2 ?´s

1. How important do you think motivation is for success in language learning, compared to, for example, language aptitude?

In my opinion, I believe that motivation is very important for language learning, in fact it might be the most important aspect of learning anything in general. A student can have all the aptitude in the world for learning new languages, playing a guitar, etc. but if he or she isn't motivated to do so, it will be very hard for them to learn anything. I can compare it to cleaning the house, we all have the capability to do so, but if we're not motivated then the task won't be done.

2. The urge to engage in learning activity for its own sake (intrinsic motivation) is distinguishable from the urge to learn for the sake of some external reward (extrinsic motivation). Do you think there is any difference between children and adults in the degree of influence of these two kinds of motivation?

I believe there's a difference. Different people are motivated in different ways, depending on the goal they have, let it be learning something useful or just getting good grades. Although it's more common for children to have extrinsic motivation because of the rewards they obtain because of good grades, etc. and adults to have intrinsic motivation because they view learning as more of a necessity than a reward. There could be exceptions, but in school , the main goal is to get good grades, pass the course and obtain some kind of reward from our parents.

Instrument

Well, we had to make a questionnaire reflecting the student's levels of motivation, ambition and self esteem. It took me a while to figure it out, so here we go.

 1. Do you like to study?                                                                              

o  Yes       o No 

2. Have you set any goals for this year?          

o  Yes       o No

3. I worry about what people say to me         

o  Yes       o No

4. You want to be somebody in life.  

o  Yes       o No

5. I am happy with myself        

o  Yes       o No

6. Do you tend to slow down after achieving success?  

o  Yes       o No

7. Would you give up going to a party to study for a test?  

o  Yes       o No

8. You have many friends

o  Yes       o No
     

9. I enjoy competition 

o  Never      o  Sometimes      o  Frequently      o  Always   

10. You know exactly what you want 

o  Never      o  Sometimes      o  Frequently      o  Always   

11. Do you panic when things don’t go your way?    

o  Never      o  Sometimes      o  Frequently      o  Always      

12. You accept yourself for who you are and not who you want to be   

o  Never      o  Sometimes      o  Frequently      o  Always     

13. Completing difficult tasks satisfies me 

o  Never      o  Sometimes      o  Frequently      o  Always  

14. You're afraid to face a crowd

o  Never      o  Sometimes      o  Frequently      o  Always 
15. You prefer to listen than to talk
o  Never      o  Sometimes      o  Frequently      o  Always 
16. You don't feel comfortable meeting new people
o  Never      o  Sometimes      o  Frequently      o  Always

Questions  2, 4, 8 and 10 deal with ambition.
Questions  1, 7, 9 and  13 deal with motivation.
Questions  3, 5, 11 and 12 deal with self esteem

Questions  8, 14, 15 and 16 deal with introvertion/extrovertion

I would evaluate this test using simple math, I have 4 different questions about each personality factor (self esteem, motivation, ambition and introertion/extrovertion).

The percentage of the first test would be obtained using a scale, for example, ambition has 3 questions, with a possibility of 50%, so if we get 2 answers that are positive and one negative, we would be 66.6% ambitious.

In the second test, we would use the same formula, except using 50%, we would substitute 75% for a never or always and a 25% for a sometimes or frequently, then we find the average. For example, we would use self esteem, which has 2 questions. We could answer always and sometimes, which gives me 100%, dividing it by 2, would make the student 50% ambitious.

Then, I would find the average of all the scores in a particular category and  come up with the final result.

I got a little carried away with the mathematics, but it's a subject I really miss from school. I put a lot of thought into this questionnaire, hope it turns out well. Getting ready for another busy weekend full of work, take care everybody.

Myers Briggs Test (check)

Your Type is
INFJ

Introverted	Intuitive	Feeling	Judging
Strength of the preferences %
78	12	38	22

You are:

The Protector......or the Counselor

I've been investigating my personality type on a couple of websites and they can't agree if I protect or council. What they do agree on are most of my personality traits, which are the following:

- Order: INFJ's like to have order in their lives, they stick to a system in which they organize themselves and they stick with the one that works best for them. Personally, I've tried over 40 different systems and I still can't find the right one, but I guess there's something I'm doing right....I'm not that messy.

- Feelings: INFJ's have some sort of "special feelings" towards things and certain situations, it's like we have some sort of psychic powers. It's true because I can identify the outcome of certain situations before they unfold, which actually is pretty cool.

- Feelings (Part 2): As INFJ's we care a lot about other people's feelings, which I believe is where we get the "Counselor" stereotype. I totally agree with this statement because I usually try to help people when they're feeling down or if I have to dissapoint someone, I usually try to do it without hurting their feelings. In simple words, I'm a sensitive guy.

- Perfectionism: The story of my life, I always strive for perfection and I won't stop until I reach it (which is going to be difficult because I'm never satisfied xD), but if I do something, I want to do it well, period.

- Anger: This surprised me a bit, being true that I'm a very laid back person I usually hold back my anger, but the day I boil over, it's going to be pretty intense because I'm going to have it all crumbled up on the inside, and I haven't gotten truly angry in a while, so....watch out children.

Teaching Analysis

As a future teacher I think my personality type fits in quite well, we are caring, which might help on the motivational side of the job, we are also perfectionists, striving for the perfect class and always looking for improvement. The order I think is also an important factor, if I can maintain myself organized, I can have a successful teaching career. Plus, being a teacher was also a recommended job for an INFJ.

I believe I must work on is on mental toughness, I tend to let myself down after some negative situations, this can also apply to being tough inside the classroom and earning respect from the students. I believe this is the most important area of improvement, because without earning respect from the students, it'll be very difficult to teach.

So, I'm an INFJ,

In other words.....

muajajajajajajajaja

Personality Factors (check)

Personality factors deal with how a student's personality can affect a student's learning process and overall performance. A student can be intellectually brilliant but if he is lacking confidence or motivation, he might not be able to live up to his full potential.

What I learned from this class, was that the different factors greatly affect a student's performance, such as motivation, self esteem, extrovertion and introvertion. Motivation is very important because it shows the student's desire to learn, if the student isn't motivated, it will be very difficult for him or her to learn. Self esteem has to do with a student's mental state in which he limits his capacities to learn, he can either put boundaries or expand his learning experience.

This is related to my future teaching experience because, as a teacher I have to figure out exactly the problem of a struggling child. Logically, we would blame his lack of intellectual ability when in reality there are factors based on motivation and self esteem that affect the child. I would try to diagnose the problem and then try to find a way to motivate or boost a student's confidence so he or she can get better grades and learn more efficiently.

Three concepts I would highlight would be:

1. Motivation - it's a very important factor because an unmotivated student won't be able to learn a new language, no matter how entertaining the class is. It's a factor that we as teachers have to try to increase.

2. Self esteem - another important concept that not only deals with the student, but also with the teacher, as I learned from first hand experience, a student has to believe in himself in order to succeed, if he is unable to do that, he will have an incredibly difficult time reaching his goals.

3. Introvertion and Extrovertion - this is also a very important concept because it's also very tricky, we can see an extroverted student and think he's intelligent and motivated while an introverted student can surprise us teachers with his skills. It's important to identify and judge correctly.

Second Language Acquisition

Well, I should have written this yesterday, but my mind was in another dimension and it's not back yet,  I have had lots of things running through my mind this week, so it's time to get organized.

I understood most of the class, due to the fact that it was related to our general linguistics course from last semester. Second language acquisition deals with people learning another language, whether it's conscious or unconscious. I also understood the various difficulties related with second language acquisition, such as age, boring textbooks and insufficient time and use of the second language.

This is connected to my future teaching experience because we are going to be teaching a second language, and we as teachers have to find a way to make English classes interesting and fun so the student could be interested in learning. The complications mentioned in class are very useful because we have a general view of why people don't learn English and we have to find a way to limit those complications and improve the students' learning experience.

The 3 concepts I would highlight would be the three different methods used in second language acquisition. Grammar translation, which is the "traditional" way of learning and focuses mostly on grammar and the teacher is seen as an expert. Audiolingual is the method that focuses mostly on listening and repetitive drills. Communicative approaches are based on interactions and focuses more on the student. These are the different ways that are used to teach a second language, and my objective is to find a way to mix all three of them to make learning more complete.

In conclusion, being my first class I understood most of the concepts that were explained and I feel as though it will be a good year.

Blogging

I guess I'm a blogger now, never expected to be doing this, so it's kind of odd. I just opened up my blog, still learning how to use it, but it will be ready sometime next week. I would fix it up during the weekend if only I didn't have to work. I'm looking forward to writing about all sorts of different topics. It's been a really weird week, so I got my mind running around all sorts of different places. I'm happy so I won't complain, time to make a change in my life and get ready for the future.

This is a new adventure in my life and I'm ready for all the challenges coming up.
Life's good.