Class+2+Reflection+(September+1)

= Am I Motivated? =

Todays class we focused a lot on motivation. As a student, I was always motivated when I was young, but as I started growing up, I became less motivated internally. Now it all makes sense. When we are younger, our teachers are constantly praising us for our good work, and nice attitudes, but as time went on, teacher's slowly starting stopping this motivation. For me, it didn't affect me as much, since I was always worrying about my marks, and my future, which was enough motivation for me to want to do well in school. As for the other kids, they stopped doing their homework, or working on stuff during class. They weren't motivated anymore, and it showed!

The two types of motivation are very important to recognize. Extrinsic Motivation is the kind of motivation when you get candy for handing in your homework at the end of the day. This is a good strategy sometimes, but when used constantly it can cause students to ONLY complete tasks when they will get candy! Intrinsic Motivation is when students WANT to learn, or they do their homework because they want to have good grades. This kind of motivation is good to have in a student, but how do you get all your students to have intrinsic motivation? Alfie Kohn, a public speaker and author talks a lot about this topic. He is very interesting to listen to, and all of his talks have scientific proof, but he has yet to tell his audience what to do instead of motivating students. Maybe there is no solution, and once it has started, there's no hope in turning back. Take Canada for example. If all of a sudden the government said there was no punishment, and no money for work, what would it look like?

It's funny how our whole world revolves solely around motivation (money and punishment).We only get money by working, and if we do something bad, we can be fined, go to jail, or even (in some places) be killed! It would be interesting to see how our world would look if we didn't have these laws set in place. Would it be chaos? Are these rules set for a reason? Do teachers use extrinsic motivation because it is the only way they can get their class to do anything, or do they use it to control their students? I guess every case is different, and as a teacher myself, I will have to encourage intrinsic motivation in my class. Maybe then they can have a treat :)

Heather