ARCS Motivation Model In College English Classroom

Motivation, which is one of the main influential factors of foreign language achievement, has drawn more and more attention of English teachers and researchers. It is a decisive factor that influences the success of language learning. The teacher plays a very important role in arousing the students'motivation, so they need to implement a scientific and systematic method to arouse the motivation in the process of teaching English.ARCS (Attention, Relevance, Confidence and Satisfaction) Model of Motivation is a systematic approach for creating instructions that would stimulate the motivation to learn. Based on John Keller's ARCS Model of Motivation, this thesis investigates college students'motivation of learning English. The major purpose of this study is to motivate the non-English major students in college English learning by implementing the ARCS Model design into the classroom instruction.Thirty-six sophomores and thirty-two freshmen from Shenyang Polytechnic College participated in the project research. Questionnaire, student self-reflection, interview and observation were employed to obtain both quantitative and qualitative data. Then a motivational treatment incorporating Keller's Motivational Design was also developed. The results of the study shows that the students'motivation in English learning has been to some extend stimulated. The four aspects of ARCS Model of Motivation exert different impacts on students'motivation level, and the strategies based on these categories are all essential elements in the process of learning English in university. The findings also indicate that:(1) The students'attention in the English learning has been improved through using tactics such as stating objectives of each lesson, playing video segments and students performing role-plays in English.(2) The students'relevance in learning English has been developed through tactics of combining the classroom instruction with the students'past experiences and existing knowledge; enlightening their visions toward the future and emphasizing that English is important and useful for their study and career.(3) The students'confidence in learning English has been stimulated by helping students build a positive expectation for success and emphasizing the students'efforts or abilities in activities.(4) The students'satisfaction in the English course has been enhanced through tactics such as the instructional-design, which help students to establish active expectancy for success in learning English and the Teacher-Student email communication, which offers the students positive comments from the teacher.In the end, some limitations toward the ARCS Model of Motivation were listed and based on the findings of this study, the thesis gives some recommendations for the further research in college English teaching.