A correlative study of motivation for learning Chinese according to academic achievement and parental encouragement among grade four to grade six students at Ladprao Bilingual School (LBS), Bangkok, Thailand

Abstract

Parental encouragement has been shown to have a positive relationship with students' learning motivation and their academic achievement. This study examined the level of the students' Chinese learning motivation, the student's perception of parental encouragement and the relationship among parental encouragement, Chinese learning motivation and academic achievement. The researcher used a questionnaire as the main instrument for data collection. One hundred and thirteen students at Ladprao Bilingual School (LBS) grades four to six in the academic year 2014 participated in this study. The collected data were analyzed by mean, standard deviation, and Pearson-Moment Correlation. The findings indicated that the level of the students' Chinese learning motivation was high. Also, the students had a relatively high level of the perception of parental encouragement. The findings showed that a significant relationship existed among the students' Chinese learning motivation and academic achievement, students' perception of parental encouragement and Chinese learning motivation, students' perception of parental encouragement and academic achievement. Recommendations for both practice and future research are provided.