Classroom Motivation

Linking Research to Teacher Practice

Eric M. Anderman, Lynley H. Anderman

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000282993
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Didattica
• Subtopic: Psicologia dell'educazione

Classroom Motivation is a comprehensive introduction to the practical applications of research on academic motivation to teaching and learning. Though grounded in theory, the book is uniquely structured around instructional practices that teachers use daily in schools, such as rewards, group activities, academic tasks, student assessment, and parent interaction. This thoroughly revised third edition includes new content on interventions, mindsets, technologies, engagement, and social-emotional learning. Each chapter's case studies, application exercises, and updated empirical findings will further connect preservice teachers with motivation in practice.

1 What Is Motivation?

Few educators or parents would argue that students don’t really need to be motivated. If pressed, however, they might struggle to define exactly what motivation “is.” Even though there is almost universal agreement that student motivation is important, there is much less agreement about how to promote and support that motivation.

As you will see, motivation is a fascinating and multifaceted topic, and it can be thought of in many different ways. Consider the following examples:

Seth is a fourth-grader who hates reading. His teacher and parents say that Seth is “not motivated” when it comes to reading.

Molly is a ninth-grader who takes advanced science courses and spends a great deal of time working on science projects. Molly works hard on science because her parents give her $100 every time she brings home an A for science on her report card.

Bella is a 12th-grader who has just about given up on school. She feels that she simply doesn’t have the ability to succeed in her classes. She thinks that she is “dumb,” and she just doesn’t want to continue to struggle with academic work that she can’t handle and that she doesn’t think is important.

Ethan is a second-grader who loves school. He enjoys everything that he does at school, and he approaches everything with a positive attitude.

Nikki is a first-year college student who wonders why she is getting low grades in her first-year writing course. She used to get great grades when she was in high school, but now she wonders if that was all an act, and if she really doesn’t have the ability to be successful in college.

Christian is an eighth-grader who is in quite a few advanced courses. All of his friends are also in those courses. Christian struggles with some of the courses, but he works incredibly hard because he is terrified of being switched into the non-advanced classes, where he wouldn’t be with his friends.

Bryce is an extremely competitive 10th-grader. He likes to show everyone how smart he is; in addition, he is very concerned about not appearing “stupid” by making mistakes in front of other students.

These examples all describe different types of academic motivation. Seth and Bella are students who have motivational problems: Seth appears to dislike reading, whereas Bella doesn’t believe in her own abilities and is ready to forego her formal education. In contrast, Molly and Ethan appear to be highly motivated: Molly is motivated to work on science assignments, albeit to receive rewards provided by her parents; Ethan seems to be motivated to do anything and everything. Academic success used to be a normal part of Nikki’s school experience, but since she has transitioned into college, she has begun to question her abilities. Christian is motivated out of fear – the fear that he will not be able to be in classes with his friends if he doesn’t keep up his grades. The case of Bryce is intriguing: He seems to be motivated by competition, but he is also afraid of failing in front of others.

These examples represent different aspects of academic motivation that will be examined in this text. We could provide several examples of other motivational issues that confront students, teachers, and parents daily. Nevertheless, these examples illustrate the complexity of motivation. This book is about the multifaceted topic of academic motivation. However, the goal of this book is to make the broader topic of motivation as uncomplicated as possible. When you finish reading this book, you will understand the complexity of academic motivation, but also have some evidence-informed strategies available so that you can help to maintain and facilitate optimal motivation in your students. Also, you will probably gain some important insights into yourself and better understand what motivates you as a learner!

The Classroom Teacher and Motivation

Mrs. Fallon is a middle school principal. She is fond of stating that middle school students are “hormones with legs” and that, because of puberty and the physiological changes associated with adolescence, it is impossible to motivate teenagers. She believes that middle school is a place where students really can’t be motivated to learn (because of their physiological development), so she sees middle school as a place where students should be strictly disciplined until they get to high school, at which time they’ll be better able to control their impulses and learn.

Is there any hope for the students in Mrs. Fallon’s school? Will her negative attitudes toward adolescent motivation be mirrored in her teachers? Will her evaluations of her teachers’ performance reflect these attitudes? The answer to every one of these questions is “yes.” Negative attitudes and misperceptions about student motivation can have adverse effects on students. However, hope exists. One of the goals of this book is to highlight and correct some misconceptions about student motivation so that teachers’ instructional practices can reflect current research findings.

The Bottom Line

In this book, we explore the motivation-related issues that teachers confront daily. Although most books don’t start out with the ending, we want to mention our most important conclusion up front: Teachers can and do have an impact on student motivation! If you remember nothing else after reading this book, please remember that. You, as a teacher, will have dramatic and important effects on your students’ academic motivation.

Teachers influence student motivation in many ways: Through daily interactions with students, they influence students’ beliefs about their abilities, their attitudes toward certain subject areas, their immediate and long-term goals, their beliefs about the causes of their successes and failures, their beliefs about their limitations, and their reasons for ultimately engaging with their academic work. As you will see, the types of instructional practices that you use with your students affect their current motivation, as well as their future motivation to take additional coursework and even to enter into certain careers. A student who has very unpleasant experiences during math classes may develop such a negative view of math that she may rule out math-related careers altogether; in contrast, a student who becomes deeply interested in science may decide to take advanced science classes, participate in science-based camps and nonprofit organizations, and eventually pursue a career in science. The ways that we as teachers motivate (or don’t motivate) our students can have profound effects on the choices that students make later in life.

Short-Term and Long-Term Effects

Teachers’ interactions with their students affect both short- and long-term outcomes. Consider the following example:

Mrs. Stern is a fourth-grade teacher. She displays the math work of her highest achieving students on the bulletin boards in her classroom. She believes that this will serve as an incentive and will help to motivate some of her lower achieving students. Gabe is a student in Mrs. Stern’s class. He does not do well in math, and he resents the fact that his work is never displayed. Gabe does not exert more effort in math as a result of the bulletin board; he just gets angry when he looks up at it.

Mrs. Stern’s strategy is certainly well intentioned, but it does not have the desired positive influence on Gabe’s motivation. Let’s consider both the possible short-term and long-term effects on Gabe. In the short term, Gabe may resent his teacher and come to believe that he is not good at math, compared to other students in his class. Now imagine the effects on Gabe if he has had similar experiences with other teachers, or if he continues to have experiences of this nature in the future. Although Gabe may initially enjoy math activities, we can expect that he will gradually lose confidence in his math abilities and come to dislike math more and more each year. Gabe would probably be unlikely to consider a career involving math because his school experiences may have led him to believe that he is unable to do well. This is an unfortunate situation; nevertheless, it’s quite realistic for students like Gabe to be able to improve their confidence and competence in mathematics if placed in a motivationally supportive environment. However, if instructional practices lead Gabe and students like him to believe that they are “bad at math,” they may never realize that they might be able to learn math quite effectively, under other circumstances.

It also is important to note that some instructional practices may have different effects on individual students. For example, whereas hanging up the work of the best students did not motivate Gabe, it may have the opposite effect on other students. Some students might be positively motivated by this type of practice, and might try harder in math so that they could get their own work displayed.

If the same practices can benefit some students and hurt others, what should a teacher do? We explore those questions throughout this book, including ways that teachers can make decisions that will support the motivation of all their students.

Figure 1.1 Although many factors influence our students’ motivation, perhaps no factor is more important than the classroom teacher.

Introduction to the Theories

Much of the research on academic motivation is guided by well-developed, research-based theories. Whereas many textbooks on motivation are organized around theoretical perspectives, this text is organized around instructional practices. Rather than introducing the theories in their own chapters, the theories are integrated throughout the text.

In this chapter, we briefly introduce these theories. The brief comments about each theory are intended to simply introduce you to these perspectives. There are l...