How pupils view languages at school

 An anonymous poster on Facebook recently shared a PhD thesis carried out by Robert Sakhrani. The title is "Exploring the decline in uptake of modern foreign languages at GCSE in England through Positoning Theory: reflecting on the perspectives of pupils and teachers in secondary schools." The thesis is publicly available here.

I found this thesis very worthwhile and interesting, even if the findings were unsurprising. Policy-makers would do well to read it. For this post, I asked ChatGPT to summarise in about 500 words the findings of the chapter covering the results of the pupils voice interviews. For background, the thesis interviewed students and teachers from four schools in Norfolk (eastern England), there of which are state schools, one independent. Below you will find the AI bullet-point summary of pages 179 to 188 of the thesis.

You'll see that, in discussing motivation, there is only brief mention, at the start, of methodology as an implied possible source of increased self-efficacy and motivation (i.e. do pupils enjoy their lessons?) Elsewhere in the thesis there is a background secton on the evolution of methodology over the last few decades, including situational language teaching and  Gianfranco Conti's EPI (Extensive Processing Instruction) approach which has gained a lot of traction in English schools. No attempt is made to link methods with motivation.

You may like to know what Positioning Theory is too, since that was the framework Robert Sakhrani chose to contextualise his findings. Positioning Theory is a way of analysing how people construct identities for themselves and others through interaction. It examines how, for example in conversation, people position themselves and others in particular roles, and how those positions carry certain rights, responsibilities and expectations about what they can legitimately say or do. In this PhD extract, for example, pupils position themselves or others as “linguistic”, multilingual, knowledgeable, or uninterested in languages, and these positions influence how they approach language lessons in school and whether they choose them as options.

See what you make of the pupil voice findings. Note the contrast between the independent schools and state schools in this sample. Family background and parents are a huge influence.

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Findings summarised:

Pupils’ attitudes to language learning are shaped by their family background, social environment, school experiences and peer relationships.

Independent-school pupils generally expressed stronger and more deeply rooted motivation towards language learning.For many of these pupils, multilingualism was normalised at home through multilingual parents, international travel, relatives studying abroad and parents working overseas. They associated languages with education, travel, professional opportunities, personal development and social mobility.

Some readily adopted a “linguistic” identity, seeing themselves as people who naturally liked or were good at languages. Their motivation was often intrinsic: languages were seen as worthwhile and enjoyable in themselves, not simply useful for examinations or employment.

State-school pupils generally had fewer personal or family connections with multilingualism.

Their motivation tended to be more instrumental and short-term, focusing on exams, holidays or particular jobs.

Some questioned the relevance of the vocabulary and content taught in MFL lessons.

Some also had a narrow view of careers involving languages, particularly associating them with becoming a teacher or translator.

Being good at languages did not necessarily have the same social status among state-school pupils as it did among some independent-school pupils.

Independent-school pupils were more likely to reject English monolingualism, particularly the expectation that English speakers should be able to use English abroad. They associated multilingualism with cosmopolitanism, tolerance, cultural openness and respect.

State-school pupils were less strongly opposed to monolingualism, although many thought that attempting the local language abroad was polite and respectful.

Messages from schools about the economic and career benefits of languages had limited influence on both groups.

Parental influence was important, but operated differently: positive multilingual experiences could encourage language learning, while parents’ own poor experiences or limited language skills could contribute to weaker motivation.

Some pupils deliberately asserted their independence from parental advice when discussing whether to continue languages.

The interviews also revealed important peer-group effects. Pupils positioned themselves and others as “linguistic”, knowledgeable or uninterested in languages.

Confident multilingual pupils could acquire greater authority within the discussion, while less enthusiastic pupils could become positioned as outsiders or “anti-linguists”.This group positioning could influence what pupils felt able to say and might even suppress more negative attitudes towards languages.

Overall, pupils were most strongly motivated when they could see language learning as part of their identity and future lives, rather than simply as another school subject.