The motivational dimension of language teaching

Abstract

Motivation is recognized as a vital component in successful second language learning, and has been the subject of intensive research in recent decades. This review focuses on a growing branch of this research effort, that which examines the motivational effects of language teaching. This is pertinent because, despite enhanced mobility and expanding access to foreign languages online, most learners' early encounters with the second language (L2) still take place in classrooms, and these encounters may shape attitudes and determine students' willingness to invest further in the L2. Four main types of research are reviewed: first, that which deliberately seeks to identify and evaluate strategies to motivate L2 learners; second, that which has tested the validity of psychological theories of motivation by applying their precepts in L2 classrooms; third, that which assesses the motivational effects of a pedagogical innovation or intervention; fourth, research on what has been too often the unintended outcome of language education, namely learner demotivation. The review highlights the complexity of the relationship between teaching and learner motivation but an attempt is made to articulate some emerging verities and to point towards the most promising avenues for future research.

Reexamining the Role of Vision in Second Language Motivation: A Preregistered Conceptual Replication of You, Dörnyei, and Csizér (2016)

“…Nevertheless, our recommendation for future research would not in fact be to suggest that scholars conduct yet more SEM studies, at least not initially and not in isolation. A more fruitful direction would be to first establish causality among variables experimentally (for similar calls, see Al‐Hoorie, ; Lamb, ; Yun et al., ). We also recommend that motivation researchers deliberately advance hypotheses for future testing as we have done in this article.…”

Teachers’ and Students’ Second Language Motivational Self System in English‐Medium Instruction: A Qualitative Approach

“…There is no doubt that teaching and being taught in English (when it is a foreign language) makes the learning process more arduous and demanding. This is why motivation, a widely acknowledged factor in the success of instructed knowledge acquisition in general (Henry, ) and of successful second language learning in particular (Lamb, ), becomes a determining factor in EMI contexts. However, and despite the “unprecedented” growth of studies on motivation in the last decade (Boo, Dörnyei, & Ryan, , p. 145), it is noteworthy that the number of publications on the interaction between EMI and motivation is scarce (Lasagabaster & Doiz, ).…”

“…The ought‐to L2 self is closely linked to peer‐group norms and other external pressures and, in contrast to the ideal self, which encompasses the individual's own visions for themselves, the ought‐to self has to do with other people's visions for the individual; (3) L2 learning experience : this component is conceptualized by Dörnyei at a different level from the two aforementioned self‐guides, and concerns the immediate learning environment and experience. It has to do with the learner's experiences (and the resulting attitudes) of learning the L2 inside and outside the classroom (Lamb, ). However, and as Ushioda () underscores, the interaction between this component and the future selves is still undertheorized, which is why our focus is on the impact of EMI on this interaction.…”

“…Under its classic definition, identity is “the way a person understands his or her relationship to the world, how that relationship is structured across time and space, and how the person understands possibilities for the future” (Norton, , p. 4). The connection with possible selves seems thus obvious, as the learning of a foreign language forms “an important part of one's identity” (Dörnyei & Kubanyiova, , p. 11), as reflected in the ever‐important role attributed to the concepts of self and identity in educational psychology (Lamb, ). Our focus on identity is driven by the criticisms of the L2MSS based on the grounds that it ignores the motivational consequences of “more immediately relevant identities” (Lamb, , p. 318).…”

Didactic variable in Russian students’ ulterior motivation for second language learning

“…On the whole, Russian researchers have limited specific individual factors of educational motivation to personality characteristics of the learner (gender, intellectual maturity, ability to assess teachers and their academic potential, positive and negative ways of the pedagogical process, specifics of the foreign language as an academic subject [7] We cannot but agree with British sociolinguist M. Lamb who maintains that any good teacher is, by definition, a motivator of learning, however a motivational dimension in teaching is distinct from a motivational dimension in 'good teaching', because students should be motivated to achieve their goals as efficiently as possible [8].…”