j ; Increasing and directing student motivation is one of a teacher's responsibilities, though as Dick Allwright argued, we cannot be responsible for all of our students’ motivation. In the end itis up to them (Allwright 1977). However, there are three areas where our behaviour can directly influence our students’ continuing participation: * Goals and goal setting: we have seid that motivation is closely bound up with ‘a person’s desire to achieve a goal. A distinction needs to be made here between long- and short-term goals. Long-term goals may include the mastery of English, the passing of an ‘exam (at the end of the year), the possibility of a better job in the fature, etc. Short-term goals, on the other hand, might be the earning of a small amount ‘of new language, the successful writing of an essay the ability to partake in a discussion or the passing of the progress test at the end of the week. “Teachers need to recognise that long-term goals ae vitally important but that they can often seem too far away. When English seems to be more difficult than the student had anticipated, the long-term goals can begin to behave like airages in the desert, appearing and disappearing at random. Short-term goals, on the other hand, are by their nature much closer to the student’ day-to-day reality. I is much easier to focus on the end of the week than the end of the year. Ifthe teacher can help students in the achievement of short-term goals, this will have a significant effect on their motivation. After all, ‘nothing succeeds like success! ‘© Learning environment: although we may not be able to choose our actual classrooms, we can still doa lot about their physical appearance and the emotional atmosphere of our lessons. Both of these can have a powerful effect on the initial and continuing motivation of students. When students walk into an attractive classroom at the beginning of a course, it may help to get their ‘motivation for the process going. When they come to an unattractive place ‘motivation may not be initiated in this way. ‘We can decorate even the most unattractive classrooms with all kinds of visual material to make them more agreeable as learning environments. Even where this is not possible because the classroom is not ‘ours, we can still change the atmosphere through such things as the use of music; even the immavability of the furniture (if this is a problem) can be ameliorated by having students get up and walk around the room when this is appropriate, Al ofthis is less important, however, than the emotional atmosphere that teachers are able to create and sustain. That is why they have to be careful about how they respond to students, especially in the giving of feedback and correction (see Chapter 7). There is a need for a supportive, cooperative envionment to suit the various learner types we discussed in Section » of this chapter. Above all, the teacher's rapport with the students is critical to creating. the tight conditions for motivated learning. © Interesting classes: if students are to continue to be intrinsically motivated they clearly need to be interested both in the subject they are studying and ina nee the activities and topics they are presented with. We need to provide them with a variety of subjects and exercises to keep them engaged (see Chapter 22). The choice of material to take into class will be crucial too, but even more important than this will be the ways in which itis used in the lesson. ‘Our attempts to initiate and sustain our students’ motivation are absolutely critical to their learning success (as we shall see with the need for ‘engagement’ in Chapter 6, 43) for as Alan Rogers writes, ‘motivation ... is as much a matter of concern for the teacher as itis for the learner; it depends as much on the attitudes of the teacher as on the attitudes of the students’ (Rogers 1996: 66). Chapter notes and further reading # Young children (On teaching children at and before primary level, see $ Reilly and V Ward (1997), 'W Scott and L Ytreborg (1990), J Brewster et al. (1993), and $ Halliwell (1992). © Adolescents On the young person's search for identity see the work of E Brikson (1963) reported in M Williams and R Burden (1997). ‘The idea that adolescents present an ideal teaching and learning age is put forward in P Ur (1996: 286) and R Ellis (1994: 484-494). © Adult learners ‘On adult learners, see especially J Rogers (1977), A Rogers (1996), and H McKoy and A'Tom (2000). © Aptitude ‘The best discussion on aptitude I know is in P Skehan (1998: Chapters 8 and 9). See also H D Brown (2000: 98-99). ‘The two most widely quoted aptitude test instruments from the 1950s and 1960s ‘were the Modern Language Aptitude ‘Test (MLAT) designed by J Carroll and §Sapon (Carroll and Sapon 1958) and the Pimsleur Language Aptitude Battery (P Pimsleur 1966). * Psychology for language teachers ‘The two most approachable books I have come across on the psychology of learning are P Skehan (1998) and M Williams and R Burden (1997). © Learning styles For more on learning style, see P Skehan (1998: Chapter 10), A Rogers (1996: 10-112), and H D Brown (2000: Chapter 6).