Motivating Students

M

SEC-201

October 5, 2017

Debra Lynch

Motivation has an important effect on students behavior and academic achievement. Whether intrinsic or extrinsic what motivates a student will determine the amount of effort they put what they are doing. A sense of achievement when having completed an assignment, mastered a skill or played a game well is important for self esteem. It is also recognized that cognitively it is important for students to develop their self efficacy.  It is considered beneficial for parents and educators to set standards for adolescents that challenge to perform at the highest levels they can achieve (Santrock, 2016).  Motivation, classroom engagement, and sense of school belonging are important aspects of students' overall adjustment in school (Kiefer, S. M., Alley, K. M., & Ellerbrock, C. R., 2015).

Some examples of instructional strategies that increase motivation among adolescent students would be to be consistent, encouraging to the students and be creative and give students some control. Children and adults all respond to consistency and when students can come to expect that you will enforce your rules, or will follow up on their work and effort they are more likely to follow through. I find it important to be encouraging and positive, students respond to enthusiasm and encouragement that they can improve and achieve more than they may think they can. Creativity is especially helpful to find ways to motivate students and goes along with giving them more control. When adolescents feel as though they have a choice they are likely to perform better. For example, giving students an array of assignments related to the topic might motivate them to choose one they think they can excel at. The expectations component includes students’ belief that they are able to complete a task (including their self-efficacy and control beliefs) (Peetsma, T., & Van der Veen, I., 2015). Providing opportunities for them to succeed motivates their work, when they can see that they have achieved a goal they are likely to want to do it again. It is important to get to know the students as early as possible,  knowing their backgrounds, their home lives, their interests can help you to motivate them in different ways.

Some examples of how technology can be used to increase motivation could be simply having programs that students need to master on technology because adolescents in current society usually consider themselves pretty tech-savvy. It can also be used to help motivate students to do research on the topics and find more information faster. This can help them build their confidence by being able to use the technology to achieve their goal. It can also be useful to use videos to reach the students with some of their interests. For example, asking them to find culturally relevant videos or movies that apply to the topic at hand.