teachers at FELTE, HULIS, VNU in social English lessons of first-year mainstream students, from the perception of both the students and the teachers?

In order to collect the data for this first question, respondents including both theteachers and the first-year students were required to mark the level of frequency of eachmotivational strategy in the range from 1 to 5 in which the numbers respectively meant

never, seldom, sometimes, often and always.

The bar chart below shows the result of the first-year students’ questionnaires andthe teachers’ questionnaires with the mean score indicating the frequency of motivationalstrategies used in social English class:

Figure 5: Frequency of using motivational strategies, perceived by the first-year

students and the teachers

It can be clearly seen in the chart that the most frequently used motivational

strategies evaluated by the teachers were Elicitation of self and or peer correction (4.45),

Establishing relevance (4.45), Scaffolding (4.18), Personalization (4.18), Promoting cooperation (4.09), Arousing curiosity and attention (4), Stating the communicative purpose of utility of the activity (3.82), Inconsistent group/pair work (3.73) and Team competition (3.73) On the other hand, the choices of the students were quite different,

according to them, most frequently used strategies were Inconsistent group/ pair work (4.26), Elicitation of self or peer correction (4.17), Establishing relevance (4.01),

Personalization (3.97), Promoting cooperation (3.91), Signposting 1 (3.91), Process feedback (3.89), Scaffolding (3.86), Class applause (3.78) and Stating the communicative purpose of utility of the activity (3.76)

The dissimilarity was that the teachers chose Arousing curiosity and attention and

Team competition as two of the most frequently used motivational strategies but the

students did not At this point, from the observation of 9 sessions in English social class,the researcher agrees with the students These two strategies were rarely applied by the

teachers Particularly, Arousing curiosity and attention strategy was applied in only one

class (in Video 1) when the T1 asked the students to look at the book and guess the

situation About Team competition, it was applied in one class (in Video 4) when T4

divided the class into 5 groups and designed an activity Each group could gain starswhen they had correct answer for the activity The group gained largest number of stars

would be the winner It seems that Team competition is fun but it takes a lot of time to

design that kind of activity in class

Another difference was that the students said Signposting 1, Process feedback and

Class applause were three of the most frequently used motivational strategies but the

teachers did not From the observation, Signposting 1 was applied only in one lesson of T1 when she said that “The focus function today is about news” In addition, Class

applause and Process feedback were not used in any class There were times that the

students clapped, but it was not because the teachers asked them to do, they just clappedbecause they felt so excited with some activities Therefore, it could not be concludedthat it was the strategy applied by teachers