Motivation as a key to oral interaction : How 7 to 9-grade teachers in Sweden stimulate pupils' oral interaction in the English classroom

Sammanfattning: Pupils who want to learn English as a foreign language, EFL, need to practice speaking. This is a necessity, not least since this skill is crucial when communicating with others. When pupils lack this inclination, EFL teachers have to know how to engage them in oral interaction. The aim of this study is to investigate what overall strategies four teachers say that they prefer to use when motivating pupils in grades 7 to 9 to interact orally in the EFL classroom. The aim is also to investigate if there are certain strategies that the teachers participating in the study find more successful. The method chosen to analyse the data was qualitative content analysis. Semi-structured face-to-face interviews with open-ended questions were conducted. After the interviews, the collected data were coded, divided into different themes and analysed. The results of this study showed that the teachers say that they use a wide range of strategies, such as for example creating a safe learning environment and letting pupils work in smaller groups with subjects they can relate to. It was found that the participating teachers often agreed with each other concerning what strategies to use, as for example when accentuating the importance of creating a safe learning environment in the classroom. In order to make pupils want to interact orally in the EFL classroom, it is of vital importance that teachers understand what strategies are seen as worthwhile to use when teaching. Hopefully, the study can contribute to this understanding and thereby increase the level of motivation amongst pupils.