Analysis of Affective Factors and Corresponding Solution in English Teaching

文科爱籽者Vol. No.1January 2009LIBERAL ARTS FANSAnalysis of Affective Factors and CorrespondingSolution in English Teaching张劲松[Abstract] Afeet is the related sses that infuence the students' leamning progress and resul, including one's interest, emotin,self- confidence and so on. Affective fartors are the motivation for the students' leaming. In the past few decades, people have always been pursuing the efctive methods of teaching, from the Grammar Translation Method, to Communicative Language Teaching.Now people start to focus on afeetive teaching and have gol some god result.[Keywords] efer afective facors, Fnglish learhing[中图分类号] G642[文献标识码][文章编号] 1671-1270(2009)1-0004- -02Theoretically, afet is a temn that refers to the purposive no chance to interact with members of the target group. Theand emotional sides of a person's reartions to what is going sorial situation helps to delermine both what kind of orienta-on. It has to do with aspeets of person's emotional being. tion leamers have and what kind is most important for lan-However, it is not easy to give a clealy stated definition of it. guage leamning. Leamers rarely select one form of motivationIf leachers could use more positive, frilitative emotions instead when learming a second language, but rather a combination ofof negative emotions in teaching, the language leaming will be both orientations.more efective. Affect plays a very important role in leaming1.2 Self-confidencehat is, in the proress of changing a lrarmer's inner me-Sellf-confidence is normally assumed to have an influencesources 80 that they will become useful. Here. inner resources on successful leaming. When affective factors are explicitly dis-refer to leamers’ aective faclors. Arcordingly, research hacussed, there seems to be a consensus that the general notionfocused on individual diference: characteristicn of the studentsof self-confidence may be a crucial factor in the learer's asuch as atitudes and motivations, language anxiety, inhibition,bility to overcome occasional setbacks or minor mistakes in theself- confdence, field independence, personality variables, intel- process of learning a second language. By self-confidence, weligence, language aptitude and language leaming strategies. refer to the evaluation which the individual makes and cus-Krashen (1985) 8uggests the notion of the afective filer. Thistomarily maintains with regard to himself. In short, sel-confi-is a representation of the way in which aertive factors suchdence is a personal judgment of worthiness that is expressed in8s competitiveness and other emotional responses can help ofthe atitudes that the individual holds towards himself. It is ahinder language leaming.subjective experience which the individual conveys to others by1. Affective factors in English teachingverbal reports and other overt expressive behavior. From theVarous afetive factors in English leaming interweave sodefinition, we can see that self- confidence plays a very impor-that we can't separale the function of one from that of thetant role in human behavior. Self- confidence manifested in for-others. The main afective factors are幽fllows:eign language leaming includes both learmers’ assessments of1.1 Motivationtheir overall linguistic competence and their- assessments of aMotivation is an important afctive faclor which influencesspecific skill. We would expect that lack of self -confidenceforeign language leamning. It is considered a a key to success-would be an inhibiting factor for leamers.ful leaming. Moivation is commonly thought of as an inner1.3 Anxietydrive, impulse, need, or desire that .moves one to a particularAnxiety is perhaps the afective factor which impedes lan-action. Cardner and Lambert (1972) place motivation into twoguage leaming to the greatest extent. It is related with suchcalegonies: integrative and instrumental. Inegrative motivation is had felings as uneasiness, disappointment, self-doubt, worry orcharacterized by the leamer's positive atitudes towards the tar-tension. It is perhaps best viewed a8 an aspect of personality.get language group and the desire to integrate into the targetState anxiety can be defined as apprehension that is experi-.language community. In some of the early researches conductedby Cardner and Lambert, integrative motivation was viewed asite situation. It is a combination of trait and situation- -specificbeing of more importance in a formal learming environmentanxiety. This ltter type consists of the anxiety which isthan instrumental motivation. In later studies, integrative moti-aroused a specifec type of situation or event such 幽publicvation has continued to be emphasized, although now the im-speaking, examinations, or class participation. The diary studiesportance of instrumental motivation is also stressed. However, itindicate that leamers' competitive nature can act a a sourceis imporant to note that instrumental motivation has only beenof anxiety.acknowledged as a signifcant factor in some researches where-2. Solution to the current phenomenon88 integrative motivation is continually kinked to successfulLeamers，in particular classroom learners, react to thsecond language acquisition. It has been found that generallylearming situations they find themselves in a variety of affectivestudents seleet instrumental reasons more frequently than inteways. Many studies testify to the complexity and dynamicgrative reasons for the study of a language. Those who do sup-r he influence these haveport an integralive approach to language study are ually moreon theitl中国煤化工ng Leamen, ii sem,highly motivated and over all more sccessful in languageneefocusHCNMHG; stres before they canlearming. One area where instrumental motivation can prove toce of which is direclybe sucessful is in the situation where the leamer is providedacknowledgedhumanistic approaches to language teaching.with no opportunity to use the target language and therefore,As teachers, they have responsibility to set the tone or一4-