© 2007 ASLI, inc .. © 2007 ASLI, inc . What am I going to talk about? “What is motivation?”...


What am I going to talk about?

“What is motivation?” – motivation inside and out“Motivation is so yesterday” – enter ‘shovelware’“A tour of motivation” – a tour of theory and software“Did it work?” – results of the studyConclusion – summary and Q & A


Part I: “What is motivation?”

motivation inside and out


“The great disclaimer”

One possible definition of motivation: “a general cover term – a dustbin – to include a number of possibly distinct concepts, each of which may have different origins and different effects and require different classroom treatment” (McDonough, 1981).


Two types of motivation

Motivation is what makes you want to do something to begin with.

Intrinsic motivation: “energy called forth by the circumstances that connect with what is culturally significant to the individual”.

Internal drivers: curiosity, personal goals, fun, etc.

Extrinsic motivation: “performing a behavior to attain a specific reward”.

External drivers: prizes, grades, money, etc. (Saadé, He, & Kira, 2005)


Motivation and a whole different animal

There are many theories on and gurus of motivation in the fields of education/ESL (and other fields too!).But software is a “whole different animal”. There is no physical environment. NO:

TeachersStudentsGrades and/or parents (in most cases)

So the real question is: “How do we motivate people aside from adjusting these factors?”


Part II: “Motivation is so yesterday”

enter shovelware


Motivation, that is so yesterday.


Enter “Shovelware”

“Virtually all of the instructional efforts on the Web are simply the delivery of shovelware….What pedagogical value is added if we merely distribute virtually the same course resources through a computer rather than, say, on paper? That sort of unimaginative computerization is….warmed over, insipid, pedagogically pointless”. (Fraser, 1999)


So what do we have?


Part III: Tour of Motivation

a tour of theory and software


So where to gain information? Through the lenses of varied

disciplines!

We looked to other fields to get ideas how to foster intrinsic motivation - encourage a sense of fun, humour, and curiosity.Psychology and theories of motivationUsability Studies (Computing)Humor as studied by philosophy and organizational behaviour/psychology


Stop One: Psychology and theories of motivation

As aforementioned, we can assume that most learners begin using software with at least some degree of intrinsic motivation. So how can feed intrinsic motivation?

Catch their attention. We have to get their attention before we can hold it.

Graphics, descriptions, advertising.Hold their attention. We have to give the information we present meaning via personal application.

Active, not passive information distribution. Games, engaging exercises, interaction (Durik & Harackiewicz, 2007)


Stop Two: Usability and Computing Studies

The first concept from usability is flow: A state in which “people’s minds are captured; they are immersed in activity; they feel of sense of exhilaration and enjoyment…and accomplishment”.

Can be experienced regardless of cultural background.Activities that proceed flow need to be relevant. Structure important, but so is control.Challenging (i.e. there must be a balance between anxiety and boredom – not too hard, not too easy).

Software is an ideal medium to promote flow…students can choose their activities and customize them in a structured environment. Good software is also adaptive to students abilities (Sedig, 2007).


Stop Two: Usability and Computing Studies cont’d

The second concept is lost in hyperspace. Studies have shown that many learners have a hard time organizing their learning activities using traditional webpages. They click and skip through pages without regard for their semantic or logical relations (Narciss, et al., 2007).

Which is not surprising, everyone “surfs the web” which is by definition, meandering.

promotes flow and prevents “lost in hyperspace”


The Final Stop: Humour

Verbal humor, because of its plays-on-words and culturally-loaded content, can sometimes be inaccessible to learners (without the teacher giving background/explaining)

Clever pictures and certain types of comic strips can sometimes reach learners better than verbal humour can (Berwald, 1992).


The Final Stop: Humor cont’d

The use of satire and sarcasm can sometimes be problematic as ESL speakers sometimes are unsure whether a remark/quip is to be taken with humour or not (Banitz, 2005).



When we try to see how humour could work in a cross-cultural context, we have to realize we are dealing with cultural norms. Everyone has ideas of what should happen in the specific situation. Humour plays off those assumptions (Cooper et al., 2007).

catch

Home? Or to the shoe store?



It has been well documented in communicative learning theory (CLT) that not all students feel that learning should be fun and interactive. Many think learning only happens via drills and the like (Defeng, 1998).

People have been learning languages such the beginning of time; many cultures have had many different ideas about how best to get the job done – some of these ideas worked quite well (Savignon, 2001). We need to be sensitive to that, and not push any one way so much that it excludes other learning styles. After all, next year, something else new and improved is sure to come out.In the end, we decided pictures and subtle jokes were the way to go, because if you don’t like them, they are not an integral part of the program. We tried to make sure that our attempts at humour would be non-offensive (if not funny). But of course, no humour or fun is devoid of culture.

Waiting for Dentist


Part IV: “Did it work?”

Results of the study


A tale of two research projects

This spring we started a study using two versions of the software: a “fun” one and a “dull” one. We wanted to find out which people would like better.

That FLOPPED. Miserably.

We felt, that in the end, we were getting only the “best” answers on our surveys.

Sample excerpts from the survey instructions

“We are trying to find out what people would like”.“We expect to receive negative feedback some of the time”.“We will not be surprised or offended if you actually dislike the software”.“Please don’t just circle the ‘best’ answer”.“Tell us what you really think”.Etc., etc., etc.

Sample excerpts from the survey responses

Q: “How would you rate _____?”ExcellentExcellentExcellentExcellentExcellent


Research Question

We still needed to find out:“Does our attempt at making software fun (via games, graphics, and quizzes) motivate people?” As evidenced by:

Do they like using it?Do they find it interesting/intriguing?Do they think it is fun?


Distress to delight: The improved research design

After getting nowhere with the previous design – we decided to do something novel: talk to people.

FriendsWorkmatesFamily AcquaintancesIf you knew anyone involved in AccentSchool, you were a likely “victim”.


Distress to delight: The improved research design

cont’dWe decided that the following methods of communication were OK:

EmailIn-person interviewsNotes given to us by the user about the user’s experienceObservations of others who watched the user use AccentSchool (spouses, partners, etc. with the subject’s permission)


Basis for the design

CALL (computer assisted language learning) is a notoriously difficult beast to research.Johnson (1992) outlines a multi-faceted qualitative approach in her book, Approaches to Research in Second Language Learning.

She was researching the effectiveness of SLA software in NY schools.


Basis for the design cont’d

Here’s quote from the article “SLA Property: No trespassing” (Firth and Wagner, 1998):

“SLA [Second Language Acquisition] has collected data mainly in lab-like situations. There is reason to believe that this quasi-experimental situation triggers a certain set of interactional activities which…have been shown to occur systematically in a large number or studies…our conclusion is that experimental elicited data may provoke the nonnative speaker into acting as an interactional guinea pig….We are astonished that SLA research has, in general, resisted data types from a variety of mundane everyday, or professional social contexts”.


Results of the newly-minted qualitative research

People liked the graphics.Out of the 10 people we talked to, everyone liked the graphics.



People were not put off if they didn’t get the joke.

Most people didn’t understand certain attempts at humour, but they just overlooked these parts.



People liked the quizzes and games.The quiz format seemed to keep people engaged. People wanted to see “what’s next”.

However, 2 out of 10 people felt that we should just tell them straight-away.


Fun

People were motivated by the fact that is was fun.

“I want a copy”.“She really enjoyed the cats”.“I liked the cats”.


Limitations

Content and student attitudes also played a role in how students felt about the software (our linguist presented this part of our study in a separate presentation).Our sample was not random – we talked to a lot friends (but tried make the results more meaningful by asking open-ended questions and talking to observers)This study is not meant to be taken quantitatively or as a statistical measure. It is a glimpse into the opinions of some users.However, it hints that we may be on to something – that students may be motivated by a lighter approach.


Future Research Angles

How much does fun influence what a learner retains when using learnware?How much does fun influence how much a time a learner spends doing a voluntary e-learning activity?What types of fun are most effective at encouraging students to spend time using learnware?

Games, graphics development, etc is very resource intensive due to the fact that it is often separated from content development.Some students may subconsciously be engaged by “nice” looking learnware, but they may not feel games are real learning activities.


Future Research Designs cont’d

Click patterns: Electronic media gives us the ability to objectively measure how users react by statistically analyzing their click patterns (i.e., what did they click on, how long did they look at a page, when did they exit a site, etc).We would like to do a controlled, comparative study with two software versions (one “fun” and one “dull”) of and quantitatively compare the click patterns and the time students spend looking at various pages.

Surveys did not prove useful for this type of study.


Part IV: Conclusion

summary and Q & A


Summary

Qualitatively speaking, People seemed to be motivated by our attempts at humour.More research, particularly quantitative, controlled research, is needed.


Any questions or comments?

Contact us: Visit our site: www.accentschool.comEmail us: [email protected]

http://www.accentschool.com/

mailto:[email protected]

© 2007 ASLI, inc .. © 2007 ASLI, inc . What am I going to talk about? “What is motivation?”...

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