I found this chapter (Chapter 8 – Motivation and Learning)
to be a little bit disappointing. As a teacher of college students, motivation
has been a problem for me as long as I have been teaching. I was hoping that
this chapter would give me some good insights into how to handle this issue.
Most of my students are in the process of moving into the role of adult
learner, but haven’t necessarily completely made the transition. Many of them
do not have the life experience or work experience that the authors and the
studies that they cited recommend the teachers of adult learners use to
motivate. It isn’t possible to make connection to their real world situations
because most, if not all, have never had real world situations that can be used
to relate the topics to. I know that this is a generalization, but I have been
teaching long enough to know that it holds true for a lot of my students. I do
try to use relatable situations wherever I can when I am teaching, there just
aren’t necessarily a lot of them.
When I was searching online for information on motivating
college students I came across some interesting insights. In his blog “Millar
Fillmore’s Bathtub,” history teacher Ed Darrell argues that teachers can’t
motivate students, the students must motivate themselves. The best that a
teacher can do is to “remove barriers to motivation, or help a student find
motivation. But motivation cannot be external to the person acting (Darrell,
2013).” He bases this assertion on an article by Frederick Herzberg in the Harvard Business Review called “One More
Time: How Do You Motivate Employees?” In this article de discusses how the KITA
(Kick In The A--) method of motivation isn’t motivation at all – it is
movement.
He defines incentive programs as positive KITAs (Herzberg,
2003). While his suggestions are specifically for the workplace, some of his
suggestions can be translated to education. The factors that lead to job
satisfaction (achievement, recognition, work itself, responsibility,
advancement and growth) could all be adapted to varying degrees as could his
principles of vertical job loading (Herzberg, 2003). His principles of vertical
job loading are given in the table below:
While the suggestions made by Derrell and Herzberg still
aren’t completely relevant to the motivating of young adults, they seem more reasonable
than many of the models suggested in the text. I am going to keep them in mind
when I am redesigning my course for this summer.
References
Darrell, E. (2013, October 18). Again: Motivation 101 – How
NOT to. Retrieved March 21, 2015, from https://timpanogos.wordpress.com/tag/motivation/
Herzberg, F. (2003, January 1). One more time: How do you
motivate employees? Harvard Business Rview. Retrieved March 20, 2015,
from https://hbr.org/2003/01/one-more-time-how-do-you-motivate-employees
Jenny, what a difficult question to answer....I suppose we need to look to areas where WE were not as motivated to see what helped that to change - of it did......and it is difficult to make learning relevant for students with no job experience or for those who do not know what they want to do.
ReplyDeleteIt is this very lack of motivation, unfortunately, that puts them at risk for dropping out of college......
Jenny,
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with the finding you reported from Darrell, 2013 – “The best that a teacher can do is to ‘remove barriers to motivation, or help a student find motivation. But motivation cannot be external to the person acting.’” It reminds me of the proverb about being able to lead a horse to water, but not being able to make him drink. There’s only so much instructors can do to motivate students and the rest is up to them. After assisting with the first year experience for several years I’ve seen a lot of the same students you do in your courses. I’m convinced that some of them just aren’t ready for college and no matter what we do, we can’t change that fact.
The resource I found to supplement your post is from the Teaching and Learning Magna publication. I like these because they are short and to the point, but useful. This particular resource is titled “Nine Strategies to Spark Adult Students’ Intrinsic Motivation” and offers instructional strategies and intrinsic motivators. Some of the suggestions have been mentioned by you such as encouraging students to draw from past experiences, but other instruction-related strategies might prove to be helpful, even with newly minted adult learners. I think numbers 4, 5, and 6 are especially helpful with younger adult learners including providing real life applications, visual aids, field trips, and guest speakers. The one con of this resource is that while it offers great theoretical ideas it doesn’t point the reader to concrete material to use in the classroom. However, a simple Google search produces some relevant results. Additionally, the website MERLOT (Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching) contains a lot of searchable materials. (http://www.merlot.org/merlot/index.htm)
Reference:
Battista, L. & Ruble, V. (2014). Nine Strategies to Spark Adult Students’ Intrinsic Motivation. Magna publications. Retrieved on Mar 27, 2015 from http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/teaching-and-learning/nine-strategies-to-spark-adult-students-intrinsic-motivation/
Jenny,
ReplyDeleteI, too, agree with the thought that one of the few things an instructor can do to motivate students is help remove some of the barriers to learning. However, I also believe that finding meaningful activities and exercise to help student connect with the content they are learning is also a motivational factor.
As I reviewed this weeks readings and videos on motivation the Goal Orientation Theory resonated with me. I found that the "MUSIC" acronym is very effective when dealing with students.
eMpowerment - Allowing students to have control over their learning; Usefulness - Helping students to understand why the content is useful; Success - Helping students to see that they can succeed, if they put forth the effort; Interest - keeping students interested and engaged and Caring - Letting students know that the instructor cares about whether or not they meet the course objectives.
In short, I found this interesting piece of information that I believe summarizes how instructors can help to motivate students as they teach their courses. When students find positive value in a learning goal or activity, expect to successfully achieve a desired learning outcome, and perceive support from their environment, they are likely to be strongly motivated to learn (Ambrose, Bridges, Lovett, DiPietro, & Norman, 2010, p.5).
References:
Goal Orientation Theories v1. (n.d.). Retrieved March 3, 2015, from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iONas7_9q34
Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, M. W., Lovett, M. C., DiPietro, M., & Norman, M. K. (2010). How Learning Works: 7 Research-Based Principles for Smart Teaching. San Francisco, CA: Josey-Bass.