The document discusses motivating students in English language classes. It describes a teenager boy who seemed less interested in the class topics of fashion and clothes. The teacher focused more attention on the boy by asking him questions about men's clothing and activities he enjoys. As a result, the boy participated more in class and seemed to feel more included in the group. The document advocates finding ways to engage less motivated students by connecting lesson topics to their interests.

1. Purpose, Production and Personalization
Ron Martinez

2. Very interesting! (from Letícia)
I observed a teenager boy who seems to be a little lost. The only other
teenager in the class is a girl and the others are women adults. The book
requires a lot of thinking and speaking and he doesn't seem to be the kind
of person who enjoys expressing himself or maybe he doesn’t really know
how to do it - even in Portuguese. The topic of this unit is about fashion,
shopping and clothes, so you can imagine how excited he is. Last class I
decided to focus on him more than the others, to let him know that I was
there for him too. It wasn't easy, but he participated more than usual. I
prepared some activities to talk about clothes, patterns and materials
including many pictures of men's outfits. And every time there was a man
on the picture I asked him to answer that. I guess he felt less awkward. I
don't think he feels comfortable describing women's clothes. I also used
conversation questions which focused on shopping, not only shopping for
clothes, and then I asked him things about technology, his favorite mall,
what kinds of things he likes buying,etc. For the first time he seemed to be
part of the group. And the other students were interacting with him too.

3. Principle 8: The opportunity to interact
in the L2 is central to developing L2
proficiency

4. ‘“Knowing words is the key to understanding
and being understood. The bulk of learning a
new language consists of learning new words.
[…] Grammatical knowledge does not make
for great proficiency in a language.”
(Vermeer, 1992, p. 147)

5. Were you surprised at all by anything that your
students said when you asked them 'what did you
learn today'?
• “Nope.” – Camila
• “Yes, in the sense that they mentioned more
things than I had anticipated.” – Ricardo
• “Yes. One student said: ‘we studied there is/
there are, countable and uncountable’ instead
of ‘ingredients for a recipe’ as I expected to
be the focus.” – Zelir Maria

6. Lexical Acquisition
• Best if it arises from context
• ‘Context’ can mean situation, text, need to
express something – but in all cases ideally
comes from the learner (i.e. ‘noticing’)
• Purpose, production, personalization

7. What did you notice about the student who seems
less motivated/interested in your class? What could
be affecting that motivation/interest?
“The student I observed seems to have no
interesting in learning English. He actually
looked puzzled when I asked what they had
learned. He's quite young and I don't think he
has any motivation to use the language
outside the classroom, therefore he sees no
purpose for being there.”
- Camila

8. “He always says he doesn't have time. He goes
to college every morning, internship in the
afternoon and English twice a week.”
- Ezequiel

9. “This student … seems to be uninterested in
the classes. I believe this happens because he
is really good and he participates a lot, but the
other students in this class are not as good as
him and take longer to do the activities.
Moreover, they don't speak as much as he
does.”
- Luiz

10. What did you notice about the student who seems
especially motivated/interested in your class? What
could be affecting that motivation/interest?
• “He was the one who gave the most examples of
words he learned that day. He always gets books
from the library, and this could also be affecting his
motivation, as he reads and understands it.” - Nicole
• “She is very focused and ask many questions all the
time what ends up motivating the others. She is
interest in travelling and movies and I try to keep her
motivation through activities that aim her interests
(when we are talking in how to ask for clothes in a
department store for instance).” - Rosane

11. What did you notice?
• What did you notice (or what have you
noticed) about students who seem especially
(um)motivated?

12. Key from last time:
• Principle 1 – Importance of Formulaic
Expressions
• Principle 2 – Pragmatic Meaning-Making
• Principle 3 – Focus on Form
• Principle 4 – Implicit and Explicit Knowledge

15. “ The task-based approach is good when the
focus of the lesson is not grammar, but
reading or discussion. Assessment is necessary
to check students' development. We can mix
overt and covert grammar presentations.”
- Luiz Mello

16. “ The task-based approach is good when the
focus of the lesson is not grammar, but
reading or discussion. Assessment is necessary
to check students' development. We can mix
overt and covert grammar presentations.”
- Luiz Mello

17. Principle 6 – Your answers

20. Principle 9 – Individual differences

21. Some thoughts from Inter
teachers:
• “Some students are there because they like English
while others , for example, are there because of the
parents.”
• “Some of them need to find the objective behind
learning.”
• “The teacher has to respect individualism (some
students like games, others do not.)”
• “Some students who work have less time to study.”
• “Level difference (some students have been passing
levels by ROUND UP tests so frequently they are not
really able to follow the group)”

22. Nice quote from Ricardo Ratiguieri
• 1) Adults in 7 pm groups: they are usually tired, come
straight from work and often have trouble focusing
and getting around to do their homework. Usually
learn at a slow pace.
• 2) Privileged kids from traditional private school:
learn at a faster pace, get bored and distracted
easily.
• 3) People with a public school/working class
background: they sometimes don't have their
learning skills fully developed, which may hamper
their language

23. On Principle 9:
“While it is probably true that teachers can do
little to influence students extrinsic
motivation, there is a lot they can do to
enhance their intrinsic motivation.” (Ellis,
2005, p. 221)

25. Spolsky (1988)

26. Do you agree?
Quote from an Inter teacher:
“Students seem to lack intrinsic motivation.
They seem to study English moved by extrinsic
motivation only ( to get a god job in the
future).”

27. What the heck is motivation?

28. Spolsky (1988)

29. Principle 6 - Ellis (2005, p. 218)

30. Principle 7

31. Stretch!

32. ‘Pedrinho’
1. What can you say about Pedrinho’s
motivation?
2. Is he being ‘stretched’?

51. ‘Pedrinho’
1. What can you say about Pedrinho’s
motivation?
2. Is he being ‘stretched’?

52. Principle 8: The opportunity to interact
in the L2 is central to developing L2
proficiency

53. Does communication in L2 lead to
learning?

54. ‘Creating Pressure in Task
Pedagogy’ (Bygate & Samuda,
2009)

55. Problem with ‘communicative
approach’
“(T)he communicative events that learners
engage in must, necessarily, be structured and
conducted so as to add to them a learning
dimension, an ingredient that will push
learning forward. Satisfactory communication
per se cannot suffice...” (p. 91)

56. “The fact is that in second language classroom
contexts ‘pressure’ needs to be brought to
bear on communication in numerous ways,
both overtly and covertly, if it is to lead to
learning.” (p. 92)

57. Why?

58. Why tasks ‘fail to fire’: 2 main
reasons
• Tasks will lose motivation if they are “seen as
a pretext” (p. 95)
• Lack of clear relationship between the activity
and the intended outccome

59. Can ‘pressure’ be built into tasks?
• Time
• Competition
• Stakes (e.g. grade)
• Responsibility (to partner, group, team)
• Challenge
• Public (‘exposure’)
• Other?

60. Principle 8: The opportunity to interact
in the L2 is central to developing L2
proficiency

65. So what have we learned so far?
• Learning does not always happen the way we
plan – human nature is far too complex for
that! (And so is language.)
• Learning happens when people are ‘attentive’
– with their interest and attention heightened,
and when paying attention (e.g. to certain
forms, or how they want to say something)

66. THANKS!
• Slides online
• Look out for some videos (online)!

68. Next week: Relevance of
transactional vs interactional