HOW TO MOTIVATE TEENAGERS

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HOW TO MOTIVATE TEENAGERS
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MOTIVATION

• Motivation is an abstract, hypothetical concept
  that we use to explain why people think and
  behave as they do.
• Motivation explains why people decide to do
  something, how hard they are going to pursue it
  and how long they are willing to sustain the
  activity.

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Language learners goals fall into two broad
categories

• Integrative orientation, which reflects a
  positive disposition toward the group that speaks
  the foreign language and the desire to interact
  with and even become similar to valued members of
  the community.
•  Instrumental orientation, where language
  learning is primarily associated with the
  potential pragmatic gains of foreign language
  proficiency, such as getting a better job or a
  higher salary.

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Motivational conditions

• An appropriate teachers behaviour and a good
  relationship with the students
• A pleasant and supportive classroom atmosphere
• A cohesive learner group with appropriate group
  norms

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An appropriate teachers behaviour and a good
relationship with the students

• Offer concrete assistance
• Respond immediately when help is requested
• Correct tests and papers promptly
• Arrange extracurricular programmes
• Listen and pay attention to students (e. g. show
  interest in their hobbies)

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A pleasant and supportive classroom atmosphere

• Tolerance
• Humour
• Decoration encourage students to personalise
  the classroom environment

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A cohesive learner group with appropriate group
norms

• Cohesive group a group which is together in
  which there is a strong we feeling
• Members should learn things about each other
• Contact and interaction
• Prevent rigid seating patterns

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Generating initial motivation

• Point out challenging, exotic or satisfying
  aspects of learning foreign language
• Connect learning of foreign language with
  activities that students find interesting
  (computer-assisted learning)

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• Familiarise learners with interesting aspects of
  the culture
• Share your own positive experiences related to
  the foreign language (culture)
• Focus on cross-cultural similarities (and not
  just differences)
• Bring various cultural products (magazines,
  music) to class

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Ways to improve motivation

• Journal writing Empathy
• Using photos Authenticity
• Music - Acceptance

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Journal writing, why is it good for?

• to find out more about teacher's students lives
• The idea is to communicate effectively in English
  and not to worry too much about mistakes
• (teacher will prepare a list of common
  mistakes)
• Students can be more opened to their teacher and
  They can begin to trust him, this means that the
  teacher will never read anyone's writing out in
  the class

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Preparation

• At the start of a course, I ask students to
  begin their journals by telling me about
  themselves and their reasons for studying
  English. The teacher collects all the journals in
  and replies individually to each one and asks a
  question or two, which will be the topics for the
  next class's journal writing.
• When introducing the idea of writing journals it
  is important to make the aims and general rules
  clear to students.
• Students should each have their own notebook to
  use as their journal. These should be kept by the
  teacher and it should be made clear that the
  teacher will not read anyone's writing out in the
  class. It will be strictly a two-way
  'conversation' between the individual student and
  the teacher. At the end of the course a teacher
  always gives the students their journals to
  keep.

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Using photos

• Teenage students can be very curious and
  inquisitive.
• They want to know more about their teacher and
  his/ her life outside the classroom
• Teacher decides how much of his/her life wants to
  give away and shares with the students
• personalizing really helps to increase students'
  interest levels. 
• How much more interesting to describe a photo of
  the teacher's friend or sister than to describe a
  photo of a random unknown man in a book .

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Preparation

• Topics that lend themselves to the use of photos
  are describing people, family, holidays or
  describing places.
• Grammar lessons can also be supported with
  photos. To give a simple example, teaching 'used
  to' becomes much more memorable when sentences
  with a visual image can be formed. Eg. "my
  teacher used to have long hair and a moustache"

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Music

• Teenagers love listening to music!
• Due to the fact that so much popular music is in
  English it can be a source for highly motivating
  activities. 
• Having music on in the background can really
  change the atmosphere of a classroom. When
  students are working in groups.

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Preparation

• To get this information students can write
  surveys to do with the class to find out the top
  five favourite bands. 
• Lyrics can be easily found on the internet and
  there are many opportunities to exploit language
  in songs.
• Students themselves can be involved in creating
  activities to use with their favourite songs.
• To prepare a project about music styles
• like EMO, ROCK, PUNK, HIP HOP

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• MIXED CLASSES
• - Students vary or are similar in many ways (in
  their interests and plans, in their learning
  style, etc.).
• - A teachers task is to get to know a class as
  much as possible and then to choose learning
  activities which are appropriate interesting
  and useful.
• - For lessons which are consistently interesting
  and useful for mixed classes, what kind of
  activities do we need?

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We need activities which

• are flexible they allow students to choose from
  a menu of sub-tasks that they can attempt at
  different levels of ambition
• cater for a variety of learning aims
• Some activities have both flexibility and variety
  of aims
• e.g. Kill the text (accuracy in speech, writing,
  listening to others)

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• POORLY MOTIVATED STUDENTS
• - There are four types of low-proficiency
  student
• Some are weak in English for some reason
  students need lots of attention, but they are
  able to work hard if they get adequate attention.
• Students with psychological learning disabilities
  such as poor hearing.
• Students with severe psychological problems
  resulting from traumatic experiences.
• Students who are weak in English largely because
  their motivation is low it is necessary to have
  lessons not just useful and well-managed, but
  also interesting and varied. gt our target group

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Some features of interesting lessons

• variety is important
• activities should be clearly understood and have
  achievable goals
• games are usually very good for generating
  interest (a degree of competition), as well as
  use of activities which encourage students to use
  the target language for communication of
  interesting messages
• extensive use of non-language stimuli such as
  pictures, objects, mime, music and sound effects
  is very important

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• try to discover what topics are of current
  interest to the age group and try to include them
  in lessons
• periodic opportunity to move about, or stand and
  move, is highly beneficial
• make lessons success-oriented (achievable aims)
• Adequate portion of humour is important too!

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• Some activities which can help us in
• maintaining discipline in the classroom e.g.
  the disappearing word
• ice breaking, warming up etc.
• e.g. alphabet improvisation dialogues
  (spontaneity, listening to a partner, following
  strict rules)
• clap and say (rhythm, concentration,
  learning names)
• speaking mainly e.g. letter on the board
  (spontaneity, fluency, sticking to a topic)
• listening mainly e.g. ticking differences (gist
  listening, speaking)
• writing mainly e.g. write in the shape
  (writing, speaking)
• learning and reviewing vocabulary e.g. How
  many? (terms for numbers, parts of the body,
  etc.)

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Sources

• Language activities for teenagers, edited by Seth
  Lindstromberg
• Motivational strategies in the language
  classroom, Zoltán Dornyei