If you are a bright, motivated 9th grader, which combination of courses should you take? Algebra I, English, Human Geography Geometry, Honors English, Human Geography Geometry, Honors English, AP Human Geography Calculus, Honors English, AP Human Geography Option A would be typical in many high schools, but in my experience it’s too easy for most…
Read MoreAll articles filed in student motivation
You might be surprised who is engaged
What can you do with a student who resists your efforts to engage him, scoffs at your thoughtfully planned assignments and slyly undermines you in class, without ever doing anything overt enough to warrant discipline? I’ve been working on that puzzle for years, with varying degrees of success. Sometimes, the best you can do is…
Read MoreHer math problem? Chronic boredom
Here is how Clara, a 7th grader in Rhode Island, says she spends each day in math class: 50% Doodling, working ahead, doing homework for my other classes, or reading 25% Doing pointless work (that’s the “math”) 15% Spacing out 5% Talking 5% Listening “Sometimes I just watch the clock or think about the book…
Read MoreGrades: Not the motivation we want
If the question is “Do rewards motivate students?” the answer is, “Absolutely, they motivate students to get rewards.” – Alfie Kohn Last week, after several days spent learning about operant conditioning and behaviorism, my AP Psych students read Alfie Kohn’s 1994 article, “The Risks of Rewards.” In this article, Kohn argues that rewards are as…
Read MoreThe technology that could replace us
Most of the claims that new technology will make teachers obsolete are patently false. TED Talks, MOOCs (Massive Online Open Courses), educational videos, vast online databases and typical educational apps and games simply cannot replace an effective teacher in a classroom. But that doesn’t mean that nothing can. The technology tools with the greatest potential…
Read MoreWould you give out all As?
What would happen this year if I tossed out all of my rubrics, test scores and grading scales and just granted As to all of my students? Would my classroom become a utopia, where students — free from the rat-race of chasing grades — would engage in learning for the pure love of it? Or…
Read MoreThey might not be paying attention
If you could secretly observe each of your students during class one day, what would you see them doing? I hope I would see my students all on task, listening intently to me (or their classmates), contributing to discussions, taking thorough notes, working collaboratively during group time, and getting the most they can out of…
Read MoreThe “why” matters
We don’t talk enough about relevance. In one study of more than 300 teachers, motivation researcher Jere Brophy found that only 1.7 percent of them clearly explained the relevance of their lessons to students. The rest may have assumed that relevance doesn’t matter; after all, the students are required to learn this stuff. But it…
Read MoreMake them care
When I was an education reporter years ago, a school administrator in Kansas told me this: A major problem in education is that most teachers liked being students. You may wonder why that’s bad. Would we really want people who hated school to be put in charge? The problem is: Consciously or unconsciously, we teachers…
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MARTHA RUSH 