In my ESL class I tried to interest my students in English culture by setting them to work on a project entitled «The Greatest Canadian». I selected 40 well-known English Canadians and asked my students to draw a name, research the person they had drawn and then write a text . I quickly realized that the students were not interested in the subject. Their research didn’t have any depth, the students were not showing any enthusiasm and the initial stages of the text were proving to be a copy/paste exercise from articles on the internet.

Because the students had not been active participants in deciding who should be on the list of candidates, nor who they would research, it was understandable they lacked interest in the project. I couldn’t change the project to any great extent as the students had already begun their research so I decided to add an element of competition that I hoped would spark the students’ interest.

I showed an excerpt from the CBC show «The Greatest Canadians» to try and motivate the students and explained to them that after they had finished their texts they too would present their candidate to the class in such a way as to convince their classmates and me that their candidate was indeed the most worthy to be called the «Greatest Canadian». A vote would then be taken to decide on the winner.

was disappointed with the outcome of the project. The additional component of competition added a little interest but the result was nowhere near as successful as I had envisioned. The texts remained copied passages from internet sources and the presentations were uncreative. However, I think the main reason for the lack of interest in this project was because I imposed all aspects of the project and did not give the students any choices. The fact that the students were not motivated meant that they had no reason to undertake the very difficult task of reformulating their research information and so took the easy way out and simply copied word for word. Showing the television programme was a desperate effort to inspire some interest and save the project but it had very little impact.

I learned that in order for a student to be interested and involved in his work, I must listen to his ideas and opinions and give him a chance to make some choices on what he is going to produce. I have reused this project but changes have been made. The students are now involved in the choice of candidates. To avoid the copy/paste syndrome, the RAFT system is used which requires the students to research the candidate but then present the information from a particular angle. The student is able to use his creativity and I still have a certain control on the type of information being presented. The element of competition has been maintained but widened to a school-wide event. The fact that their peers are viewing and learning from their projects encourages the students to excel.