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 CHANYEN BAI Yếu tố xã hội- giáo dục ảnh hưởng đến động học Tiếng Anh 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 CHANYEN BAI Yếu tố xã hội- giáo dục ảnh hưởng đến động học Tiếng Anh 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 iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements………………………………………………………… i Abstract………………………………………………………………………ii Table of contents…………………………………………………………….iii List of figures and tables…………………………………………………….vi Part I: INTRODUCTION………………………………………………… 1.1 Rationale …………………………………………………………… 1.2 Objectives of the study …………………………………………………2 1.3.Research questions………………………………………………………… 1.4 Methods of the study……………………………………………………… Scope of the study………………………………………………………… 1.6.Significance of the study…………………………………………………… 1.7.Design of the study………………………………………………………… Part II: DEVELOPMENT Chapter I: LITERATURE REVIEW…………………………………………… 1 Theoretical background of motivation………………………………… ….4 1.1.1 Definition of motivation……………………………………………………4 1.1 Theories of motivation…………………………………………………….5 1.2 Types of motivation……………………………………………………… 12 1.2.1 Integrative motivation………………………………………………… 13 1.2.2 Instrumental motivation……………………………………………………13 1.2 Intrinsic motivation……………………………………………………….13 1.2 Extrinsic motivation………………………………………………………14 The roles of motivation in second language learning………………………14 1.4 Gardner’s socio-educational model…………………………………………15 iv 1.5 Social and educational factors affecting motivation……………………… 16 1.5.1 Social factors…………………………………………………………… 16 Educational factors………………………………………………………18 1.5 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 The informants……………………………………………………………….23 The data collection instruments………………………………………………23 3 Summary …………………………………………………………………….24 Chapter IV: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION………………………… 25 Questionnaire……………………………………………………………….25 4.1.1 Participants’ Profile……………………………………………………….25 4.1 Attitudes towards English……………………………………………… 26 4.1 Participants’ self-evaluation of their learning English …………………27 4.1 Participants’ investment in learning English…………………………… 27 4.1 Participants’ learning strategies………………………………………… 28 4.1 Participants’ Using Language Opportunities…………………………… 28 4.1 Support for Participants’ Learning home…………………… 29 4.1 Participants’ Reported Challenges in and Opportunities for English at v Learning English…………………………………………………………………30 The interview……………………………………………………………….31 4.2 Students’ awareness of the importance of English……………………… 31 4.2 Students’ self-reported difficulties in learning English………………… 32 4.2 Parents’ attitudes………………………………………………………….32 4.2.4 Conditions for learning English………………………………………… 32 Summary ………………………………………………………………….33 Part III : RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION……………………34 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 Recommendations for teaching………………………………………………36 Limitations of the study………………………………………………………37 Suggestion for further study………………………………………………… 38 References……………………………………………………………………… 39 Appendices vi 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 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 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 semistructured 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 socioeducational factors toward students‟ motivation to learn a second language, from the factors affecting Son Thinh students‟ motivation in learning English (especially socioeducational factors), the teachers may find appropriate activities or methods to increase students‟ motivation to learn English better 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 socioeducational factors affecting students‟ motivation in second language learning + 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 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 ... SECONDARY SCHOOL IN VAN CHANYEN BAI Yếu tố xã hội- giáo dục ảnh hưởng đến động học Tiếng Anh học sinh trường trung học phổ thông Sơn Thịnh- Văn Chấn- Yên Bái M.A MINOR THESIS FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING...VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES VŨ THỊ HIỀN SOCIO-EDUCATIONAL FACTORS AFFECTING THE STUDENTS’... LEVEL Need for achievement Self-confidence * Language use anxiety * Perceived L2 competence * Causal attributions * Self-efficacy LEARNING SITUATION LEVEL Course-Specific Motivational Components