Developing Learning Environments: Creativity, Motivation and Collaboration in Higher Education

6. Developing learner motivation through curriculum innovation

6 Developing฀learner฀motivation฀through฀ curriculum฀innovation฀ Richard Pemherton, Sarah Carmichael and Martha Lam INTRODUCTION฀ There hav e bee n recen t call s fro m th e governmen t (e.g. , Educatio n Commission 2000 ) fo r th e developmen t o f lifelong learnin g skill s i n university students. At the same time, however, there have been stron g calls from sectors of the business community, along with the government, for students to demonstrate that they have reached 'acceptable' levels of English on leaving university. Many university language courses in Hong Kong, whil e payin g li p servic e t o th e nee d t o promot e learne r responsibility, give learners little chance to control their own learning , and use the limited course time available to prescribe set communicatio n tasks in an attempt to improve performance levels. This chapter report s on a course for first-year engineerin g students at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) that took a different approach . Most o f th e students o n th e cours e describe d obtaine d a D or E grade in the Use of English examination. The y are therefore no t hig h 106฀Richard ฀Pemberton,฀Sarah฀Carmichael฀and฀Martha฀Lam฀ achievers i n English . Lik e th e majorit y o f Hon g Kon g student s (Littlewood an d Li u 1996 ; Lin and Detaraman i 1998 ; Richards 1998) , most o f ou r engineerin g student s thin k tha t Englis h i s important . However, as Littlewood and Liu (1996, 80) noted in their study of over 2,000 first-yea r student s a t four universitie s in Hong Kong, there is 'a gap betwee n students ' positiv e attitude s toward s Englis h an d thei r motivation to take concrete steps to improve their English' . Many students' motivation to learn has been negatively affected b y their previous experienc e of learning English in an educational syste m that i s highly selectiv e and examination-drive n (e.g. , Tang and Bigg s 1996). From th e beginning o f Form 5 , most student s are fed a diet of Practice Papers (Cheng 1998), teachers are judged on their ability to get students throug h exams , and 'th e test becomes the curriculum' (Bigg s 1998, 319). As a result, comments like the following are typical of ou r first-year engineerin g students : In฀the฀past,฀I฀learnt฀English฀for฀exam,฀which฀made฀me฀bored฀and฀not฀ successful.฀ The question facin g those of us responsible for writing the English course for first-year engineering students was therefore how to overcome their sense of failure in English and increase their motivation to learn. Over th e pas t thre e decades , a grea t dea l o f researc h ha s bee n conducted o n studen t motivatio n i n language learning . Gardner an d Lambert's seminal stud y o n motivation (1972 ) differentiate d betwee n integrative motivation , i n whic h learner s ar e motivate d b y persona l interest i n th e peopl e and th e cultur e which th e language represents , and instrumental motivation , i n whic h learner s are motivated b y th e practical advantage s o f learnin g th e language , suc h a s passin g a n important publi c examination . Gardne r an d Lamber t suggeste d tha t integrative motivation is more conducive to successful language learning. Another distinctio n i n th e motivatio n literatur e i s tha t betwee n intrinsic and extrinsi c motivation. Intrinsic motivatio n involves doin g something for its own sake and has been characterized as 'the subjectiv e Developing฀learner฀motivation฀through฀curriculum฀innovation฀ feeling of enjoyment tha t is responsible for continuation of the activity' (Csikszentmihalyi 1978 , 213) . Thi s i s contraste d wit h extrinsic motivation, in which the learner is motivated by external factors, suc h as the need to learn a language to find a good job. Extrinsic motivation i s seen as the source of a surface approach t o learning (Biggs 1992), in which the learner puts minimal effort int o th e learning tas k t o fulfi l...