The Impact of Cooperative Language Learning on EEC Students’ Motivation

Abstract

The aim of this study was to investigate the students’ attitudes towards cooperative language learning and the effect of the cooperative language learning approach on students’ motivation. Moreover, the current paper aimed to find the factors that influence students’ motivation while working collaboratively. The final aim of this project was to design deliverables, comprising a list of recommendations that can help EEC teachers to implement collaborative language learning in the classroom successfully. The qualitative data was collected by observing classes in 4 EEC (Experimental English Courses) groups to get in-depth information about students’ motivation, cooperative tasks given by the teacher, factors influencing students’ motivation, teacher’s role,etc.; by taking field notes based on the researcher’s observations; by interviewing the teachers and a limited number of students from the aforementioned EEC groups. The data collected through the observations, field notes and interviews were analyzed qualitatively.The findings indicated that most of the students found collaborative learning interesting, engaging, enjoyable and pleasant. The overall finding was that cooperative language learning fosters students’ motivation. However, this is not true in all situations, because the level of students’ engagement greatly depends on several critical factors, such as the group members’ personal relationship, the type of the cooperative task given by the teacher, as well as students’ personal characteristics and their overall mood.