The Importance Of Motivation In Education

If students are rewarded for quality schoolwork, grades may initially improve. They may show more excitement. However, in the article “Why You Shouldn’t Pay Children for Grades” by Amy Mccready, it is found that the enhanced grades deteriorate along with the excitement for the payment. Most children simply lose interest in the reward. It is better to just let youth accomplish

Margaret Heffernan once said, “For good ideas and true innovation, you need a mix of human interaction, conflict, argument, and debate.” In the article it is debated if there is any benefit in monetary rewards for students. Teachers, and parents alike are always trying to find the best way to reward and inspire there students to do well in school. Matthew G Springer is a professor of Public Policy and Education at Vanderbilt University. He is also the director of the National Center on Performance Incentives. He wrote this article to display his research and studies.

The concepts of motivation allowed me to understand each of my students on an individual level as well. Not all students are motivated the same way and learning new ways to motivate first graders that are not, “if you do this, you will get a prize” changed my classroom environment. I used strategies like goal-setting to get my students motivated to do well on their assignments. When they saw the growth they were making it was pushing them to do better. They didn’t need to get something in order to do well. The satisfaction in seeing their growth gave them motivation. I am hoping that by starting them out with this strategy young, stays with them as they move on to the upper grade levels.

Following the introduction of the whole school behaviour policy, it was also made compulsory for schools to include a system of rewards and sanctions (Elton, 1989, Steer, 2005; DFE, 2014; Payne, 2015). Within school X it was found that this system was based on the behaviourist principles of Skinners (1974) theory. The use of rewards and sanctions in school X consisted of positively reinforcing desirable behaviours and correcting negative behaviour through sanctions. The behavioural theory underlines that by reinforcing a particular behaviour, children will repeat it as they begin to associate rewards with a particular behaviour (Skinner, 1974; Morgan, 2009; Rogers, 2011a). For example it was observed that when a child was positively praised for helping others, the teacher would reward the child by awarding a dojo. A dojo is used as a form of praise which amounts to a score at the end of the week based on how many dojos a child receives. This will then feed on to the merit card and sticker system enabling children to be rewarded by prizes. Consequently children were able to make associations between the desired behaviour and its outcome. This is therefore identified as a form of extrinsic motivation (Roffey and O’ Reirdan, 2001; Payne, 2015).

At this young age, it is recommended that criterion specific rewards be used to motivate Doug and increase the frequency of positive behaviors in the classroom (Curran & the IRIS Center, 2003). Criterion specific rewards are incentives that are customized to individual students and based on what motivates them (Curran & the IRIS Center, 2003). Initially, it is necessary to identify what motivates the student and proceed to utilize that information to create

Education today is too Type X- meaning the emphasis on greater rewards for doing what you should do anyways is based on extrinsic rewards. The education system seems to be heavily based on carrots and sticks. The biggest way to motivate someone seems to be by dangling something, such as a carrot, in front of someone 's face or poking them with a stick. If you want a student to do something, why are they motivated with some type of compensation such as an A in the class? In his book, Drive, Daniel H. Pink divides motivation into three categories that evolved over time- Motivation 1.0, 2.0, 3.0. using these theories to challenge this motivation of carrot and sticks.

Motivation is an important aspect of everyday life. "Researchers have consistently found that an approach based on extrinsic rewards and consequences actually reduces children's intrinsic motivation to learn" (Solley). Motivation is lost due to the pressure

Intrinsic motivation is a key aspect of student success in school. Van den Broeck, Vansteenkiste, and De Witte (2013) define intrinsic motivation as, “the engagement in an activity for its own sake, that is, for the satisfaction and enjoyment experienced during the course of the activity itself” (p. 4). Educators encourage intrinsic motivation within their students as it boosts

In a classroom setting, it may be clear that most students are more extrinsically motivated to undertake their academic work, even though for some, it could be inherent extrinsic motivation, an example being, a student who understands that studying hard and doing assignments has a bigger reward in the long-term, as they will pass exams and attain good grades. In the same class could be another student who does assignments to avoid sanctions by teachers or parents (Lepper, Corpus and Iyengar, 2005). Both of these examples showcase students who are extrinsically motivated to study even though one appears to be more inherently thoughtful of their own benefit, while the other is doing it just to avoid punishment and is more dependent on the teacher’s or parent’s reaction. Children mostly do things that are

This type of motivation is influenced heavily by rewards and external incentives. It also implies the notion that “I have to do something” in order to be compliant with what someone else wants me to do. It is a motivation that is primarily influenced by the hope of attaining tangible items such as prizes, special privileges, or money. Although Drive implies the heavy use of Motivation 2.0 by the corporate world, Pink also draws attention to the fact that schools typically operate under this mode, as well, and that it can have detrimental effects on our students and on learning, in general. Motivation 2.0 is also referred to in the book as the “Carrots and Sticks Approach”, and although it may yield positive results in the short-term, the repeated or incorrect use of extrinsic rewards can actually work against what educators are trying to achieve in terms of truly motivating their students.

They may contend that students should want to do well for themselves and their own future and should not expect a reward especially bribery. They may also say that this will encourage cheating in schools. However, this is not true for all students because some individuals may need some incentive in order to do well and actually pay attention in class or to the teacher. Some individuals may need that extra push and that idea of an extrinsic reward. Schools chief Arne Duncan observed that when he went to schools they seemed more excited and the excitement increased when they got their checks (Ripley, 5). Sometimes the idea of getting a reward pushes individuals to do better than they usually would. In this case, the reward would be pushing the students to get better grades in school and generally do better in school to get their reward, money. Many studies showed, there were students that no matter how hard they tried they were unable to get the “A” grade to get the reward (The Time Schools Tried, 2). Even if the student does not earn the money, at least they tried and their grade has made a small improvement since their last report card. In some cases even graduating earned the students money. Having the extrinsic reward

Throughout the book, the author’s major theme is that we, as a society, use reward almost like “bribes”. For example, we say “If you do this, then you can have this”. The author sees this as problematic for a number of reasons. For one, it is bad motivation for students They are doing what they’re told solely because they hope to get what they are promised in return. In all actuality, they should be doing what they are told simply because it is the right thing to do. Also, it is a bribe. The only reason teachers are giving students these things in return is because they hope it will convince the

As Alfie Kohn said in his article “The Risk of Rewards” (December1994) “rewarding motivate students to get rewards” [6]. This means that even if you pay them $100 dollars for do their work they will not do it because they have to, they will do it for the reward.

A reward is a high extrinsic motivator. The reward can be monetary, gift certificate, day off with pay, a two hour lunch, or working for two hours on anything but work. All entice performance and competition in the workplace. A gold star, being the teacher’s helper for a day, no daily

What is motivation? What influences it? The term motivation can be defined in different ways. Motivation can simply defined as “ a need that, if high, is evident in a strong desire to achieve, to excel, to reach a high level of excellence” (Lefrancois 430). To become motivated, one must have a positive attitude to a variety of learning skills. Some factors that influence motivation include our peers, friends, parents, and environmental settings. Division four being high school division, attention is focused towards learning and what methods can be used. Students at this stage are more eager and develop a sense of what he or she wants to do and accomplish in upcoming adulthood. With a division comes a group of intelligent theorists. All