Hi Jo
I thought that I would add to James' piece below a research study that I did in 2001, so not recent. I asked my sample of 180 learners why they wanted to learn English and came up with some interesting findings in section 4, esp 4.10. The link is below
http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20130401151715/http://www.education.gov.uk/publications/eOrderingDownload/4RP21098.pdf
I hope it is useful!
Regards - Philida
-----Original Message-----
From: ESOL-Research discussion forum and message board [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of James Simpson
Sent: 18 December 2015 14:36
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Motivation in ESOL learners?
Hello Jo, all
A big question. An enormous amount has been written about adult language learners’ motivation though, much of it relevant to ESOL. Your student probably needs to go beyond work done in the specific ESOL/Language learning in migration contexts for this. Some classic work (e.g. Norton 2000, 2013) was carried out in recognisably ESOL contexts.
My PhD student Khawla Badwan, who passed her viva today (well done Khawla), wrote about motivation in her thesis. Because I've been looking at this recently, I'll take the opportunity here to pull out some of her points with ref to particular researchers whose work might be relevant. Everything below is summarised from Khawla's PhD thesis (Negotiating rates of exchange: Arab academic sojourners’ sociolinguistic trajectories in the UK).
• Norton (2013 p.323) explains, the imagined community is ‘a desired community that offers possibilities for an enhanced range of identity options in the future’. However, moving from the classroom community to the ‘target language community’ (Norton, 2013) gives rise to social inequality and power issues.
• Dörnyei (2005, 2009, 2010) introduces the move from the integrative/instrumental dichotomy to a more recent conceptualisation of motivation which regards motivation as being part of learners’ self systems, closely associated with learners’ ideal L2 self.
• The ‘L2 Motivational Self System’ encompasses three components: the Ideal L2 self (a person’s idealised L2 self), Ought-to L2 Self (attributes one should have to meet expectation and avoid negative consequences), and L2 learning experience (situated motives in the learning environment) (Dörnyei 2005, 2010).
• In her study of dialogic approaches to learner motivation, Harvey (2014) draws on the work of Mikhail Bakhtin to define language learner motivation as ‘ideological becoming, a process of learning to be in the world’ (p. 291). The study emphasises the importance of allowing learners to ‘speak as themselves’ (Ushioda 2011, p. 21) so that their identities and motivation are engaged and allowed to develop.
• Evidently, part of learners’ engagement with the others involves direct and indirect confrontations with power relations and structural inequalities, and the way learners interact with and respond to these issues varies. Some will continue to aspire towards the L2 community and others can take a range of different stands that may resist assimilation to the target community without giving up on the aspiration of learning English, or studying abroad to obtain a skill or a degree that may help them climb the socioeconomic ladder, in pursuit of what Lamb (2013) calls ‘a fantasy of future happiness’ (p. 20) which is seen by Kubota (2011) and Kariya (2010) as imagined mobility.
• We are reminded by Ferrari’s (2013) ‘Fiume (River) Model’ that adult motivation has various motivational sources and/or tributaries, and there will be times when the motivational flow is interrupted by rocks, driftwoods, and other obstacles. In essence, these challenges do affect how learners engage with and perceive the target language and its community. This gives rise to understanding learner motivation as socially-constructed through dialogue and interaction with the outside world (Harvey 2014; Ushioda, 2009, 2011).
• In addition to learner motivation, desire is a core drive towards what individuals want to achieve in their lives. Underlying learning and travel experiences are desires to self-fulfilment. Motha and Lin (2014) indicate that desire has attracted research attention in the areas of cultural studies, postcolonial studies, feminist studies, philosophy and psychoanalysis, but has been largely undertheorised in TESOL.
References:
Dörnyei, Z. (2005) The Psychology of the Language Learner. Marwah NJ: Erlbaum Dörnyei, Z. (2009) The L2 motivational self system. In Z. Dörnyei and E Ushioda (eds) Motivation, Language Identity and the L2 Self Dörnyei, Z. (2010) Researching Motivation. In S. Hunston and D Oakey (eds) introducing Applied Linguistics: Concepts and skills. London: Routledge.
Ferrari, L. (2013) The motivation of adult foreign language learners on an Italian beginners course. PhD Thesis, University of York.
Harvey, L. (2014) Language Learning Motivation as Ideological Becoming. PhD Thesis, University of Manchester.
Kariya, T. (2010) From credential society to "learning capital" society: A rearticulation of class formation in Japanese education and society. In H. Ishida and D Slater (eds) Social class in contemporary Japan. Routledge.
Kubota, R. (2011) Questioning linguistic instrumentalism: English, neoliberalism and language tests in Japan. Linguistics and Education 22/3, 248-260.
Lamb, M. (2013) 'Your mum and dad can't teach you!' Constraints on agency among rural learners of English in rural Indonesia. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 34/1, 14-29.
Motha, S. and A. Lin (2014) 'Non-coercive rearrangements': Theorising desire in TESOL. TESOL Quarterly 48/2: 331-359.
Norton, B. (2000) Identity and Language Learning: Gender, Ethnicity and Educational Change. London: Longman.
Norton, B. (2013) Identity and Language Learning: Extending the Conversation. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
Norton, B. (2013) Identity. In J. Simpson (ed) The Routledge Handbook of Applied Linguistics. London and New York: Routledge.
Ushioda, E. (2011) Motivating learners to speak as themselves. In G. Murray, X Gao and T. Lamb (eds) Identity, motivation and autonomy in language learning. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
-----Original Message-----
From: ESOL-Research discussion forum and message board [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Jo Gakonga
Sent: 18 December 2015 07:24
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Motivation in ESOL learners?
Hi all
A quick plea for help from anyone who might know about these things... A student of mine is doing some research on motivation in ESOL learners - does anyone know of any recent literature on the subject? There doesn't seem to be much out there. Any leads gratefully accepted and I hope that you all have a really happy Christmas and New Year :) Best, Jo Gakonga
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ESOL-Research is a forum for researchers and practitioners with an interest in research into teaching and learning ESOL. ESOL-Research is managed by James Simpson at the Centre for Language Education Research, School of Education, University of Leeds.
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ESOL-Research is a forum for researchers and practitioners with an interest in research into teaching and learning ESOL. ESOL-Research is managed by James Simpson at the Centre for Language Education Research, School of Education, University of Leeds.
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