A Study Of English Learning Motivation Of Senior High School Underachievers Based On TARGET Model

As one of the most important affective factors in underachievers' foreign language learning, motivation has a vital influence on the processes and results of underachievers' English learning by directly exerting influences on their enthusiasm, consciousness and persistence. The New English Curriculum Standard also emphasizes the stimulation of underachievers' learning motivation to improve their interest in English and academic performance.Among studies on learning motivation, Ames put forward a method called TARGET model to stimulate students' learning motivation in 1990. It refers to the six classroom structures including task design, authority distribution, recognition practices, grouping arrangements, evaluation practices and time allocation. By adopting TARGET model, teachers can create a kind of active classroom atmosphere conducive for students to build up their mastery goal orientation, which puts more emphasis on the mastery of new skills and knowledge as well as the full development of students' abilities and is helpful in stimulating students' learning motivation. The author reviews the studies on stimulation strategies of learning motivation in recent years, and she finds few of them are related to stimulation of underachievers' learning motivation especially stimulation of senior high school underachievers' learning motivation based on TARGET model. To test the effectiveness of TARGET model in stimulating senior high school underachievers' English learning motivation, the author puts forward three questions.Question 1: What are the problems of underachievers' English learning motivation?Question 2: What are the reasons for these problems of underachievers' English learning motivation?Question 3: Can TARGET model effectively strengthen underachievers' English learning motivation and improve their academic performance?In order to answer the three questions, the author chooses two classes with the lowest senior high school entrance exam scores of grade one in Zhoukou No. 3 Senior High School as experiment subjects. One is the experimental class(EC), and the other is the control class(CC). To find the problems and reasons of underachievers' lower learning motivation, all of them are given an English test as presented in Appendix A, and they are also asked to fill out the English learning motivation questionnaire as presented in Appendix B before the experiment. Then, TARGET model teaching is applied in the EC, and traditional teaching is applied in the CC. During the four months' experiment on TARGET model, heterogeneous grouping is used to promote mutual cooperation and to weaken competition among group members so as to encourage those underachievers to participate in task design, time arrangement, achievement evaluation, etc. In this kind of class, students become the real master of their study, and they can feel more happiness from autonomous learning to offset the negative feelings from their constant failures as underachievers. This is helpful in stimulating and maintaining their learning motivation. After four months' experiment, students in the EC and CC are asked to fill in the English learning motivation questionnaire again, and the author gives them another English test as presented in Appendix C and also has an interview with 20 underachievers as presented in Appendix D.After the experiment, the author collects all the data of the pre-questionnaire, pre-test, post-questionnaire and post-test, and she analyzes the data processed by SPSS 22.0 software. She also sorts out students' attitudes toward the application of TARGET model of the interview. The analyses show that TARGET model can effectively stimulate underachievers' English learning motivation especially their intrinsic motivation in the EC. They no longer attribute their failures to their IQ and teachers, but they tend to attribute their failures to their method, attitude and effort. More and more of them begin to build up their mastery goal orientation. Besides, the average academic performance of the underachievers also gets great improvement in the EC. The research results have some enlightening effects on underachievers' English teaching in senior high schools, and English teachers can flexibly apply TARGET model in English teaching to strengthen the underachievers' learning motivation.