In a performance-driven school culture, how do you keep kids motivated?

I’ve always believed that there’s more than one way to motivate students. The key is to make them feel that they have control over their destiny. If that sounds like a reach, think about what we as adults work for.  We don’t just work to pay the bills: some of us work to gain autonomy over our lives, some of us work for the challenge, and some to achieve a higher goal.

Children may not be able to articulate why they’re motivated to do assignments just yet, but they have similar goals. To most of them, a good grade is a reward. But a good grade is only one piece of the puzzle of how to motivate students.

Most schools are part of this country’s test-driven educational culture and are set up so that students earn grades for performance. Consequently, the grade is the reward. But think about the student who isn’t motivated by the promise of a good grade – who believes he is stupid and destined for poverty or failure. That student doesn’t care about grades at all. How can teachers motivate him to do assigned work and boost his grades? How do we make him care?

A game-changing idea

What if you could ignite a student’s motivation, and build their confidence, by associating them with an identity and its specific behaviors and motivators? For teachers in crowded, time-crunched classrooms, this could be a game-changer.

Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton, authors of What Motivates Me: Put Your Passions to Work, detailed five different identities of people that are motivated in different ways. These identities were given the titles of Builders, Caregivers, Reward-Driven, Thinkers, and Achievers. Now, Gostick and Elton surveyed adults, and their identities were built from this study of 850,000 adults and what motivated them. Much, if not all, of their findings applies to children, also.

Builders, for example, like having a purpose, and like it when their work matters. They tend to work well in groups, too. Likewise, caregivers, may like working in groups for a different reason: They are very social and are motivated to make things better for others. Achievers may pick the toughest goals, with an eye on accomplishment; they see the achievement as their reward. Thinkers like to solve problems on their own.

Teachers who are challenged to motivate their students in new ways may find effective solutions in studying these traits and applying these identities to students – without telling them directly. For example, give a thinker a choice of assignments so they feel more in control of their environment. A builder may get a huge boost of confidence by being asked to help a fellow student with an assignment during class. Place a caregiver in charge of distributing materials for a lesson and see how positively they react to this new responsibility.

A builder at heart

I had a student in class who would never get his homework done. He was up out of his chair constantly. You know these kids: They’re really smart, but they’re not turning their work in. One day I had the class doing independent work, and I was going from student to student to help them out. One student, Danny, needed extra help, Jimmy was already bouncing around the room, and there was only one of me. I said, “Jimmy, I know you know how to do this. Would you mind helping Danny? Would you show him how to do it?”

What happened next was incredible. It was one of those things as a teacher where you go, “Wow!” Jimmy immediately sat down with Danny, and he performed like the best teacher in the world. The two of them sat there, completely focused, for the rest of the period. He helped Danny get all the work done – the whole assignment, even though he didn’t do his own.

It left me with a bit of a dilemma in grading Jimmy. Should I give them the same grade? Both their names were on the paper; they both did the assignment. Ultimately I gave Jimmy the same grade because I felt it would be a real motivator for him, although other teachers might answer that question differently.

That AHA! Teaching moment happened before I’d read What Motivates Me, but after reading the book I realized that Jimmy was either a builder or a caregiver. And on that day, I’d hit on exactly what motivated him to do the work.

Trying new motivational tools

Gostick and Elton’s book includes a motivator assessment, which is also available online – so teachers can try it out for themselves and look over the detailed descriptions about each personality type. It could help foster some ideas on motivating students with different personalities. (I’m including a non-affiliate discount code for the assessment at the end of this article.)

In a time-starved classroom, trying out new motivational tools may be difficult. Teachers might work in alternative creative assignments and responsibilities as best they can. Possibly, motivate and engage students by providing optional assignments or responsibilities as extra credit.

Remember that no child fits exactly into one motivator identity, and each will respond differently to assignments. They may not blossom when peer tutoring, for example, but might show real confidence and motivation when participating in a group assignment.

If you have students that you know are smart, but aren’t working for the grade, can they be motivated another way that doesn’t revolve around testing and grades? Is there some other way to reach them? It’s worth a try. And now, finally, there’s a tool to help you get a better handle on what motivates your students. 

For a $5.00 discount, use the coupon code: Fitzell5

Sources:

Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton, What Motivates Me: Put Your Passions to Work (The Culture Works, Sept. 2014)

Susan Fitzell, Motivating Students to Achieve Success (Cogent Catalyst Publications, March 2014)

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The post Why Grades are the Wrong Motivator: Motivate Students According to Who They Are appeared first on Susan Fitzell.

We all know how important engagement is to helping students learn and retain information. Yet motivating students to engage in a lesson is a constant challenge.

In the past, I’ve offered some examples of ways to motivate students by including them actively in the learning process. However, I LOVE to share examples I’ve learned from teachers like you who are in the trenches and doing this great work every day. Here’s some of their ideas for how they build enthusiasm for learning in their students.

The bubble gum machine
Ricki Miller keeps a bubble gum machine in the classroom. Instead of gum, it’s filled with plastic containers. Each container has a slip of paper in it, with a reward written on the paper such as “Sit with a friend for a day,” “Homework pass,” and so on.

Students earn “coins” when they participate in class, and these coins give them chances at the bubble gum machine.

Act it out
Some lessons that we have to teach are on dry topics. There’s no getting around it. However, Karen McKibbin of Niles High School in Michigan uses an interesting approach to hooking her students in to the topic.

When she’s teaching about the states of matter, she arranges the classroom desks in the shape of a beaker. The students in her classroom stand inside the “beaker” and are given instruction to behave as if they are particles of a solid, a liquid, or a gas. McKibbin then provides the “energy” to change the “particles” to a different state, while students act out the way they think a state of matter would change.

In another example, a journalism teacher (who didn’t want to share their name) told me that students in the class learn how to conduct an interview and write a news article by acting out a press conference. One student plays the part of the person being interviewed and the other students practice being reporters. After the “press conference,” students write an article or press release based on what they learned from interviewing their fellow student.

Are you willing to share your techniques for engaging students? Please share in the comments below, or email me your examples. I’d love to include your examples in a future blog post!

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The post How to Motivate Students and Keep Them Enthusiastic About Learning appeared first on Susan Fitzell.

I’ve worked with several students with autism spectrum disorder who seem impossible to motivate. No matter how hard I try, no matter how much research I do, and no matter how many plans we come up with, I have still been unable to help these students make progress.   Are there any uncommon or outside-the-box strategies that could help me motivate students?

Answer:  Because each ASD student is unique, it’s difficult to provide a specific answer without knowing each student’s specific situation. However, there are resources and general advice out there.

I also reached out to other teachers of students with ASD to get their thoughts and advice, and they offered compelling answers, which I’ve lightly edited for clarity.

Sue Izeman, Behavioral Psychologist:

Students with ASD are less likely than typically-developing students (or students with other disabilities) to “buy in” to the social dynamic of school. It’s not that they “don’t care” what other people think, it’s just that other people’s interests are not enough to motivate them. They are motivated by the things that interest them and sometimes motivated by “rules.”

I know one student who knows that the goal of school is to “learn everything about everything” and another who wants the good grades, but neither of them, as far as I can tell, has made the connection between HS grades and college, for example, or the connection between HS study and long-term goals. A third boy I know is very hard to motivate. He likes what he likes and cannot be pushed to do more than minimum in things he doesn’t like.

I don’t know what strategies have already been tried in the situation you describe, but the best strategies are ones that either tie into a student’s interests or that are built on “rules” rather than rewards.

Anne Salerno, M.A., Special Education Teacher:

There are many layers to this question in order for it to be answered appropriately:

• What type of classes are the students in? General education classes or self-contained?
• What are you trying to teach?
• What is the goal for each student: HS grad, college bound, CDOS, vocational?
• How much support do they have – aides, teaching assistants, etc.?
• What are the students’ interests? Can you use those interests as a reward? For example, “If you complete your work, you can use your phone.”

As Sue mentioned, students with autism are not motivated in the same way as students without autism. You need to find the “hook” that gets them motivated and interested.

Kathy Wheeler Wright, Educational Consultant:

Using the terms “what’s important to” and “what’s important for” is often helpful.  (See Person Centered Assessment and Planning, http://cdd.unm.edu/pfe/a-to-z/person-centered-assessment-tools.html)

• Example: Watching YouTube videos is important to the student … so it’s important for student to complete a, b and c tasks.
• Example: Having quiet time is important to the student … so it’s important for student to spend 15 minutes in group.
• Example: Working at a job site is important to the student … so it’s important that the student demonstrates appropriate behavior.

Karolina Przewloka LaBreque, PhD, Behavioral Consultant:

Do an assessment to find out what the student is like. Find out:

• What is the level of work? It could be way above their current level. Remember that they’ve experienced failure multiple times since high school.
• Have the students consulted a behavior analyst?
• What’s in their IEP?
• Get guidance from someone certified in Child Centered Applied Behavioral Analysis.

And as hard as it is to accept, there are some kids that just can’t be motivated to do school work no matter what you do. They are motivated, just not motivated for what the school wants them to do.

Resources:

In addition to the above suggestions from teachers and consultants, there are resources available to help you research your students’ specific situation and try new strategies to catch their interest and motivate them to work toward a goal, whether short- or long-term. Here are a few:

Person Centered Assessment Tools listed by the University of New Mexico Center for Development and Disability (mentioned above by Kathy Wheeler Wright)

Motivating Students Who Have Autism Spectrum Disorders, at the Indiana Resource Center for Autism

Strategies to Increase Engagement and Motivation, by Autism Spectrum Australia (Word document download)

Using Special Interests to Motivate and Engage Students by Sue Larkey (PDF)

Which Behavior Therapy Works Best for Children With Autism? by Christine O’Rourke-Lang and Mark Bertin, M.D.

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The post Dear Susan – Motivate Students with ASD appeared first on Susan Fitzell.