A Study Of Motivating Vocabulary Instruction

The issue of English learners' motivation has always been the concern of linguists and English instructors. There are different theories on motivation, but little research is found on relations between English vocabulary learning and English-learning motivation. Drawing from relevant motivation theories, the author carried out a research on motivating vocabulary instruction, aiming to analyze the relations between English-learning motivation of learners in higher vocational schools and their English vocabulary learning. The author particularly observed the process of changes in learners' discourse proficiency and their vocabulary-learning motivation regarding self-belonging, self-respect, the sense of freedom and pleasure. The purpose is to see if learners' intrinsic motivation is enhanced after their participating in the motivating vocabulary learning activities.The data of this study was got mainly from observation notes, oral interviews, questionnaire responses and the participants' products. By analyzing the collected data, the researcher acquire the following findings:1) The three-month motivating vocabulary instruction helps enhance the learners' vocabulary-learning intrinsic motivation considerably.2) For students in a higher vocational school, their increased English vocabulary-learning motivation has played an undeniable role in improving their overall learning motivation, the language output, and satisfying students' four needs for their healthy personality development.3) Other factors affect learners'vocabulary-learning motivation, including the participants' English proficiency, teachers' guidance, limits of time and energy, restrictive campus culture, parents' support or supervision.With the above findings, the author concludes that effective vocabulary teaching can enhance the vocabulary-learning motivation of learners in vocational schools. And the integration of the online sources into vocabulary teaching helps students learn vocabulary more effectively and improves their overall learning motivation. The author hopes the results of the research can offer certain implications for other instructors engaged in vocational college English teaching to solve their students' English learning motivational problems.