Justin Boehringer

Walking into my practicum school on the first day of my two week practicum, I was excited to be returning to the school that I had spent my high school years at. It was going to be a unique experience for me as I knew the majority of the teachers, I knew where all the classes were, and my two school advisors had both taught me at some point throughout high school. R.E. Mountain secondary school is involved in the International Baccalaureate (IB) Program where students can enroll in courses that are designed to be at a first year university level. Upon completion of these courses students receive university credit that can be transferred to a university or college. The IB program spans the course of two years, through grade 11 and grade 12. In grades 8, 9, and 10 students who intend to enter the IB Program are enrolled in honours courses. These honours courses are designed to prepare students for the IB program and cover the same material as a regular class would. The Social Studies 11H class is composed of grade 10 students who are planning to enter the IB Program but first need to complete the BC ministrys required curriculum as the IB Socials class moves beyond the standard curriculum so the students can receive university credit. For my practicum I will be teaching two regular Socials 11 classes as well as two Socials 11H classes.

My inquiry project evolved out of the first few discussions I had with my SA who has these four classes and is passing them on to me for my practicum. One of the first things my SA told me was that the honours students are motivated to learn and it doesnt take a lot of effort to get them to do what you ask of them. This was good to hear as getting students motivated to do what you ask of them is probably one of the more difficult things to do and often leads to the most stress for a pre-service teacher. After hearing this my SA then told me that the biggest difference I will see between the honours classes and the regular classes is the motivation. The regular students he told me are more apathetic towards the school work and are just here because they have to be here; the students dont have the same intrinsic motivation that the honours students have. My SA summed it up by describing the process with the regular classes needing a lot more coaxing and convincing while the honours classes will follow your lead and enjoy it at the same time. My SA did tell me though that the descriptions of these classes are generalized and there are a few intrinsically motivated students in the regular classes and there are a few students lacking the intrinsic motivation that others have in the honours classes. I myself was one of the intrinsically motivated students in one of his regular classes when I had him as a teacher for

Justin Boehringer

my History 12 course. So my question then became centered around motivation and how students either become motivated or unmotivated and what is the teachers role in both of these cases. I then focused more closely on the question: Are some students naturally unmotivated? Or do students become unmotivated due to teacher practice? I got really into the idea of this question as it kind of resembles the philosophical question what came first: the chicken or the egg? The new thought coming out of the research around the idea of motivation is that all students are motivated and there is no such thing as a student with no motivation. Barbara R. Blackburn is one of these researchers who believes that humans are all motivated by something (Blackburn 89). This is a concept that needs to be understood in order to go further with the idea that no student has no motivation. When a teacher encounters a student perceived to be unmotivated it is actually that the student is very motivated - but that motivation is currently directed at not being in your class (Blackburn 90). A teacher will never be able to make a student be motivated but a teacher can create an environment in the class and in the lesson where a student is more likely to direct their motivation to the class (Blackburn 91). A teacher needs to remember that all students are motivated - you just

have to figure out what causes them to react (Blackburn 93). These ideas from Blackburn support the side of my question that all students are in fact motivated and it then becomes the teachers responsibility to establish an environment where the student becomes more inclined to direct their inherent motivation in the direction the teacher wants. Blackburns idea of motivation is related to Eric Jensens belief that there is no such thing as an unmotivated student. There are, however, students in unmotivated states (A.A. Karim). Jensen is one to believe - like Blackburn - that all students have an inherent motivation inside them and that no student is unmotivated. It is common knowledge, Jensen believes, that different students will have varying levels of motivation (Jensen 102). This can easily be seen everyday by teachers as some students will finish a worksheet in 5 mins without saying a word while others will take 20 mins to finish maybe half. A teacher following the concept of students being in unmotivated states must then undertake the task of moving that student into a better mental and emotional state where a desired pool of potential behaviors exist; these behaviors usually relating to working and learning (Jensen 109). So motivating students becomes an issue of state management rather then behavior management (Jensen 109). Teachers need to remember that part of the motivation

Justin Boehringer

problem develops from the way we treat students and motivation is not an issue isolated within the student (Jensen 111). Teachers who are often saying Todays students just arent as motivated as I was when I was in school, Jensen has something we should all remember:

First, remember you are the person who survived and made it through school, so youre not exactly part of a random population sample. Second, many students who do not appear to be highly motivated in school turn out to de well in life. Finally, there is plenty that you can do to reduce the problem of low student motivation (Jensen 103).

Something we should keep in mind when teaching is to not keep asking how can I motivate students? but instead ask, In what ways is the brain naturally motivated from within? (Jensen 111). This question can then revolutionize how a teacher looks at creating a classroom environments and daily lesson plans. The blog Dropout Nation takes a more aggressive stance on the problem of motivation in classroom. When teachers and schools say they can only do so much if a student is unwilling to sit down and open their books, Dropout Nation feels that this theory is pure hogwash (Dropout Nation).

When adults declare that kids arent motivated to learn, they essentially fail to consider if their curricula lacks rigor and relevance, if their instruction is of low-quality and lacks subject-matter competency, that they dont care enough for the lives and futures of their students, and if the cultures they have created in schools are mediocre and dont nurture the inherent capacities of the kids (Dropout Nation).

Blaming students for the failures of adults who are unwilling to greatly improve their instructional practices and administrations unwilling to change aspects of public education needs to stop (Dropout Nation). This is a very aggressive stance taken against teachers and the school system that is in place today. Putting the responsibility on the teacher is in line with Blackburns and Jensens theory that all students are motivated and it is the teacher who needs to access that motivation by creating an environment where the student wants to do the work. Another researcher who supports the thought that all students are motivated is McCarty and Frank who looks at humans as a whole and relates that to students in the classroom. All humans are motivated by their unmet needs or unfulfilled wants (McCarty and Frank 2). So a teacher can make their students feel that they have an unmet need in the content area to motivate them to fill that gap by learning in class.

Justin Boehringer

Something to remember in the classroom is that someone else can not give you motivation. Inner motivation needs to be tapped into and accessed (McCarty and Frank 5). A teacher can access this inner motivation by bringing in the ideas that Jensen and Blackburn had where to set up an environment where tapping inner motivation becomes easier. McCarty and Frank sums up the idea by saying the important fact to remember is: everyone is motivated by something. If you can determine what the major motivations are in [the] class, you can become a motivational teacher (McCarty and Frank 5). While these previous researchers have presented the thought that all students are motivated, there are others who feel that motivation is something different. People often refer to motivation as a personal quality and describe some students as motivated and others as unmotivated (NAP 33). This is where teachers can get stuck in a rut with their own philosophical ideas on student motivation. Karim highlights this by believing the problem is more prevalent in a teacher-centered classroom environment, i.e., the traditional lecture method in which teacher/lecturer talk and students listen (Karim). Teachers who believe motivation is a personal quality usually prefer to teach

students who they perceive to be self-motivated (NAP 33). The unmotivated student is the one whose attitude toward schoolwork screams, I dont care! (Shore). These are some points that counter the new wave of theory on motivation and provide a debate within the discipline. There are many techniques a teacher can keep in mind to establish an environment where a students mental state is ideal for motivation. Rewards and punishments are too often the only tools available to a teacher when trying to motivate students (Raffini 1). This can be clearly seen when entering a lot of high school classrooms today, where there is little motivation happening beyond the final grades at the end of term. I think we can all agree that the best and easiest way to motivate students involves creating long-term intrinsic motivation where the teacher is no longer a necessary part in the motivation process (Jensen 103). But as ideal as this sounds it is very difficult to achieve, luckily there are still things we can do to strive for this ideal. One common theme throughout the literature is the idea that students need to taste success, and build on that success, to have their motivation to continue to be directed towards school work (Shore, Marshall 109, S4T, Wright

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2). All teachers should understand this when it comes to assessment and marking because it can have a great affect on a students intrinsic motivation. Giving students a sense of choice in assignments and classroom activities is another popular way to generate students intrinsic motivation as they feel that they have some control when it comes to their education (Shore, Jensen 107). Putting responsibility back into the teachers hands, there is a strong feeling coming out of the research that a teacher can always make a lesson more interesting; changing up teaching styles that connect with a teenagers need for fun is key to creating a state where a student will be motivated to learn (Shore, Raffini 231, Wright 7). Creating a class room environment/state where it is a safe place to take risks, has low stress, and high challenge is an ideal way to generate student intrinsic motivation for learning (Jensen 107, S4T). Dropout Nation again brings forward an aggressive stance on what the ideal is for a student to develop intrinsic motivation; you can put any child in an environment filled with high-quality teachers, strong school leaders, rigorous curricula, caring adults and cultures of genius, and that child will thrive and achieve their potential (Dropout Nation). This is of course easier said

then done but provides a great target, saying that educators should be shooting for the stars and not the tree tops. It took me some time to decipher through all of the research that I found but I was able to see a noticeable consensus that confirmed my initial belief that all students were in fact motivated and it was largely teacher practice that was allowing students to become unmotivated. I feel being a student teacher that is very recently out of high school, it has helped me understand a lot from the point of view of students. I also have the unique experience of being a student teacher at the high school where I graduated from and have had my School Advisor as a teacher, so I have observed his teaching style as well as experienced his teaching style. These two factors are what generated the initial idea of teacher practice being the key issue for student motivation. The research has widely supported my initial belief while also turning me onto new ideas. Jensens idea of students needing to be in the right state to have the desired behaviour is one that I will definitely carry with me through my education career. Thinking of behaviour management as state management gives me a clear picture on

Justin Boehringer

how I can formulate my class and daily lessons to get a desired behaviour out of my students. I had completed an education course in first term this school year that covered the topic of motivation, so going into this inquiry I didnt think I would be surprised by very much and I didnt think I would discover a whole lot of new information. After completing the extensive research for this project I was pleasently surprised at all the new information I uncovered as it made me feel more confident in my abilities to become a motivational teacher for my practicum and career. Going into a classroom and knowing that every single one of my students in there are going to be motivated changes how I will approach that class. State management is something new that I learnt through the research that I really like. Creating an environment where the potential pool of behaviours are positive intrinsic motivation behaviours is a very new theory of motivational teaching that I want to adopt wholeheartedly in my teaching practice. A second point of research that is a strong compliment to the idea of state management is the idea that one cannot give someone else motivation. This new idea only added to my feelings of the state management concept as they are very

similar and can be paired together easily for a teacher to view their classroom. For many teachers it is probably hard to believe that all of their students are motivated because many teachers look out to the desks and see apathetic students uninterested in their lesson. The type of teachers who look out and see students that they perceive to be unmotivated and disinterested are the same teachers who are not using engaging teaching techniques where the students feel like theyre having fun while learning. The research provided me with a lot of new ideas that I am glad I found as it has made me feel better quipped to become a motivational teacher in the classroom. Prior notions I had heading into this inquiry was that there really wasnt too many reasons for a student to be unmotivated or in a an unmotivated state. I felt that if a student was going to be unmotivated it was because they were disinterested in the course material or they were tired of being in class. My reason for believing this was because those were the reasons that I became unmotivated in a classroom. I became unmotivated in math class because I was very disinterested in the course material. In morning classes after late night hockey games I was easily unmotivated to contribute anything to the class or

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partake in class debates. The research though showed me pretty much the complete opposite of what I initially thought, there is any number of different ways that can lead a student into entering an unmotivated state. Some of the reasons I hadnt thought of (besides ones already mentioned) include: Student becoming unmotivated because the effort needed to complete the assignment seems too great; the student is unmotivated because he or she fails to see an adequate pay-off to doing the assigned work; the student is unmotivated because of lack of confidence that he or she can do the assigned work; the student is unmotivated because he or she lacks a positive relationship with the teacher (Wright 5, 10, 13, 16). These are just a few ways that the research has noted as being reasons for students to become unmotivated in the classroom and behaviours that I will consider when I see a student in an unmotivated state. Motivation to me was a concept that I had only spent about an hour and a half discussing in a class from term 1. This inquiry has given me the opportunity to further understand a key piece to being a teacher. The Jensen reading that I used for my research is one that I feel every student teacher should read

before going into practicum as his argument for a state management idea of motivation, was so clearly explained and can provide a sense of empowerment for new teachers going into the system. The research helped me get over a lot of the unknowns I had in regards to the mindset of a high school student. Being a motivational teacher that can get students engaged in the subject matter, providing an environment where students can go away with extrinsic motivation but instead look into their own intrinsic motivation, and making the classroom a place where students want to be and learn.
Works Cited Blackburn, Barbara R.. Classroom motivation from A to Z: how to engage your students in learning. Larchmont, N.Y.: Eye On Education, 2005. Print. Engaging schools: fostering high school students' motivation to learn.. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 2004. Print. Jensen, Eric. Teaching with the brain in mind. Alexandria, Va.: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 1998. Print. Karim, A.A.. "One Stop Learning: November 2010." One Stop Learning. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Jan. 2013. <http://onestoplearning.blogspot.ca/2010_11_01_archive.html>. Marshall, Jeff C.. Overcoming student apathy: motivating students for academic success. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Education, 2008. Print. McCarty, Hanoch, and Frank Siccone. Motivating your students: before you can teach them, you have to reach them. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2001. Print.

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Raffini, James P.. 150 ways to increase intrinsic motivation in the classroom. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1996. Print. Shore, Ken. "Education World: The Unmotivated Student ." Education World: The Educator's Best Friend. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Jan. 2013. <http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/shore/shore060.shtml>. "There Are No Unmotivated Students | Dropout Nation: Coverage of the Reform of American Public Education Edited by RiShawn Biddle." Dropout Nation: Coverage of the Reform of American Public Education Edited by RiShawn Biddle | Coverage of the Reform of American Public Education Edited by RiShawn Biddle. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Jan. 2013. <http://dropoutnation.net/2010/12/25/no-unmotivated-students/>. "Why are Students Unmotivated?." Success 4 Teachers. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Jan. 2013. <www.success4teachers.com/Why%20are%20students%20unmotivated.pdf>. Wright, Jim. "Six Reasons Why Students Are Unmotivated (and What Teachers Can Do)." RTI Toolkit: A Practical Guide for Schools. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Jan. 2013. <www.fehb.org/CSE/CCSEConference2012/wright_CCSE_Conference_Breakou t_Motiv_Students_15_Mar_2012.pdf>.