Foreign language learning motivation among post secondary school students in Ghana: A case study of French students at Ghana Institute of Languages, Kumasi, Ashanti region

Felix Kwesi Fandoh, Purdue University

Abstract

Many countries have addressed the need to produce graduates who are bilingual or even multilingual in the effort to compete in the global market. Ghana has acknowledged the importance of proficiency in other foreign languages especially in French in order to develop human capital that drives the economy since Ghana is surrounded by French speaking countries in the sub region. Unfortunately, the government and all stakeholders in education expressed dismay about the decline and lack of motivation in the study of French as a foreign language in post-secondary schools and senior high schools, observing that most of the schools had even struck it off their curricula Ghana News Agency, (2011). It is in light of this growing concern that this study seeks to explore and investigate French students motivation towards learning French as a foreign language at Ghana Institute of Languages, Kumasi of the Ashanti region, Ghana. The study also investigates gender differences in motivation to learn French among participants at the Ghana Institute of Languages. In this study, 37 French students from Ghana Institute of Languages, a post-secondary institution in Kumasi Metropolis of the Republic of Ghana completed a questionnaire reflecting their motivation for learning French. In order to determine the students' tendency towards the two kinds of motivational orientations (integrative versus instrumental), a modified 30-item survey adapted from Gardner's (1985) and Clement et al. (1994) model of second language (L2) motivation, was administered to the student participants. The results indicated that the participants had positive attitudes towards the French language and they were highly motivated both integratively and instrumentally. Nevertheless, it is worth mentioning that both male and female participants in this study were more instrumentally inclined than integratively, and they had positive attitudes towards the target language. On gender difference, the results revealed that, there is no considerable difference between female and male participants with regard to the instrumental and integrative motivation. These findings provided sufficient answers to the research questions guiding this case study. The findings were also in line with other studies (Keblawi 2006 and Vaezi 2008) conducted to investigate motivational orientation. This study on motivational orientations of the participants at Ghana Institute of Languages would possibly provide insights into better identifying existing motivational challenges and ways of improving French language teaching in order to sustain and increase students' motivation towards the target language. This case study on motivational orientations is the first of its kind conducted on French as a foreign language and Ghanaian students of French.

Degree

M.A.

Advisors

Brown, Purdue University.

Subject Area

Linguistics|Foreign language education|Higher education

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