A Study On Junior High School Students' English Learning Motivation

Many researches have shown that motivation is the source of learning and has a great influence on the learning outcome.Only when the learners have the motivation and need to learn will they take actions to learn.There are many researches about motivation and learning motivation in psychology and linguistics,but the study on the middle school students' motivation of learning English is limited.During the teaching practice,the writer has met many students who are much less motivated towards English,which is worrying.As a result,the writer attempts to get to learn about the motivation theories and to analyze the reasons why students are not motivated based on the teaching practice and the studies on the students motivation.It's hoped that some effective strategies can be found to motivate students from the valuable experiences and theories of the great masters with the method of problem solving.This paper uses various research methodologies such as literature review method,interviews and questionnaires,which all supports the empirical study.Data is collected and analyzed on the website of sojump.com and 98 middle school students are involved in the questionnaires.Ten students come from Grade Nine.Forty-one students are from Class 1,Grade Seven while the other forty-three students are chosen from Class 1 Grade Eight.It has shown that students who are good at English have stronger intrinsic motivation than those who are weak in English and the latter usually have extrinsic motivation.Well-performed students have stronger motivation than weaker students,so they are more goal-oriented and are more willing to put energy and time to overcome difficulty.Meanwhile,students with good English grades are less serious in English class and while using English than those with poor English.At last,students with good English grades tend to attribute their good performance in English to their hard work and believe that they have gifts for English learning.On the contrary,students with poor English are less confident and they do not think they have the ability and gift to master English.In the end,the paper puts forward some strategies and advice on how to keep students motivated from the perspectives of language learning,learners and learning situation.On the language level,teachers should help students to understand western culture and increase their interest in it and English.On the learner's level,teachers should increase students' confidence and reduce their anxiety during the learning process.On the learning situation level,plentiful school-based curriculum should be developed and appropriate tasks should be set to enhance students' motivation.Besides,the role of teachers should be made full use of,for example,teacher need to respect and love students,create a harmonious classroom atmosphere and have proper expectations and attributing for students.Last but not least,students should be given some autonomy to learn English so that they can adapt to their learning strategies and plans according to their own processes and adjust their emotions.Teachers will take the motivation factors while preparing lessons and use some strategies to motivate students according to the circumstances.However,this does not happen in every class.The strategies English teachers have used most including using every method to make students interested in English and English learning,making use different evaluating methods to promote students' English learning,encouraging students to learn in pairs or groups and helping students' set their own goals and make plans for English schoolwork.