If you’re looking for some ideas on how to motivate ESL students, then you’re in the right place. I’m going to give my top tips to help motivate English learners in a fun way.
Here’s how to increase motivation in an ESL or EFL classroom. How do you motivate learners in a TEFL classroom? Leave a comment and let me know!
Meet Students’ Needs to Motivate Them
The first idea is to meet students’ needs. So if students, for example, have to pass a TOEIC or a TOEFL or an IELTS exam at some point in the next year, but your class is just very heavily focused on movie English, it’s not related to the students’ needs and motivation will be low. I generally ask students: Why are you in this class? And, Why are you studying English? Based on what they say, I try to tailor my lessons to their specific needs.
User Positive Reinforcement
The second way to increase some motivation is to practice positive reinforcement instead of negative reinforcement. I like to focus on the positive examples of using English in kind of an effective way. And the positive, kind of good things in terms of behaviour as opposed to the bad examples. So focus on the positive in your class and you’ll have more positive in the future.
Give Praise
The third way to increase motivation is to give praise. Everyone likes to be praised. Everyone likes to be told that they’re doing a good job. Praise your students often, even for small things. For some students, even doing a very small thing in English can actually be quite a big accomplishment.
External Rewards for Motivation
The fourth thing is to give some external rewards. I don’t always like to have reward systems or attach things limke participation points because it’s kind of fuzzy. Why are students studying English? Is it to get some little sticker? Or, to get some grade or a pizza party?
However, it can actually be quite an effective way to conduct classes, especially with children. So for example, I have classes compete against each other, or little groups in the class and maybe the winner would get a pizza party at the end of the semester or even monthly rewards in class. Maybe a chocolate bar, or something like that. A few external rewards can be a fun way to kind of create an element of competition and they can actually just help you increase the kind of behavior and language use that you want in the class.
Be a Role Model to Motivate Students
The next one is to be a role model. So hopefully, if you’re an English teacher, you’ve also had the experience of learning another language in a classroom setting so you know how difficult it can be. And if your students know that you’re actively studying another language while they’re actively studying English, it can kind of be encouraging for them and help increase their motivation.
ESL/EFL student motivation
Give Feedback to Motivate English Learners
The next thing is to give students feedback. I often ask my students what they kind of expect from the teacher at the beginning of the class, or the beginning of the semester and they’ll often say I want feedback from the teacher. This is an expectation that students have, particularly of native English-speaking teachers so give feedback. However, don’t give feedback about every single thing. It can be quite demoralizing. Instead, I focus my feedback on things that I’m talking about in that class.
For example, if I’m teaching the simple past, I’ll give feedback about all mistakes related to the simple past. And also things that we’ve covered through in the previous classes in the semester. Give feedback and give it often, but of course, give it in a very kind way. The next way to increase motivation is to prepare interesting lessons. So by interesting, I mean relevant topics that are relevant to the students where you’re teaching and then also to their age level. I mean, high school students probably are not that interested in a lesson on buying a house. And adults are probably not that interested in a lesson on say maybe video games that a 13-year-old boy would play. You know what I mean.
Just choose interesting topics and meet students where they’re at. This will go a long way toward being a teacher that motivates students to learn English.
Use Partners and Small Groups
The next way to increase motivation in an English class is to use partners or small groups more often than a large class. I really love to divide my class into smaller units because this increases students talking time. If students are talking a lot, they’ll feel like the class was valuable and they’re actually getting something out of it. If I’m just standing at the front, giving a lecture to 20 or 30 students, I think I would probably wonder why am I in this class? This seems like a waste of my time. Am I actually getting anything out of it? As opposed to, I’m with a partner and I’m talking I don’t know, 40 to 45% of the class time.
How to motivate English learners.
Add an Element of Competition to Motivate Students
To increase motivation, you can also add an element of competition to the class. I will generally kind of do a warm-up activity and then I’ll introduce some grammar or vocabulary. I do a bit of controlled practice, and a bit of freer practice, and then I love to finish off kind of with a competitive game of some kind. Maybe a board game that involves the language.
I always would bring a bag of prizes to my class. I’d have pens, erasers, pencils, Post-it notes and a whole bunch of candies and chocolate bars. Whoever wins, if I put students into groups of say four to play a little board game, the winner of each of those little groups of four would get to choose one prize. A little bit of competition in kind of a fun and yeah, quite a simple way to increase English learner motivation.
Mix Up Groups for Increased Student Motivation
All right, the last thing you can do to increase motivation is to mix up groups in your class. People tend to sit in the same spot in a class, but what if you’re the student who’s quite a good student, but you end up with maybe the worst student in the class who doesn’t speak English? I mean, you’re probably not going to learn that much and you might feel pretty demoralized.
What if you’re a weaker student but you end up with the best student in the class? That person is probably frustrated at you, annoyed because they can’t talk to you in English. I like to do kind of different groups in my classes, almost every class. Students will have to talk to a different person. It’s not great if students sit with their best friend every class. If they’re with their best friends, they might just be chatting in their first language. But if you mix up groups, then students are more motivated to speak English and kind of to impress the people that they’re with.
More Tips to Motivate English Learners
- Amazon Kindle Edition
- Bolen, Jackie (Author)
- English (Publication Language)
- 301 Pages - 12/21/2022 (Publication Date)
If you really want to level up your English classes, then you’ll definitely want to check out this book: ESL/EFL Teaching Practice and Methodology. There are a ton of tips and tricks to motivate students, plan lessons, and more.
ESL Student Motivation: Join the Conversation
Okay, so those are all my tips for increasing motivation in the ESL classroom. Do you have any tips or tricks for increasing ESL/EFL student motivation? Leave a comment and let me know! I’d love to hear from you.
Last update on 2022-07-17 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API
