國
立 政 治 大 學
‧
N a tio na
l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y
‧
國
立 政 治 大 學
‧
N a tio na
l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y
1. Introduction
With the economy of China improving, people of China begins to heed the importance of English language. Chinese people are now learning English with unprecedented passion. During this recent period of high economic growth in China, a large of number of Taiwan businessmen have been doing business in the Mainland China and many of whom brought their entire family to live and be educated in China. Many of these Taiwanese businessmen have brought back information in connection with their educational experience in the Mainland China. We now have means to learn more about China's educational system including English language education and learning.
1.1 Motivation
Few years ago, one of my students (junior high school) migrated to Dalian, China and studied there because her father was transferred to work there. Like most of the children of Taiwanese employees stationed in the Mainland China, she came back to Taiwan during summer vacations. She came to see me and showed me her English text books. I was impressed at level of English taught in China which is much higher than that in Taiwan. The thought that came to my mind was that although China is big and powerful with a nationalistic attitude, it still has the ambition and drive to become more competitive by making their population proficient in foreign languages. I was intrigued by the Chinese students' motivation to learn English.
Another reason to arouse my interest in this subject is a certain teacher in China that I heard about. The teacher, Li Yang, is a passionate and enthusiastic English teacher who taught countless Chinese people his "crazy English" and earned a very high reputation. Yang is very good at motivating people's desire to learn. Yang motivates people's desire, their ambitions and even their love for their country.
Yang's motivational teaching in English was at the peak during the time when China held the Beijing Olympic Game.
In 2008, China held the Beijing Olympic Game which caused an English learning
‧
國立 政 治 大 學
‧
N a tio na
l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y
‧
國
立 政 治 大 學
‧
N a tio na
l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y
“fever”. People learn English like crazy, from kids, students in every rank of schools, young people and even grandfathers and grandmothers tried to learn English. Chao Chi-Cheng1, a committee member of the Chinese Peoples' Political Consultative Conference, in an English speech competition said that, Chinese people learned English for learning new technology few decades ago; but now, Chinese people learn English for introducing China to the world and for presenting the Chinese culture, which I doubt very seriously is the sole or even the strongest motivation behind this phenomenon. Regardless, the motivations behind learning English appear to be very different in China and Taiwan, at least on the surface.
Some of the Taiwanese businessmen's children who migrated to China with their parents and went to local schools or international schools cannot catch up with the local students' English level and were asked to move to a lower grade. Chinese high school students construct their future career plan with determination and hard-working. Taiwan should be aware of the crisis in their competitiveness and should take a look at what is behind Chinese students' strong motivation and ambition in learning English.
While I was doing my studying, I noticed that there are many researches made in connection with college students' English learning motivation but very few in connection with the motive of high school students. It is meaningful to do this research in order to achieve better comprehension on the advantage and disadvantage English teaching and learning methods in China and Taiwan. The results from this research could also be beneficial in forming relevant educational policies.
1.2 Purpose
This study is trying to investigate the difference in English learning motivation levels between the junior high school students in Shanghai and Taipei, the two largest cities in China and Taiwan respectively. This paper will also identify the elements that influence the student's motivation levels in learning English in
1 Sun, Lu (2009). Chao Chicheng looked back to see the history of “English fever” in China.
Retrieved April 13, 2009 from http://cppcc.people.com.cn/BIG5/35377/9117490.html
‧
國立 政 治 大 學
‧
N a tio na
l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y
‧
國
立 政 治 大 學
‧
N a tio na
l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y
these two cities.
Taiwan and China have the same Chinese language and the same culture, but they have developed separately in the last 60 years. The Culture of Revolution in China, especially, has introduced vastly different concepts of value and behavior model to Chinese people. Taiwan, on the other hand, is an island once colonized by Japan and its people was forced to learn Japanese. After Chinese nationalist came to Taiwan at the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, Taiwanese people were forced to speak Chinese Mandarin in stead of Taiwanese.
While the communist China was in a period of self imposed isolation, Taiwan was flourishing in international trade and Taiwanese people spontaneous learn English in order to pursuit higher academic achievement and international business achievement. Taiwan is a relatively small economy and well understood the importance of international trade and its people are aware of the advantage of knowing different languages. It was only about twenty years ago that China started to attach importance to English learning2.
2 Wang, Shaomin (2005). A review of researches on English Learning Motivation in China over the past 20 years. Journal of TV University. Retrieved 2005 from http://www1.open.edu.cn/elt/11/4.htm