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Running Header: MOTIVATION OBSERVATION

Motivation Observation
Amanda Stonerock
Ivy Tech Community College












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Motivation is extremely important when it comes to teaching. I define motivation as
being the key to learning. Without motivation you may not care or want to learn thus making it
key to education. Without motivation learning will not occur. Teachers find ways by watching
the behavior of their students to determine what motivated ach student. With that teachers can
find many ways to keep students attention and natural curiosity flowing to enhance learning.
The defined meaning of motivation is an internal state that arouses, directs, and maintains
behavior.
In the classroom I believe that a students role in motivation is important. Both the
teacher and the student should come together in class time for learning and proper behavior to
happen. Teachers should set goals and help the students to be motivated but I believe that there
needs to be shared experiences for the classroom to work properly. Students have to want to
learn and participate for the teacher to receive the progress that they are looking for. Both the
student and teacher are needed for motivation to take place.
In a classroom that I observed there are twenty-four students who are all motivated
differently. Five students are motivated by success and the compliments that the teacher gives
them when they are correct. It appears as if these students are intrinsically motivated to learn.
Nine students are motivated to behave so they do not have to turn a card. Turning a card when in
trouble seems to really upset many students and they will behave just to not ae to do so. The last
ten students are motivated by recess. If the class acts up their recess time gets taken away from
them and students behave just to be able to have recess. The last nineteen students in the
classroom are extrinsically motivated to learn. As I observed the classroom the teacher was
switching over to reading. As reading started the teacher asked the students to get out their
reading books and turn to the page she was on. There is a list of vocabulary words at the
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beginning of each section. She goes down the list word by word and asks students what each
work meant and to use it in a sentence. The first word was youre and a student tells her it means
you are. Another student uses it in this sentence youre my friend. This goes on until it is time
to read the story. She tries to read a sentence and the have the whole class read the next
sentence. The teacher has some problems with the class reading together so she switches to
calling out for individual students to read the next sentence in the story. Problems once again
arose and now she just reads the story to the children. What worried me was she even stated at
the beginning of reading that this whole process was review from a story that they read earlier in
the year. The class is having a test on Friday over the stories and she wants them to be prepared.
As the teacher is sitting in front of the room she asks the class what a sentence means. She wants
them to answer that a sentence is like a sequence of event in the story. She has to give them the
answer because the students could not get it correct. Now the students are given a sheet of paper
to put four different parts of the story into order. The students write what happens first, next,
then, and finally and draws pictures to illustrate. It is now ten oclock and the teacher must move
to math. Not one student finished their work.
The teacher asked the questions she did to keep the students on track and to really think
about what each work meant. I believe that the teacher interactions with the students improved
their behavior. If students did not follow along they would then get into trouble and have to turn
a card. This kept each student motivated and ready to answer what questions the teacher had for
them. I am not sure how much the students learned in the process, but the teacher will find out
when she gets their grades back from the test that they will take over the story. I also do not
believe ha it improved productivity because not every student finished their work. I did like
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how she would ask each student what the word meant and how to use it in a sentence but also
feel as if some things that needed to be changed.
For this classroom the teacher uses more of a behavioral approach towards motivating her
students. When a students offers the correct answer to a question they are rewarded as well as a
student who is not paying attention is punished. The teachers outcome was a group of students
paying attention just so they can be rewarded and try to avoid punishment. The teacher would
ask questions about what was going on throughout the story as well as asking what words meant.
This helped the students to be ready ad follow along. This strategy motivated the students to pay
attention and follow along with the story. The student behavior that I noticed was how students
would use their fingers to follow along to make sure they were in the right spot when called on to
read the next line. This was beneficial to students who did so, but there were a few who were
punished for not following along. After the punishment he would put each student back on track.
Students learned because they followed along with the teacher and answered the questions about
what the story was about at the end. Students followed along because they did not want to
change a card and get into trouble. Because a majority of the classroom is motivated by not
having their card changed, the teacher uses this to keep the student motivated. By asking
questions about the story also helped the students to be interested and enjoy the story.
Based on the reading and observation there are a few things that I will bring with me as a
teacher. I have noticed that motivating seems to be really hard for first year teachers. The
teacher that I observed is also a first year teacher and will soon find much better ways to keep
her students motivated. I would have enjoyed seeing how a teacher that has been teaching for a
little longer would have handled motivation in their classroom. One thing that I would change is
how the teacher was sitting at the front of the classroom. I believe that a teacher should be
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standing up and being involved in student learning. This is defiantly an obligation that teachers
should attain for their students needs.
There are many resources that new teachers can use to learn the best ways to keep a class
motivated. In our book I learned a few things that I can use as a future teacher. I believe in
Maslows Theory and how nothing will get some without the students lower level of the
pyramid being satisfied. If school is a fearful, unpredictable place where neither teachers nor
students know where they stand, they are likely to be more concerned with security and less with
learning (Woolfolk, 2010). I can use this to make sure that I know where I stand as a teacher and
make the rules set from day one. From this I will also make sure that from day one each student
feels safe, secure, and have a high self-esteem in my classroom. Students are more likely to
work toward goals that are clear, specific, reasonable, moderately challenging, and attainable
within a relatively short period of time (Woolfolk, 2010). Setting goals each year are important
and both the teacher and student should do so. I will use this each year to make sure students
have a goal in mind and each day will work towards their gal. Goals can help students be
motivated. Teachers should find ways to catch and hold students attention during activities.
Whenever possible, it helps to connect academic content to students enduring individual interests
(Woolfolk, 2010). I know that it is hard today to do so, but is important. If I know that students
would rather read a book that they find interesting instead of each student reading the same book
that can be boring, I would rather keep the students interested to help them learn. Way to keep
students interested, teachers could energize them by introducing variety, piquing their curiosity,
surprising them, or giving them a brief chance to be physically active (Woolfolk, 2010). I have
seen this first hand ad it is important to have some type of activity in the classroom. This activity
can help stimulate the brain and keeps the classroom flowing. I will use TARGET as many
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teachers do today to help with the diversity in the classroom. This way I can design tasks and
manage time for each student in the class. Lastly, I will take how important motivation really is
in the classroom. From the observation and the text I have realized that there is a huge diversity
of learners each year in a classroom. With motivation being so huge, I think that it is important
to get to know and understand each student at the beginning of the year to develop ways to
motivate. I know that there will be many more resources that I can find to help me as a future
teacher motivating my students.












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Resources
Woolfolk, A. (2010). Education Psychology. Merrill: Person. Pages 380 to 400.