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Motivation is one of those things that changes with each student. The primary motivation is a teacher students can trust. We, as teachers, need to build a relationship with each student. Sometimes, students come from backgrounds that don't allow them to trust us - we must find a way. There are others that trust us too much, we must find the balance. Some students want to please the teacher, some students want to eat lunch, some students want a reward, other students want to see that the teacher is fair. We are constantly being evaluated by our students. Finding out who they are and what motivates them to learn is one way to ensure learning. The community feel becomes a key factor for success throughout the year.
Horn & Staker make a point in the text to highlight the importance of student choice. The student must decide they are going to learn. The Summit School video that accompanied the text showed maximized student choice. This community clearly bought into the culture that the district was trying to create. This would be quite a shift in the educational setting of students, but blending offers traditional classrooms a shift towards this design. In my own classroom students would prefer to work on Khan Academy for digital content than ALEKS. In my opinion, this is because Khan Academy is directed specifically at the readiness level of the student. I assign students a list of skills that they are ready to learn. ALEKS is a district mandated digital content and I must create student motivation for this content. Creating motivation looks different for each student. One of the rewards for ALEKS completion, is to get to work in Khan for the rest of the week when digital content is the focus.
Giving students control of which video they are selecting, and which content they are learning, is giving them the opportunity to choose their learning. It doesn't matter that they are choosing from an already listed set of objectives, they still feel a sense of choice and ownership. I'm working to develop lessons that allow students the same kind of choices. Aligning my curriculum to student choice will be one way to ensure success in my classroom, but finding the time to implement the changes is going to be challenging. Finding the strength to endure the change, and all the uncertainty that goes with change will be a challenge for me, however I am motivated to make this change for the success of my students. Hopefully, having a teacher they see motivated to make changes for their success, will motivate them to "hire" me for the position of teacher, and ultimately, all parties will be more successful at their job.
Horn & Staker make a point in the text to highlight the importance of student choice. The student must decide they are going to learn. The Summit School video that accompanied the text showed maximized student choice. This community clearly bought into the culture that the district was trying to create. This would be quite a shift in the educational setting of students, but blending offers traditional classrooms a shift towards this design. In my own classroom students would prefer to work on Khan Academy for digital content than ALEKS. In my opinion, this is because Khan Academy is directed specifically at the readiness level of the student. I assign students a list of skills that they are ready to learn. ALEKS is a district mandated digital content and I must create student motivation for this content. Creating motivation looks different for each student. One of the rewards for ALEKS completion, is to get to work in Khan for the rest of the week when digital content is the focus.
Giving students control of which video they are selecting, and which content they are learning, is giving them the opportunity to choose their learning. It doesn't matter that they are choosing from an already listed set of objectives, they still feel a sense of choice and ownership. I'm working to develop lessons that allow students the same kind of choices. Aligning my curriculum to student choice will be one way to ensure success in my classroom, but finding the time to implement the changes is going to be challenging. Finding the strength to endure the change, and all the uncertainty that goes with change will be a challenge for me, however I am motivated to make this change for the success of my students. Hopefully, having a teacher they see motivated to make changes for their success, will motivate them to "hire" me for the position of teacher, and ultimately, all parties will be more successful at their job.