Using Educational Technology in the English Language Classroom

Week 2: Vocabulary

Study Guide:
“Motivation Matters in Mobile Language Learning: A Brief Commentary”
By Ema Ushioda
http://llt.msu.edu/issues/october2013/commentary.pdf

The reading explores the link between student motivation and mobile language learning. It should help you
think about your students’ motivation and how their motivation affects their learning. It should help you
understand why some students are more interested in mobile learning than others are.

IMPORTANT EXPRESSIONS
Please use a dictionary on the Internet to provide a definition for each of the following expressions:

• Autonomy:
• Mobile technology:
• Motivation:
• Special issue:
• Student perspective:

BEFORE YOU READ

Think about these questions:
1. Have you ever used mobile technology in the classroom?
2. If so, how did you and your students use mobile technologies?
3. Are your students motivated to learn using mobile technology? Why or why not?

AS YOU READ
Consider these questions:
1. What motivates a student to use a new technology?
2. Is it better to require students to use mobile technology for learning, or is better to allow them to choose?
3. How does the use of mobile technology influence students’ language learning?

Notes:

SUMMARY OF ARTICLE
Fill in the blanks with the most appropriate word. Use the article to help you.
• Introduction
o Mobile technology language learning is a growing field, and needs to be studied more in-depth.
o The student perspective when it comes to language learning is very important, especially related
to ____________________ learning.
o The rest of the article is a commentary on the subject of ___________ and mobile learning It is
not a research article, but it refers to some research articles.
• Motivation as a matter of __________________________
o There are two types of motivation that influence a student’s desire to learn using technology: 1) a
_______________ in technology and its applications, and 2) a strong desire to learn a language
using whatever means possible.
o Each student brings a different level of motivation to their studies, and each student differs in
their _________ for learning a language and their desire to engage with technology.
o Many studies have shown that students are more motivated when they are given ____________
whether or not to use mobile technology in their learning.
o Most researchers in the field believe that providing choice, flexibility, and autonomy for the
learners is key when implementing mobile technology.
o Some students might be hesitant to use mobile devices for language learning because they see
those devices as being _____________ for social uses.
o The author believes that teachers can create __________________ in the field by using mobile
language learning devices.
• Motivation as a matter of personally meaningful casual learning
o Many studies have shown that some students want to use mobile technology, but they fail to use
it in a deep and meaningful way. Instead their use is superficial and brief.
o One potential way of thinking about this problem is to consider that mobile devices can be used
to encourage ___________ uses of the language learning tools, rather than meaningful ones.
o Another potential benefit to using mobile devices is their ability to help students
______________ more new language learning tools.
o Because of the limitations, many teachers tend to use mobile technology only for content that is
not too demanding, and with tools that are easy to use.
o This problem may change in the future when technological advances improve the usability of
mobile devices
o The author suggests that this field is in need of more ____________, especially research focused
on the motivation of students to use mobile technology for language learning
• Conclusion
o The author repeats that the ________________ is vastly important in this field, and that more
research should be done that focuses on student motivation and how it effects language learning

AFTER YOU READ

• The author considers mobile language learning to be a positive change that teachers should help to
promote. Do you agree with the author?

Notes: