Disengaged Language Students

How can introductory language instructors at the university level manage students with very varying degrees of interest in and commitment to the course?

As a Spanish 401 instructor who has a relatively large class (22 students) I often feel frustrated by some of my students’ lack of interest in the course and lack of motivation to participate in class. I would guess that about a third of my class is very often disengaged, a third makes an effort to pay attention but rarely participates, and a final third really enjoys language learning and consistently participates. With such varying degrees of interest and engagement in the class, I often feel as though I end up teaching to one extreme or the other, depending on how my students are reacting to the lesson plan on that particular day. Given the large number of students, it is often difficult to single out every individual who consistently avoids participating, and when I do randomly call on such students, they sometimes have no idea what is going on and I end up feeling slightly guilty for potentially embarrassing them.

I have inferred that a small number of my quiet and sometimes disengaged students may be behaving in such a way out of anxiety, but others are obviously just disinterested. These disinterested students are taking my course out of necessity (i.e. to fulfill a discovery requirement), never come to office hours for extra help, and tend to fall behind on exams. Many just cram to memorize material for the test or quiz, but then make no effort to retain such information. This becomes problematic when I discover that some students, for example, are trying to learn more complex grammatical structures like “gustar” and “ir,” and yet have not yet committed to memory somewhat basic, yet ESCENTIAL concepts like how to conjugate regular “-ar,” “-er,” and “-ir” verbs. I obviously feel responsible for the success or failure of my students, yet it is very difficult to teach/help those who do not help themselves.

My disengaged students and their general lack of effort certainly make me nervous, but they also make it difficult to teach those students who truly want to learn Spanish. When the same 4 or 5 students are the only ones to participate in class, it makes the classroom dynamic somewhat awkward and I end up spending too much class time trying to encourage others to join in, or waiting for those who I have called on to figure out what page we are on or which question we are reviewing. I can tell that this becomes quite annoying to my very motivated students, who are eager to learn more and actually practice the language. I am more than happy to slow down the class for individuals who have questions, which obviously happens, but I am always frustrated when I have to waste time forcing students to participate.

My experience teaching 401 makes me wonder if UNH should implement some sort of alternative language class that caters to those students who are only taking a language to fulfill a discovery requirement. I would assume that other universities may have similar systems, in which students who only want to learn the bare minimum can do so without enrolling in such a fast-paced language course, which our Spanish 401 truly is. Perhaps there could be a class like “Spanish for travelers” or “Spanish basics,” where students who do not really want to learn a language could develop some basic conversational or “survival” language skills. This would save such students from having to enroll in a more serious language course, and would also make regular Spanish or French 401 courses more interesting for those students who truly do want to learn. University language courses are obviously easier to teach that those taught in high schools, in that instructors rarely have to address behavioral issues, but the lack of “levels” at the university level can sometimes be challenging, as I explained above.