how to arouse students'interest in English learning

How to Arouse Students’Interest in English Learning

Abstract

Interest is the most active element in studying English and it is also the

effective stimulant to study. This aritical presents some opinions and methods

about how to arouse the students’ interest in English learning. I think it will be

helpful for the teachers and our students.

Key words: Interest, English learning,

Einstein once said: “Interest is the best teacher”.The students will not feel

that learning is a burden if they are interested in studying. They will put their

hearts into learning actively. Arousing the interest of the students is the key to

learn English well. Learning interest can promote the students to throw

themselves into English studying. It also can enrich the students’ knowledge,

open the students’ mind and make up for a weakness of intelligent development.

But how to arouse the learning interest? Learning interest can not produce

spontaneously. All kinds of social factors are influencing the studying of the

students. The teachers should arouse the students plan fully and purposefully to

make the students interested in learning and transform the needs from the

family, society and school into the internal ones.

definition and function of interest

Interest is the state of wanting to learn or know and it is also the power to

hold one’s concern or curiosity. Interest, as one of the nonintellectual factors,

is defined as people and organizations concerned in some particular activity in

Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English. According to the theory of

intrinsic motivation, it is an innate impulse to show one’s ability and

self-confidence. And in the view of the theory of ego efficiency, it is derived

from the feeling of satisfaction to achieve some showings, while in the theory

of expectation value; it refers to the fascination of the tasks to be completed to

the learner. We learn from all these definitions that interest plays an important

role in learning.

Confucius, the great educationalist of ancient China, once pointed out:

“the man who knows it is not as good as the man who likes it; the man who

likes it is not as good as the man who takes delight in it”. If your learning

reaches the stage that you will know it because you take interest in it, you have

entered the most enjoyable stage of learning. Where the heart is willing it will

find a thousand ways but where it is unwilling it will find a thousand excuses.

The main task of a teacher is in every possible way leading the students into

the most enjoyable stage of “they will know it because they delight in it”.

There is no exception to English learning. Interest is also a spirit in studying

English. So the teacher should use all kinds of ways to arouse the

students’ interest in studying English..

II. The way to arouse the students’ interest in studying English

1. Set good relationship between teachers and students

The teacher should realize that he is not only a good teacher but also

a helpful friend to the students. Teachers must pay a great attention to

harmonizing the relations between them and their students so as to arouse the

students’ interest in studying English. Good relationship between them will

provide happy and relaxed situation. Many psychology tests have proved that

the students will generally get good results in their study when they are happy

and relaxed, and they will get bad results when they feel nervous and depressed.

A lot of practice have also shown that the students are quick in thinking and

full of enthusiasm for studying when they are in high spirits. So the teacher

should arouse the students’ interest in studying English. The teacher who

cherishes his students will surely win their love and respect. Since the

students love and esteem their teacher, they will love the course he teaches.

This is just like an old saying: “Love me, love my dog”.

2 .Helping students to build up confidence

It is true that every student is eager to make progress in his studies.

Once the progress has been made, he will have the sense of achievements. As a

result, he is full of interest, and makes still further progress. At any time when a

student fails in the examination, a teacher shouldn’t criticize him

teacher should encourage the student to study diligently again and get good

marks next time. When the student makes progress, Teacher should give praise

to the students even if they make very small progress , use the encouraging

words , such as Good , OK, CLEVER and use “try” , “Do your best “,”

I believe you can do better next time.”, which can encourage students and

help them build self-confidence instead of “No” , “ You can’t “ , then they can

learn English harder and harder and get better achievement .Getting the praise

from the teacher is a great joy and success to the students, especially to the

bottom students. Therefore the teacher should use every possible way to help

the students to build up confidence.

III. The way to arouse the students’ interest in the class

1. Using situation method in teaching

Language is the means of communicating with each other, and the

final purpose of learning a language is to obtain the ability to communicate

with others fluently.

In class the teacher should try to use material objects, CIA or

pictures to make the students see butterflies, birds, hills, water, rives, etc. The

teacher tries to widen the students’ view to lead them into the colorful world of

language, which will summon up the students’ interest and give them the

charming sense of beauty. Under this circumstance, the students will be

carefree and joyous to listen to the teacher attentively. In this case, students can

make practice with great eagerness. By using different kinds of examples, the

teacher can give various materials to his class and the possibility of enjoyment

to his students. And situation teaching method is really the effective way to

arouse the students’ interest in studying English.

2. Using the communicative teaching method

Communicative teaching method is also the good way to arouse

students’ interest. A language is not learned only by teaching, but by

drilling. one of a famous linguist, said: “The method of learning foreign

language is to practice, practice, and practice again. There is no other ways to

go.” In order to arouse their interest, the teacher should use the communicative

method to train the students and choose suitable materials for them to practice.

In communicative teaching method, there are many typical ways to arouse the

students’ interest. such as “pair-work”, “group-work”, “ask and answer”,

“ role- play” “free talk” etc.

3. Using English songs, matches and short play to arouse the students’

interest

These methods can create an active class atmosphere and adjust the

students’ emotion and the most important is that they can arouse the students’

interest in learning. Most children enjoy singing English songs and playing

games.

These methods not only can arouse the students’ interest but also can

consolidate the diphthong and consonant.

IV. The way to arouse the students’ interest out of English class

As we know, in middle schools English teaching hours are quite limited. It

is far from being enough to accomplish teaching students the language skills

that are required by the state general syllabus, if your English teaching is only

restricted to classroom teaching. Especially when you teach a big class, the

classroom teaching often tends to be teacher-centered. Thus students are given

little or limited opportunity for practicing what they have learned in class. In

this situation, on one hand, the students tend to forget the language knowledge

learned in class easily. On the other hand, the students might lose their interest

gradually. Therefore, by organizing English extra curriculum

activities, teachers might provide students with opportunities to practice the

language in actual situation so as to foster their are various kinds

of English extra curriculum activities for

the teacher to choose to consolidate the students’ English knowledge and

arouse their interest. For example:

1. English games

English games can help students learn English with pleasure, and

arouse their interest in learning English, so teachers use them in the class

and out of h games might include: word guessing, word spelling,

sentence combination, role-play, searching for things and memory games, etc.

2. Listening practise

Listen to radios or watch the English news on TV every day. Little by little,

your students will open eyes and improve a lot in can also

help to arouse their interest in learning English.

3. English corner and evening party

English corner and evening party is a lively and fascinating activity. It

helps to develop students’ skill in using English synthetically, and

especially improves students’ abilities of oral reading and oral English. The

most obvious advantage is that it involves all students and arouses the student’s

interest. The English corner and evening party can include: singing songs,

reading or reciting English poems, telling stories, role playing, or acting short

plays, etc.

VI.. Conclusion

In fact, English teaching on the basis of interest is most efficient. Because

interest can cultivate the students’ great initiative in acquiring knowledge and

their independence in studying English. Teachers should pay much attention

to the interest in the process of teaching. And the research how to arouse the

students’ interest in studying English becomes more and more important.

teachers should put the theory into practice to achieve the final goal of arousing

the students’ interest efficiently.

Notes

1.吴道存 How to teach English well effectively_Experts on English

teaching 人民教育版社 1993 page40

2. Wu Jinye How to utilize the art of making teaching contain interest

河南教育学院学报 1994年第一期 Page103

3. 周刚,张大铸 英语教学新概念 大连理工出版社 1994

吴道存. English teaching，人民教育出版社，1993.

李莛芗.《英语教学法》，北京高等教育出版社，1983.

李安庆.《英语教学心理学》，人民教育心理学，2001.

黄莆全.《现代教学论》，教育出版社，1998.

ge Teaching, Cambridge Language Teaching Language, 1986.

5. Luo Qian Arouse Students’ Interests in Studying English, 2006