Initiating and sustaining motivation

Increasing and directing student motivation is one of a teacher’s responsibilities, though we cannot be responsible for all of our students’ motivation. In the end it is up to them (Allwright 1977). However, there are three areas where our behaviour can directly influence our students’ continuing participation: goals and goal setting; learning environment; interesting classes. Here we will deal with the first of the three.

Motivation is closely bound up with a person’s desire to achieve a goal; and a distinction needs to be made between long- and short-term goals.

Long-term goals may include the mastery of English, the passing of an exam (at the end of the year), the possibility for the use of the language in the future, etc. Short-term goals, on the other hand, might be the learning of a small amount of new language, the successful writing of an essay, the ability to partake in a discussion or the passing of the progress test at the end of the week.

Teachers need to recognise that long-term goals are vitally important but that they can often seem too far away. When English seems to be more difficult than the student had anticipated, the long-term goals can begin to behave like mirages in the desert, appearing and disappearing at random.

Short-term goals, on the other hand, are by their nature much closer to the student’s day-to-day reality. It is much easier to focus on the end of the week than the end of the year. If the teacher can help students in the achievement of short-term goals, this will have a significant effect on their motivation. After all, ‘nothing succeeds like success’!

(Jeremy Harmer. The practice of English language teaching. 4th ed. Longman, 2007. Adapted)