如何激发英语学习中的差生.docx

如何激发英语学习中的差生

　　[Abstract] The problem of poor learners is a big problem in the field of education, so it is the focus that a lot of researchers have been discussing for years. This article discusses the importance of learning English and the embodiment of the “poor students” in English learning. Then the article focuses on the main cause of poor English learners in the respect of motivation, and introduces English learning motivation, one of the crucial factors influencing poor students. Lastly, the author suggests some ways of improving poor English learners’ motivation in the teaching process and the importance of parents and school’s role in motivating them as well. At the end of the article, the author also presents an example of improving poor students’ English learning to emphasis the role of learning motivation.
[Key Words] motivation ; poor students ; English learning

【摘 要】 差生问题是教育领域中最难啃的一块骨头，也是多年来教育家们不断地探讨
的焦点之一。本文从英语学习的重要性及英语教育中差生的现象展开，紧接着从英语学习动机这一影响差生的重要因素的角度入手，分析造成差生的主要原因，提出了老师、家长、学校激发差生英语学习动机的几点想法，最后结合实际中激发差生英语学习的例子强调了英语学习动机的作用。
【关键词】 动机;差生;英语学习
1. Introduction
The human race is now entering a brand new era. The 21st century is a time of advanced scientific and technological knowledge, and it is true that English plays an important role in the modernization of a country, providing a key to human education and development. According to the statistics in 1986, the people in the world take English as the mother tongue are over 400 million, almost ten percent people speak English. Approximately there are 20 countries taking English as the official language or the second language in the world, the population totally approaches 800 million. According to English culture committee‘s report, the population of studying English in the world probably approaches 1 billion, and　to 2 billion people use English to contact every day. The report also estimates that, to 2050, most of people in the world can use English. Furthermore, English enjoys a wider application. According to the statistics, above 75% mails are written in English; 60% of radio programs are broadcast in English; 80% of major international prints are published in English; what‘s more, English is regarded as the first general used language in the important international conferences. It‘s obvious that it has extended its antennae into every corner of the globe. In brief, English is so important that it exerts a far–reaching influence in the domain of politics, military, economy, science, technology, culture, trade, transportation, etc. China, as well, has entered a completely new stage in its history. With the development of the socialist market economy of China, the improvement of technology, the raising of international status, especially along with the entry of WTO, China is in an urgent need of large quantities of special talents who are skilled in English, so as to enable our country to play a greater role in the international affairs. Therefore, learning English has become essential for the social and economic development in China.
However, English learning is a complex process. In other words, English learners need to learn not only its pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar, but also its abundant culture. Some learners can learn English quickly and easily, while others find it difficult to learn，then these persons are the “poor learners” we often called .

2. Learning motivation—the main cause of poor learners
It is well known that, English learning is quite a complex process. “There are many factors influencing English learners‘ success or failure in English learning, such as learners‘ motivation, aptitude, character, intelligence, and other components. ” [1] “According to Jakobvits‘ research, he claims that the main factors influencing English learning, motivation takes up 33%, talent 33%, intelligence 20%, others 14%.” From what had been listed above, we can draw the conclusion that learners‘ motivation plays a crucial part in learning English. “Indeed, the role of learners‘ motivation in learning has been examined by many researchers who are interested in this subject area. Gardner(1985) seems to support this idea and points out that motivation in language learning is of particular importance. Similarly, Noels et al also believes that understanding more about motivation could improve learners‘ competence in learning English. ”
Some definitions relating to motivation
“Motivation”, as Jererny Harmer says, “is some kind of internal drive that encourages somebody to persevere in a course of sections”. “The origin of the word motivation is Latin for “a moving cause”(motivus). ”
“Psychologists define motivation as an internal process that activates, guides, and maintains behavior over time. It is one of the most important components of learning and one of the most difficult to measure. In plain language, motivation is what gets you going, keeps you going, and determines where you‘re trying to do.”　It can be subdivided into extrinsic and intrinsic motivation.
Concrete contents of motivation
“ Extrinsic Motivation: A reward that is external to the activity, such as
recognition or a good grade. ”　It comes from outside. It is closely related to parents, especially to teachers and students because schools are essentially artificial environments designed to motivate people to learn. Hence, teachers should have a good understanding of what initiative motivation and how motivation works.
There are four kinds of extrinsic motivation: reward, punishment, cooperation and competition. “Reward and punishment has high motivational value. Praise should be given to those who have done well on their performance. Meanwhile, appropriate punishment should be given to those who have done poor work, made careless mistakes or have been lack of improvement. Teacher, however, can neither praise nor punish students absolutely. Teacher should be more critical to the top students, and never give a punishment without showing the students how to do it better. Cooperation and competition can affect motivation as well. For example, if two top students share a desk, they may help each other; and simultaneously they compete with each other. Doing pair work and group work is a good approach for students to co-operate and compete. For instance, if teacher asks students to do group work to list ten things which people need during a trip, students may discuss heatedly among them before they have the result. Indeed, various activities are helpful in encouraging students to learn. ”
“Intrinsic Motivation: An aspect of an activity that people enjoy and therefore find motivating.”　It is largely connected with all the factors in the classroom, such as: physical conditions, teaching method, and teacher. “Physical conditions: such as the bad light, dull setting and overcrowded classroom de-motivate the students. Teaching method: the method by which the students are taught must have some effects on their motivation. If they find it deadly boring, they can hardly concentrate on class, as a result, they wouldn‘t like to participate in class activities and receive negative comment frequently. Thus, it is the teacher‘s method that affects their intrinsic motivation.”　Teacher: A well-trained teacher should make his classes interesting, be fair to his students and be a good language user. Setting appropriate goals to the students can also lead to success or failure in the classroom. That is to say, a type of much relaxed atmosphere in which a language is learnt can stimulate the students to have a positive attitude to the language. And the student‘s confidence in the method is largely in the hands of the most important factors affecting intrinsic motivation, the teacher.
Many investigations and researches suggest that the result of learning depends on the learners‘ intrinsic motivation. Once the learners are interested, they will work hard, act more actively and positively. Or the following phenomena will appear:
1. Lack of Interest
Most students begin learning English as eager learners. They enjoy learning about animal words, greeting phrases, and almost anything else. But beginning at about the second or third year, however, learning becomes difficult for some students. So they gradually decrease their interest and even give up learning it.
2. Lack of confidence
The students who are lack of the confidence in learning English explain failures by low ability often, they begin to experience helplessness, which is a motivational state acquired through consistently internal and stable attributions of causes for failure. Learned helplessness comes from repeatedly blaming their failure on low ability. They are self-abased and think that they are not born to learn English .They even don‘t like to talk with others in English, and raise any questions as well. They are afraid of making mistakes. If failure is repeatedly experienced, and if it becomes attributed to stable internal causes (low ability), confidence (the belief in one‘s power to affect outcomes) diminishes and they feel they might as well not try.
3. Lack of self-efficacy
“The outcomes of a learner‘s actions have the greatest effect on self-efficacy. Success generally increases self-efficacy whereas failure generally decreases it.” [10] Some students‘ learning foundation is poor. These students response slowly and always haven‘t got good result in the tests. Therefore, they get little chance to be praised by their teacher, while more chance to be criticized. Then a learner‘s self-efficacy is gradually influenced and decreased. And this often leads to students‘ anxious and nervous mood in learning and also affects their study record.
The role of motivation
Generally speaking, without study motivation there will be no learning activities. It is well-known that study motivation is one of the keys to the success in the study. A student with strong learning motivation will be active in the study, as proved in many experiments. The study motivation is an internal strength that impels the students to carry on the learning activities. And the function of motivation in the student learning activities mainly is represented in the following three aspects:
Firstly, study motivation determines study direction. It takes the study goals as the starting point, and aims to impel the student to work hard for achieving the certain goals. Therefore, the study motivation requests the student to understand why they study and what direction they head for. Only when a student has been clear about the study goal and the direction could he carry on the learning activity and get good results.
In the second place, study motivation determines study process. Whether the student‘s study motivation is strong or weak directly affects the stability and the durability of learning process. The student with strong motivation will show the strong will and the earnest study attitude in the study process. According to American psychologist J·W·Atkinson‘s research of learning motivation in 1980, the time needed in finishing a study assignment is closely related to the motivation involved in it.
Besides, many researches also testify that the difference, whether or not a student will study perseveringly，mainly lies in motivation. The student with strong motivation will study assiduously and perseveringly until eventually accomplish the assignment.
Last but not least, study motivation influences the study effect. Another American psychologist H·J·Wa1berg, after a study on the relation between motivation and academic record, said that the stronger study motivation a student has, the better academic record will he or she get. The direct proportion reaches 98%.
In fact, all students are motivated. The question is: What are they motivated to do? Students may vary in ability, in experience and in reaction to learning, but their quality of performance will depend on how much they are motivated to perform. Researchers have no trouble spotting poor students, the kids who are lack of motivation in study, spending their time watching the clock and waiting to end. In fact, these students are highly visible, and their numbers are disconcerting. The educator’s job is to discover, and simulate their motivations to learn, and to engage them in activities that lead to learning.

3. The means of motivating poor learners
The role of the teachers
Firstly, let‘s look at a report of students’ view of good teachers. What good qualities does a teacher need to help in providing intrinsic motivation?
A study done by Denis Girard (1997) suggests certain conclusion:
“1) The teacher must show great patience;
2) The teacher must show sympathy for his students;
3) The teacher must show same interest in every student as far as possible;
4) The teacher has to make his classes interesting;
5) The teacher must offer a good model as the target language user.
6) The teacher must be a good technician: his students should understand what
is wanted of them, be able to pronounce correctly, and be stimulated into
activity in the target language.” [11]
From what has been mentioned above, we can draw the conclusion that teacher plays a significant role in motivating students‘ learning. So a well–trained teacher should make his classes interesting, be fair to his student and be a good language user.
Helping poor learners set their own goals
One fundamental principle of motivation is that people work harder for goals that they themselves set than for goals set for them by others. So firstly teachers should have them set up short-term and proper goal.
In the first place, teacher should help students set their short-term goal. That is, the task which they have to finish is the short-term task. For example, a student might set a minimum number of books she expects to read at home or a score she expects to attain on an upcoming quiz. At the next goal-setting time the teacher would discuss student attainment or failure of goals and set new goals for the following period. During these times the teacher might help students learn to set ambitious but realistic goals and would praise them for setting and then achieving their goals.
In the second place, a rewarding learning goal must be regarded by the learner as being not too easy, nor too difficult. Or the learner may tend to withdraw from it. As we know, the goal which is too easy will become boring soon. To avoid this, a teacher needs to make learning goals a little challenging, but not discouraging. Challenging goal offers students, to explore the unknown, and to activate thinking, which is expected to bring about a satisfaction of achievement.
So, a teacher must be careful not to set a goal so difficult as to cause a feeling of frustration. In that case poor students may soon give up the hope completely. To present the learning content