How does a teacher motivate students to do well in academics, form good study habits and prevent irresponsible and demotivated students from falling through the cracks? My main question for inquiry has to do with just that: learning to find underlying causes of bad study habits and lack of motivation in students and encourage them to pursue academics. For the time that I spent at my practicum school for my short practicum, planning and teaching lessons as many times as I could throughout, I witnessed a few students in my Social Studies and English class not handing in assignments and standing at seven percent in the class. There mid term report cards cut off date is in one week and the students are now scrambling to pass the class by handing in all there missed work as soon as they can. I find it interesting that these students are only concerned with barely passing the class instead of excelling in the subject or even trying. They were not organized whatsoever and after scrambling to figure things out with the teacher, returned to their seats only to continue talking to their friends and going on their phone. Why is that the case? How can I as a teacher motivate these types of students in class?   I believe that in order to be a great teacher, that is able to inspire students to engage in inquiry, be curious about learning new things, and doing well in school, I need to learn ways to earn the trust of such students, find out what the underlying reasons behind lack of motivation and disorganization in students, and then motivate and make them feel comfortable with making mistakes so that they grow as individuals and in their academics.

On a broader scale, I want to focus on learning more about how I can motivate irresponsible, unorganized, and demotivated students, but more specifically, I would like to focus more on learned helplessness and fixed mindsets in students who believe that they do not need to do well in school because they have decided they do not want to go to post secondary school or because they are too lazy and disorganized to care. There is lack of responsibility and appreciation for learning and that is something I really want to explore. Why do some students not care? Is it their age? Is it a fixed mindset that they have; that they will never do well and so are afraid to try. Is it because of the fear of failure? Is it because they have career goals that fall outside of the realm of academics? There are so many reasons why a student may not care about school. However, I will focus on how learned helplessness and fixed mindsets contribute to this kind of careless attitude towards school.

What can I learn from other sources? In McDevitt and Ormrod’s Child Development and Education, suggest that children who encounter a consistent string of failures become more pessimistic about their chances for future success. These children underestimate their ability, set goals they can easily accomplish, avoid challenges that might enhance their learning, and respond to failure in  ways that almost guarantee failure (McDevitt & Ormrod, 2016, p. 414). This might be a reason why students do not feel the need to care about school; they may just feel that they should set the lowest expectations for themselves so that they do not face failure and disappointment. They also discuss intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and the advantages intrinsic motivation (motivation by factors within themselves or inherent in a task they are performing) has for students. Intrinsic motivated students are eager to learn classroom material, willingly tackle assigned tasks, use effective learning strategies, and achieve at high levels (McDevitt & Ormrod, 2016, p. 401). This literature makes me wonder how intrinsic motivation can be brought about in students who have inhabited learned helplessness and how developing a positive student-teacher relationship can affect a student’s willingness to learn and do well in class. In a different piece of literature focusing on the fundamentals of learning, Dumont, Istance, and Benavides mention the importance of emotion and motivation as gatekeepers of learning. Positive emotions encourage long term recall while negative emotions can disrupt the learning process in the brain. Positive emotions help students become aware of their motivation systems leading them to becoming more effective learners(Dumant, Istance, & Benavides, 2012, p. 4). There are so many factors that affect how well a student learns at school and why a student would not care to be in a classroom, take responsibility for their learning, and care to do well. All these pieces of literature suggest reasons why learned helplessness can develop in students and how it can be combated. However, I also want to consider students whose career goals or aspirations fall outside of the realm of academics. What about students who want to become an actor, or a musician, or who are interested in taking over their family business, or who pretty much only care for one subject and neglect other subjects. How does a teacher motivate those students to care about their education? Perhaps giving the student an extrinsic source of motivation would work better in these situations. Woolfolk and Perry in Child and Adolescent Development suggest that teacher quality, instructional practices, and zero tolerance approaches to school and classroom management are some factors that influence whether a student stays in school or drops out. So I wonder whether improving on these aspects would motivate students who do not care about academics to do better in their classes.

This significance of motivating students with learned helplessness and fixed mindsets does not only apply to a social studies classroom but can be applied to all academic areas where students do not feel the need to try and do well. In a classroom where there are students present who do not care for school and doing well, especially when their path in life is outside of studying academics, how would a teacher bring about curiosity, interest, passion, and engagement for a topic? This will be the main focus of my inquiry for the coming months.

 

References

McDevitt, T.M. & Ormrod, J.E. (2013). Child Development and Education (6^th ed.). New York, New York: Pearson.

Woolfolk, A. & Perry, N.E. (2012). Child and Adolescent Development (2^nd ed.).  New York, New York: Pearson.

Dumont, Hanna, Istance, David and Francisco Benavides. (2012). The Nature of Learning: Using Research to Inspire Practice. Practitioner Guide. OECD.