STUDENTS MOTIVATION

STUDENTS MOTIVATION

Motivation is perhaps no other quality is so important to success in school, nor so misunderstood. Motivation is the ultimate product of many aspects of the school experience: significant relationships between teachers and students and among students; a meaningful, well-taught curriculum; teachers who maintain high expectations and look for ways to help each student connect to the curriculum; opportunities for choice and self-evaluation that foster students’ ownership of learning.

Young children’s natural motivation to learn will survive only in schools where the curriculum is worth learning and teachers help students see why it is worth learning; where students focus on learning (not on competition or grades); and where students feel valued, and therefore are disposed to care about the school’s values, including learning.

Recent research suggests that practitioners who shift away from systems of rewards and punishment and, instead, actively involve students in shaping classroom climate and learning (through methods such as class meetings) promote both students’ motivation to learn and their commitment to democratic values.

Missing, from both Japanese childrearing at home and preschool and elementary education, are the rewards and consequences that are now commonplace in U.S. schools. Japanese elementary teachers focus their attention on building close, supportive relationships and involving children in classroom management.

Even at first grade, Japanese students run class meetings, set personal goals, self-evaluate their behavior, and discuss “the kind of class we want to be.” They form class “promises” and goals based on their class discussion. One goal of Japan’s national Course of Study is for students to develop “intimacy with classmates and an enjoyment of classroom life.”

Rewards and punishments are conspicuously absent from Japanese elementary classrooms, and teachers rely on students’ interest in well-taught, important subject matter, self-evaluation, and enjoyment of group life to gradually build discipline and support motivation to learn. Other teachers explained that rewards were used only as a last resort, when there was no relationship between student and teacher to build from.