DÖRNYEI, Zoltán: Teaching and Researching Motivation.

Pearson Education, 2001
Raf Erzeel, Lessius Hogeschool, Antwerp, Belgium

Teaching and Researching Motivation is published in a series called Applied Linguistics in Action, alongside other works with 'Teaching and Researching ...' titles. This one, although clearly a well-researched and carefully worked-out book, is disappointing from the teacher's point of view, as readily applicable elements are few and far between. The layout also leaves it open to criticism.

In the introduction, the author points out the lack of motivation models and theoretical recommendations in the field of motivation in the classroom. He then clearly states three purposes that he wants to achieve with Teaching and Researching Motivation:

1. To provide a concise summary of the various theoretical positions and propositions in the field, outlining potential pitfalls and future directions.
2. To summarise the classroom applications and implications of the theoretical insights.
3. To describe the main approaches to conducting research on motivation to learn a second/foreign language (L2).
   (p.2)

These three purposes are reflected in the structure of the book, with the following sections: I. What is motivation?; II. Motivation and language teaching; III. Researching motivation; IV. Resources and further information. The first three of these coincide with the three purposes, the fourth being little more than an appendix.

The extent to which you will appreciate the book depends entirely on what your expectations are: if you are looking for information on theories concerning motivation, or if you want to actively do research into this area, you will not be disappointed. If, however, you have high hopes in connection with classroom applications, you will be sorely disappointed. Section I is, as can be expected, very theoretical, and hardly oriented towards teaching, except for a short subsection on 'The teachers' motivational influence' on p.35 ff. and chapter 3, which is about motivation in L2 learning. But even that remains very theoretical. Yet, section I is supposed to be about theory, so we should not expect too much in the way of practical elements. But also section II, which is about classroom applications, is hardly applicable, so much so, that a list of practical suggestions, on p.138-140, takes you completely by surprise. The author is, apparently, aware of this lack of applicability, as he writes about "... a worrisome tendency for the new, educationally relevant constructs and approaches (and I hasten to add that some of my own work also falls into this 'danger zone') to become increasingly conceptual, without having sufficient research grounding [...]" (p.107), and as such admits that the theories on motivation are far removed from classroom reality.

From the point of view of the reader who is interested in research, be it his own or others', the author certainly succeeds in passing on very relevant information and a good overview of the field in question. But even these readers may have their reservations about the layout of the book. We frequently come across boxes with quotes and 'concepts', and although they can be very helpful - if you judge the information in them to be superfluous, you can ignore them - they also tend to confuse the reader, as it is difficult to know when they should be read if you feel you do need the information. As they do not form an integrated part of the text, they interfere with the reading process if they are overused. And overused they certainly are in this book: very soon you notice that the boxes take up quite some space, and you start asking yourself the question as to what is most important: the text or the boxes? As an experiment, I started measuring the proportion of boxes to text in chapters 1 and 2, and I was amazed at the outcome: almost 30% of that section of the book consists of boxes, and I don't have the impression that the proportion is any lower in the rest of the book. Frankly, this is bad editing.

In short, the most important thing is not to buy this book for the wrong reasons: if you want to use it for classroom application, don't buy it, as you will be disappointed. If you want it to inform you about theoretical issues, or to help you start up research into motivation, you should certainly consider buying it.

Ways of Working with Teachers

It's back!! - Author review
Tessa Woodward, 2004

Once upon a time there was a book called "Ways of Training" published in the Pilgrims/Longman Teachers' Resource book series. Which was, in a way, a funny place for a book for teacher trainers to live since the list was for teachers really…Anyway the little book got very positive reviews and when it was finally out of print quite a lot of people wrote to ask for it. The letters and post cards eventually made their way to the author Tessa Woodward. She did what she could….selling all her own extra copies even the two she had in her garage! But after a while people were still writing to her and she had no more copies to give them.

Tessa approached several publishers to see if they would like to reprint a revised version of the book and some were fairly interested. But, after a couple of years, none of them had really said not only "Yes!" but also "Now!" and so she went ahead on her own. The result is an A4 paperback book with an attractive blue cover called "Ways of working with Teachers".

What remains the same?

The book is still for anyone interested in the teaching of teachers whether teacher trainer, teacher educator, teacher mentor, teacher trainee, organiser or administrator of training events. It is for teachers who help each other in the staff room, who pop into each other's classrooms to observe or teachers who want to share ideas with others. It is still mostly concerned with TESOL or TEFL and modern language teacher education but contains much of interest for people involved with other kinds of training too.

The book does not deal with the content of teacher training courses directly. Rather it concentrates on the ways information, ideas, opinions, and awareness can be shared in teacher training. The book still deals with the following core areas:

• Trainer, group and experiential information sharing
• Interacting with information and material
• Consolidating information and experience and transforming these into productivity and creativity
• Planning, observing and discussing teaching
• Finding out about yourself, others and the job of language teaching
• Ways of reducing stress on teacher training courses
• There is also an innovative chapter on analysing the ideas in the book so that they can be adapted to suit your training/learning style and situation

So what's new?

Apart from the size and the colour and the look of the book, there have been other changes too.

The language has been updated throughout. New activities and new variations to activities have been added so that the extent is now 212 pages. The bibliography has been supplemented with new, up to date reading leads without taking out the 'golden oldies' that are the citation history of our field. There is a brand new section on Continuing Professional Development for all staff.

The book now reflects the new demand and varied settings for training and also discusses in the introduction the core elements of teaching and of teacher teaching.

It is selling fast and comments have been very favourable so far. The author would like to cover the costs of the first run and then a reprint.

If you would like a copy, you will need to provide a self addressed C4 ( 9" x 12") padded envelope plus the cost of the book (£15) and the cost of postage to your country. Within the UK the postage cost is £3. Get in touch with Tessa Woodward if you need more information. She works at: