ENGAGING UNMOTIVATED EFL LEARNERS IN CLASSROOM TALK

Haifa Alnofaie

doi:10.18769/ijasos.13086

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate a teacher’s efforts in engaging her unmotivated EFL learners in classroom talk. The paper identifies the teacher’s elicitation techniques during the third turn of triadic exchanges for extending turn-taking. It also identifies the types of learner initiatives that created learning opportunities. The teacher and author of this paper introduced eight Saudi EFL learners (aged 18) to a short mystery story, before requiring them to take turns in classroom talk. 40 minutes of classroom interaction were recorded and analysed qualitatively. Informed by the principles of Conversation Analysis (CA) methodology, the paper shows that the teacher’s role moved beyond giving negative or positive feedback. Her role involved extending learners’ responses by inviting disagreement, suggesting alternatives, paraphrasing and shaping learners’ responses, linking learners’ contributions and increasing wait-time. These efforts engaged learners in different types of turn taking, including presenting new ideas, building on classmates’ ideas, disagreeing with others and extending one’s turn. It was found that learners not only engaged in turn taking during interaction but also learned how to use the new language. These findings add to the small body of available literature on elicitation techniques that involve learners in extended turns when creating space for learning. It is hoped that the findings discussed in this paper will inform EFL teaching practices. More investigation is needed to shed light on how to engage unmotivated EFL learners in classroom interaction using appropriate teaching methods. Keywords : unmotivated learners, EFL, elicitation techniques, turn taking, learner initiatives, learning opportunities

Highlights

EFL language teachers often are faced with the challenge of increasing the enthusiasm of unmotivated learners
Research in the Saudi context has shown high speaking anxiety rates among Saudi learners of English, which might affect their motivation levels (Alrabai, 2014; AlSaraj, 2014). This situation raises the question of how to encourage unmotivated learners to take turns in classroom talk when they may feel anxious about speaking the new language
This paper demonstrates how one EFL teacher encouraged unmotivated learners to take turns in classroom talk

Summary

INTRODUCTION

EFL language teachers often are faced with the challenge of increasing the enthusiasm of unmotivated learners. Research on EFL motivation in the classroom has attributed learners' low motivation to various factors, such as the emphasis on writing skills at the expense of other language skills, the use of uninteresting materials, the absence of a link between language courses and future careers, the lack of rapport between teachers and learners and a dearth of technology use in the classroom (Madrid, 2002; Bacha and Bahous, 2011; Papi and Abdollahzadeh, 2012). The issue of teacher motivational strategies has not been researched widely (Papi and Abdollahzadeh, 2012). The few existing studies are limited to investigating teachers’ and learners’ perceptions of motivational strategies, relying on quantitative measures (Papi and Abdollahzadeh, 2012). A very limited number of studies has investigated how teachers apply motivational strategies in real classroom environments, using observations and self-evaluations http://ijasos.ocerintjournals.org 360. By analysing classroom discourse qualitatively, this paper examines a teacher’s motivational practice of inviting unmotivated learners to take turns in classroom talk

MOTIVATING LEARNERS TO SPEAK THE NEW LANGUAGE

A SNAPSHOT FROM AN EFL CLASSROOM

23 H: She love strange man

70 T: Who agrees with her?

CONCLUSION