Lakhasly

dariannavo, [01.06.2023 17:30]
This study initially attempts to discuss motivation and demotivation in the field of second language acquisition and additionally to explore the main factors causing demotivation in learning English among university students of vocational school. Demotivation, an understudied area in SLA is a relatively new issue for researchers. In this respect, this study attempts to explore the main factors causing demotivation in learning English among vocational school students. In the search of the reasons of demotivation, a 35-item questionnaire, which was developed by Sakai and Kikuchi (2009a), was filled by 60 university students. Descriptive statistics were employed in order to identify the most and the least demotivating factors grouped into 6 main categories such as (a) Class Characteristics (b) Class Environment (c) Experiences of Failure (d) Lack of Intrinsic Motivation (e) Class Materials and (f) Teacher. Findings from this study indicated that Teacher Competence was not a very strong cause of demotivation compared to Class Characteristics and Class Environment. This study also showed that learners did not perceive Inadequate Class Materials as demotivating. Finally this paper discusses participants’ own factors for demotivation with an open-ended question in the questionnaire provided to the participants. Data analysis shows several important findings. Firstly, the first research question deals with the most and least demotivating factors in learning English among participants. In general, the most frequently mentioned demotivating factor by all participants at Malkara Vocational School was Class Characteristics (M=2.65) which can be explained by students’ unwillingness for grammar, exam and translation-oriented lessons. Thus, it can be implied that learners’ motivation can be increased via more communicative activities including real life conversations, language games, etc. In contrast, the least demotivating factor was teacher (M= 1.43) on the contrary to what many studies suggested (Zhang, 2007; Gorham &Christophel,1992; Kim, 2011). That reveals the teacher’s focus on learners motivation and her use of motivational strategies in her classrooms for increasing learners’ motivation. As shown in Table (5), the second issue discussed was the relationship between gender and the demotivating factors. Analysis results showed that both female and male participants regard class characteristics mostly as demotivating while they perceive teacher factor as a non-demotivator. In this respect, there were no significant differences between female and male participants in terms of their demotivating factors on the contrary to what previous Tsuchiya (2004) reported. Similarly, the findings did not reveal statistically significant differences in terms of class. Data analysis did not reveal significant differences for the third research question which dealt with the relationship between academic specialisation and demotivation factors. As shown in Table (7), results of one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) did not reveal any significant differences among three departments. The mean scores for teacher factor as a demotivator lie between M = 1.36 (Marketing ) and M = 1.49 (Tourism). In general, some of the results revealed significant points on demotivation factors for participants in learning English. The most salient finding is that among six groups of demotivation factors, the most mentioned one by all participants was class characteristics which includes such reasons as learners’ being unsatisfied with the course contents and pace, focus on grammatical structures, focus on university entrance exams and the memorization of the language; while the least one is teacher factor.

dariannavo, [01.06.2023 17:30]
It is a fortunate result for the researcher which implies that teacher’s attitude, teaching competence, language proficiency, personality, and teaching style do not demotivate the learners. In this regard, it might be the case that students tend to prefer lessons not to focus on grammar or exams but to focus on interaction and communication instead. Thus, social activities, role plays are to be placed in the curriculum design more than ever to encourage the students to perform more communicative goals. The results of the present study reveal no specific differences among students majoring at different departments and classes. That shows academic specialisation and class of the participants do not have an effect on their demotivating factors. All in all, in the current study, three variables were taken into consideration, namely gender, class and academic specialisation. While the differences in demotivation may be explained by these three variables to some extent, some other variables should be paid attention for their role in demotivation such as motivation level, beliefs, attitudes, social background, personality, proficiency of learners etc.