MANAGEMENT ISSUES ASSOCIATED WITH MOTIVATION IN LEARNING ENGLISH OF THE G.C.E. (A/L) CURRICULUM IN THE KURUNEGALA DISTRICT IN SRI LANKA: STUDENT PERSPECTIVES

Abstract

With the increasing ultimatum for the English language in diverse fields both locally and internationally, Sri Lanka has been trying to facilitate the field of English language teaching in the country for years. One such initiative is introducing the General English subject to the General Certificate of Education (Advanced Level) curriculum in government schools to improve the proficiency levels in English of the school leavers. However, despite several policy ingenuities and implementations, the results of the G.C.E. (A/L) examination ascertain that a vast majority of the students fail the General English subject every year, leading to a yet-unsolved issue in the education sector of the country.

The empirical pieces of evidence have proven that learners’ motivation affects success or failure in language learning. This qualitative study focuses on the education management-related factors that affect the learner motivation for the General English subject of the G.C.E. (A/L) curriculum. The primary data were collected by conducting interviews with 60 randomly selected students in the Art stream of the 30 National Schools in the Kurunegala district while the secondary data were collected from the result analysis reports of the Department of Examinations, Ministry of Education in Sri Lanka, and the schools. The findings prove that some educational policies and macro-level planning, the nature of pedagogy in general, and some learner-related matters have been the main causes for the decline in the learners’ motivation, leading to unsuccessful learning outcomes.

Keywords: motivation, education management, educational policies, General English subject, unsuccessful learning outcome, macro-level planning, pedagogy