Why Learn English? Cape Verdeans' First Year Undergraduate Students' Motivation

Academic Paper from the year 2016 in the subject Didactics - English - Pedagogy, Literature Studies, grade: A, ( Atlantic International University ), course: MOTIVATION IN THE CLASSROOM, language: English, abstract: The purpose of this study is to identify what motivates the 1st year Undergraduate students from a public University located at the center of Mindelo City in Cape Verde to learn English as a foreign language.

Motivation is a relevant requisite in learning a foreign language, and is an issue that has been discussed by many educators since it appears absent in many students and so present in others.

Furthermore, this paper will also address what is the particular influence of Mindelo tourism in the students¿ motivation and if the motivations presented contribute with their learning outcomes in English language. Twenty 1st year undergraduate students of English Studies from the University of Cape Verde in the city of Mindelo, Cape Verde, participated in this study. There were 8 females and 12 male student participants, with an age range from 19 to 31 years old. Having in mind the purpose of this study, this research focused on qualitative data collection and the data was collected through questionnaire and semi structured interviews.

After analysing and discussing the obtained data, the results suggest that the participants of this study display an extrinsic and instrumental motivation, since it is the region's tourism that influences the motivation of these students in a positive way to the English learning, resulting in a good general performance of these students.