Classroom Motivational Quotes

We do not need to attend classroom training programmes for everything. Observation opens the windows of knowledge around us

Living a satisfying life requires more than simply meeting the demands of those in control. Yet in our offices and our classrooms we have way too much compliance and way too little engagement. The former might get you through the day, but the latter will get you through the night.

as it may be—matters. How you feel about your abilities—your academic “self-concept”—in the context of your classroom shapes your willingness to tackle challenges and finish difficult tasks. It’s a crucial element in your motivation and confidence.

How you feel about your abilities—your academic “self-concept”—in the context of your classroom shapes your willingness to tackle challenges and finish difficult tasks. It’s a crucial element in your motivation and confidence.

Men write more books. Men give more lectures. Men ask more questions after lectures. Men post more e-mail to Internet discussion groups. To say this is due to patriarchy is to beg the question of the behavior's origin. If men control society, why don't they just shut up and enjoy their supposed prerogatives? The answer is obvious when you consider sexual competition: men can't be quiet because that would give other men a chance to show off verbally. Men often bully women into silence, but this is usually to make room for their own verbal display. If men were dominating public language just to maintain patriarchy, that would qualify as a puzzling example of evolutionary altruism—a costly, risky individual act that helps all of one's sexual competitors (other males) as much as oneself. The ocean of male language that confronts modern women in bookstores, television, newspapers, classrooms, parliaments, and businesses does not necessarily come from a male conspiracy to deny women their voice. It may come from an evolutionary history of sexual selection in which the male motivation to talk was vital to their reproduction.

One of the dictums that defines our culture is that we can be anything we want to be – to win the neoliberal game we just have to dream, to put our minds to it, to want it badly enough. This message leaks out to us from seemingly everywhere in our environment: at the cinema, in heart-warming and inspiring stories we read in the news and social media, in advertising, in self-help books, in the classroom, on television. We internalize it, incorporating it into our sense of self. But it’s not true. It is, in fact, the dark lie at the heart of the age of perfectionism. It’s the cause, I believe, of an incalculable quotient of misery. Here’s the truth that no million-selling self-help book, famous motivational speaker, happiness guru or blockbusting Hollywood screenwriter seems to want you to know. You’re limited. Imperfect. And there’s nothing you can do about it.

Now, for example, people with freckles aren’t thought of as a minority by the nonfreckled. They aren’t a minority in the sense we’re talking about. And why aren’t they? Because a minority is only thought of as a minority when it constitutes some kind of a threat to the majority, real or imaginary. And no threat is ever quite imaginary. Anyone here disagree with that? If you do, just ask yourself, What would this particular minority do if it suddenly became the majority overnight? You see what I mean? Well, if you don’t – think it over! “All right. Now along come the liberals – including everybody in this room, I trust – and they say, ‘Minorities are just people, like us.’ Sure, minorities are people – people, not angels. Sure, they’re like us – but not exactly like us; that’s the all-too- familiar state of liberal hysteria in which you begin to kid yourself you honestly cannot see any difference between a Negro and a Swede….” (Why, oh why daren’t George say “between Estelle Oxford and Buddy Sorensen”? Maybe, if he did dare, there would be a great atomic blast of laughter, and everybody would embrace, and the kingdom of heaven would begin, right here in classroom. But then again, maybe it wouldn’t.) “So, let’s face it, minorities are people who probably look and act and – think differently from us and hay faults we don’t have. We may dislike the way they look and act, and we may hate their faults. And it’s better if we admit to disliking and hating them than if we try to smear our feelings over with pseudo liberal sentimentality. If we’re frank about our feelings, we have a safety valve; and if we have a safety valve, we’re actually less likely to start persecuting. I know that theory is unfashionable nowadays. We all keep trying to believe that if we ignore something long enough it’ll just vanish…. “Where was I? Oh yes. Well, now, suppose this minority does get persecuted, never mind why – political, economic, psychological reasons. There always is a reason, no matter how wrong it is – that’s my point. And, of course, persecution itself is always wrong; I’m sure we all agree there. But the worst of it is, we now run into another liberal heresy. Because the persecuting majority is vile, says the liberal, therefore the persecuted minority must be stainlessly pure. Can’t you see what nonsense that is? What’s to prevent the bad from being persecuted by the worse? Did all the Christian victims in the arena have to be saints? “And I’ll tell you something else. A minority has its own kind of aggression. It absolutely dares the majority to attack it. It hates the majority–not without a cause, I grant you. It even hates the other minorities, because all minorities are in competition: each one proclaims that its sufferings are the worst and its wrongs are the blackest. And the more they all hate, and the more they’re all persecuted, the nastier they become! Do you think it makes people nasty to be loved? You know it doesn’t! Then why should it make them nice to be loathed? While you’re being persecuted, you hate what’s happening to You, you hate the people who are making it happen; you’re in a world of hate. Why, you wouldn’t recognize love if you met it! You’d suspect love! You’d think there was something behind it – some motive – some trick…

Education makes your maths better, not necessarily your manners.

From the standpoint of education, genius means essentially 'giving birth to the joy in learning.' I'd like to suggest that this is the central task of all educators. It is the genius of the student that is the driving force behind all learning. Before educators take on any of the other important issues in learning, they must first have a thorough understanding of what lies at the core of each student's intrinsic motivation to learn, and that motivation originates in each student's genius.

Owing to the shape of a bell curve, the education system is geared to the mean. Unfortunately, that kind of education is virtually calculated to bore and alienate gifted minds. But instead of making exceptions where it would do the most good, the educational bureaucracy often prefers not to be bothered. In my case, for example, much of the schooling to which I was subjected was probably worse than nothing. It consisted not of real education, but of repetition and oppressive socialization (entirely superfluous given the dose of oppression I was getting away from school). Had I been left alone, preferably with access to a good library and a minimal amount of high-quality instruction, I would at least have been free to learn without useless distractions and gratuitous indoctrination. But alas, no such luck. Let’s try to break the problem down a bit. The education system […] is committed to a warm and fuzzy but scientifically counterfactual form of egalitarianism which attributes all intellectual differences to environmental factors rather than biology, implying that the so-called 'gifted' are just pampered brats who, unless their parents can afford private schooling, should atone for their undeserved good fortune by staying behind and enriching the classroom environments of less privileged students. This approach may appear admirable, but its effects on our educational and intellectual standards, and all that depends on them, have already proven to be overwhelmingly negative. This clearly betrays an ulterior motive, suggesting that it has more to do with social engineering than education. There is an obvious difference between saying that poor students have all of the human dignity and basic rights of better students, and saying that there are no inherent educationally and socially relevant differences among students. The first statement makes sense, while the second does not. The gifted population accounts for a very large part of the world’s intellectual resources. As such, they can obviously be put to better use than smoothing the ruffled feathers of average or below-average students and their parents by decorating classroom environments which prevent the gifted from learning at their natural pace. The higher we go on the scale of intellectual brilliance – and we’re not necessarily talking just about IQ – the less support is offered by the education system, yet the more likely are conceptual syntheses and grand intellectual achievements of the kind seldom produced by any group of markedly less intelligent people. In some cases, the education system is discouraging or blocking such achievements, and thus cheating humanity of their benefits.

I teach our young men that respect is earned each day on the practice field, in the classroom, and how each young man lives his life.

A truly powerful vision will motivate you to expend more than just time. Anyone can show up physically in the classroom but not be mentally and emotionally present.

Real learning begins outside the classroom.

As teachers, we often promote the idea that process is more important than the end product, yet it is often the product itself that provides context and motivates students to learn.

If modern scholars overlook the entertainment motive, dominant in the Iliad, and treat Homer as a Virgil, Dante, or Milton, rather than as a Shakespeare or Cervantes, they are doing him a great disservice. The Iliad, Don Quixote and Shakespeare’s later plays are life—tragedy salted with humour; the Aeneid, the Inferno and Paradise Lost are literary works of almost superhuman eloquence, written for fame not profit, and seldom read except as a solemn intellectual task. The Iliad, and its later companion-piece, the Odyssey, deserve to be rescued from the classroom curse which has lain heavily on them throughout the past twenty-six centuries, and become entertainment once more; which is what I have attempted here. How this curse fell on them can be simply explained.

The phenomenon of relative deprivation applied to education is called—appropriately enough—the “Big Fish–Little Pond Effect.” The more elite an educational institution is, the worse students feel about their own academic abilities. Students who would be at the top of their class at a good school can easily fall to the bottom of a really good school. Students who would feel that they have mastered a subject at a good school can have the feeling that they are falling farther and farther behind in a really good school. And that feeling—as subjective and ridiculous and irrational as it may be—matters. How you feel about your abilities—your academic “self-concept”—in the context of your classroom shapes your willingness to tackle challenges and finish difficult tasks. It’s a crucial element in your motivation and confidence.

by imposing on us certain conditions of life, our social identities can strongly affect things as important as our performances in the classroom and on standardized tests, our memory capacity, our athletic performance, the pressure we feel to prove ourselves, even the comfort level we have with people of different groups—all things we typically think of as being determined by individual talents, motivations, and preferences.

As for logical consequences, the "logic" is highly debatable. If you continually arrive late for my workshop, despite my warning that lateness is unacceptable, I may find it "logical" to lock you out of my classroom. Or perhaps it would be more "logical" to keep you locked in after class for the same number of minutes you were late. Or maybe my "logic" demands that you miss out on the snacks. As you may be starting to suspect, these are not true exercises in logic. They're really more of a free association, where we try to think of a way to make the wrongdoer suffer. We hope that the suffering will motivate the offender to do better in the future.

None of these approaches have shown much promise in changing people’s thinking in the long run or outside of the classroom. And that should not surprise us. We use motivated reasoning not because we don’t know any better, but because we’re trying to protect things that are vitally important to us—our ability to feel good about our lives and ourselves, our motivation to try hard things and stick with them, our ability to look good and persuade, and our acceptance in our communities.

Once you’re out of the classroom, you might vow never to open another book, after being force-fed their contents for so many years. But know this: Books are the most worthy companions to take with you on this bitter-sweet journey known as life.

As students cross the threshold from outside to insider, they also cross the threshold from superficial learning motivated by grades to deep learning motivated by engagement with questions. Their transformation entails an awakening--even, perhaps, a falling in love.

research suggests that all students are motivated to learn, as long as there are clear expectations, the tasks and activities have value, and the learning environment promotes intrinsic motivation (Wlodkowski & Ginsberg, 1995; Eccles & Wigfield, 1985; Feather, 1982; Kovalik & Olsen, 2005).

If they enjoy reading and are motivated to read outside of school, they are more likely to become expert readers than those who were put off books by being forced to learn to read before they were ready. When I was in a Finnish primary school, I peeked my head into one classroom to see Grade 1 children silently reading to themselves.

Parent and Teacher Actions: 1. Ask children what their role models would do. Children feel free to take initiative when they look at problems through the eyes of originals. Ask children what they would like to improve in their family or school. Then have them identify a real person or fictional character they admire for being unusually creative and inventive. What would that person do in this situation? 2. Link good behaviors to moral character. Many parents and teachers praise helpful actions, but children are more generous when they’re commended for being helpful people—it becomes part of their identity. If you see a child do something good, try saying, “You’re a good person because you ___.” Children are also more ethical when they’re asked to be moral people—they want to earn the identity. If you want a child to share a toy, instead of asking, “Will you share?” ask, “Will you be a sharer?” 3. Explain how bad behaviors have consequences for others. When children misbehave, help them see how their actions hurt other people. “How do you think this made her feel?” As they consider the negative impact on others, children begin to feel empathy and guilt, which strengthens their motivation to right the wrong—and to avoid the action in the future. 4. Emphasize values over rules. Rules set limits that teach children to adopt a fixed view of the world. Values encourage children to internalize principles for themselves. When you talk about standards, like the parents of the Holocaust rescuers, describe why certain ideals matter to you and ask children why they’re important. 5. Create novel niches for children to pursue. Just as laterborns sought out more original niches when conventional ones were closed to them, there are ways to help children carve out niches. One of my favorite techniques is the Jigsaw Classroom: bring students together for a group project, and assign each of them a unique part. For example, when writing a book report on Eleanor Roosevelt’s life, one student worked on her childhood, another on her teenage years, and a third on her role in the women’s movement. Research shows that this reduces prejudice—children learn to value each other’s distinctive strengths. It can also give them the space to consider original ideas instead of falling victim to groupthink. To further enhance the opportunity for novel thinking, ask children to consider a different frame of reference. How would Roosevelt’s childhood have been different if she grew up in China? What battles would she have chosen to fight there?

There’s no research that finds that failing grades motivate students, and plenty of research that has found the opposite—that a student who receives 0s and Fs becomes less motivated, not more motivated. Guskey (2009) found that “no studies support the use of low grades as punishment. Instead of prompting greater effort, low grades more often cause students to withdraw from learning.

You are the TEACHER. Some people are so stuck on what you did in the past, that they don't realize that you forgave yourself, matured, and graduated from what happened. Yet here they are stuck on that memory..wondering how you were able to move on. Time waits for no one and life keeps going. When haters try to remind you of your past, starve their attention with silence..Just realize that you don't have time to supervise adults. You got things to do and individuals to mentor. What was designed to crush you just strengthened your walk, put confidence in your talk, and encouraged you to be content with You. Their presence or opinion is only entertainment in the bleachers, tolerated decorations on the wall, and the uncelebrated clown at your events. Remember you are the teacher and they are the student...take charge of your classroom!!

Who is the learner and what is his or her relationship to knowledge and learning? Is he or she basically good or evil (or both)? Passive or active in learning? Capable of choice, or has life already been determined somehow? Motivated internally or externally? An unmarked slate or having unrealized potential? These questions are answered every day in every classroom, daycare center, or basketball court—answered by the way children are viewed and treated by adults.

I am criticizing the professionalization of teaching children because these young human beings are not cogs in a machine, And I am trying to identify the root of the problem for all those wonderful adults who went into teaching thinking that they could commit to nurturing the lives of many children only to end up having the system squash their excellent motives. Our current school system replicates factories and requires classroom managers more than teachers. Teachers are appreciably frustrated.

7. Education is the only positive reward you need. If you don’t believe this you devalue your profession. I have seen all sorts of reward systems and positive feedback systems and empathy techniques. These do not lead to classroom control, but to manipulation. The idea that you need to motivate students with gimmicks and pep talks gives the message that education is not something desirable in and of itself but requires bribery. If students want to know what their reward for good behavior is, I tell them it is an education.

a study by Marie Guilloteaux and Zoltán Dörnyei (2008) who explored the links between teachers’ motivational practice and students’ motivation for L2 learning. It was a large-scale study with 27 teachers and over 1,300 learners in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classrooms in Korea. The teachers’ motivational strategies were described using a classroom observation scheme—the Motivation Orientation of Language Teaching (MOLT). MOLT identified 25 motivational practices used by the teachers that were relatively easy to define and to observe.

Jobs asked some questions about education, and Gates sketched out his vision of what schools in the future would be like, with students watching lectures and video lessons on their own while using the classroom time for discussions and problem solving. They agreed that computers had, so far, made surprisingly little impact on schools—far less than on other realms of society such as media and medicine and law. For that to change, Gates said, computers and mobile devices would have to focus on delivering more personalized lessons and providing motivational feedback.

For those teachers I have mentioned, and also for me, teaching is much more than a job. It is a responsibility to those under my supervision—a responsibility to teach them. And how can I tell if I’ve taught them, if I’ve been successful? Right. Only if they’ve learned. Therefore, I have learned to focus on studying people, especially young people. I study the way they react, the way they are motivated, the way they are frustrated, and the way they work. This will help me discover the way they learn and when I discover that, I’m half way there. The methods I learned, both for the classroom and for the court, were created from and for my students.” - John Wooden

I have a small mind, but big goals. I have a small heart, but big ambitions. I have a small soul, but big dreams. I have small eyes, but a big vision. I have small ears, but big understanding. I have small hands, but big reach. I have a small tongue, but a big opinion. I have a small nose, but a big sense. I have a small mouth, but a big lecture. I have a small message, but a big audience. I have a small title, but a big education. I have a small purse, but a big gift. I have a small lesson, but a big classroom. I have a small resume, but a big accomplishment. I have a small company, but a big project. I have a small budget, but a big profit. I have a small team, but a big success. I have a small reputation, but a big destiny.

Western societies want men to be upstanding, proactive citizens who take responsibility for themselves, who work with others to improve their communities and nation as a whole. The irony is that society is not giving the support, guidance, means, or places for these young men even to be motivated or interested in aspiring to these goals. In fact, society - from politics to the media to the classroom to our very own families - is a major contributor to this demise because it is inhibiting young men's intellectual, creative, and social abilities right from the start. And the irony is only compounded by the fact that men play such a powerful part in society, which means they are effectively denying their younger counterparts the opportunity to thrive.

(Saying groaning!) Do you remember your fifth-grade classes? The only thing that I recall is my teachers saying one word over and over again. The hair, the face, and the fiery eyes, still creeps into my mind. This person makes my skin crawl. Let’s go way on back then… Welcome to classroom 202 that I called ‘The Mind Warp.’ Miss. Caballero's teaching style was to hand me a worksheet that I did not know how to do, at the time. Then scream at me saying quote- ‘fix, fix, and fix.’ ‘How do I fix something that I never learned how to do?’ How about instead of playing Solitaire on your computer, why don’t you do your task, to motivate and educate. This is your obligation and occupation to do so! So, damn-it just do it already, and stop wasting my time, because, in all honesty, I don’t give a shit…! Fix- it is just a dick-faced word!

Teachers in general face common problems of practice. Their professional success depends on their ability to motivate an involuntary group of students to learn what the teacher is teaching. In an effort to accomplish this, teachers invest heavily in developing a teaching persona that enables them to establish a relationship with students and lure them to learn. Once they have worked out a personal approach for managing the instruction of students within the walls of their classroom, they are likely to resist vigorously any effort by reformers or administrators or any other intruders to transform their approach to teaching. Teacher resistance to fundamental instructional reform is grounded in a deep personal investment in the way they teach and a sense that tinkering with this approach could threaten their very ability to manage a class (much less teach a particular curriculum) effectively.

Montessori believed that if children were exposed to a safe, experiential learning environment (as opposed to a structured classroom), with access to specific learning materials and supplies, and if they were supervised by a gentle and attentive teacher, they would become self-motivated to learn. She discovered that, in this environment, older children readily worked with younger children, helping them to learn from, and cooperate with, each other. Montessori advocated teaching practical skills, like cooking, carpentry, and domestic arts, as an integrated part of a classical education in literature, science, and math. To her surprise, teenagers seemed to benefit from this approach the most; it built confidence, and the students became less resistant to traditional educational goals. Through this method, each child could reach his or her potential, regardless of age and intellectual ability.

In their writing on education, Deci and Ryan proceed from the principle that humans are natural learners and children are born creative and curious, “intrinsically motivated for the types of behaviors that foster learning and development.” This idea is complicated, however, by the fact that part of learning anything, be it painting or programming or eighth-grade algebra, involves a lot of repetitive practice, and repetitive practice is usually pretty boring. Deci and Ryan acknowledge that many of the tasks that teachers ask students to complete each day are not inherently fun or satisfying; it is the rare student who feels a deep sense of intrinsic motivation when memorizing her multiplication tables. It is at these moments that extrinsic motivation becomes important: when behaviors must be performed not for the inherent satisfaction of completing them, but for some separate outcome. Deci and Ryan say that when students can be encouraged to internalize those extrinsic motivations, the motivations become increasingly powerful. This is where the psychologists return to their three basic human needs: autonomy, competence, and relatedness. When teachers are able to create an environment that promotes those three feelings, they say, students exhibit much higher levels of motivation. And how does a teacher create that kind of environment? Students experience autonomy in the classroom, Deci and Ryan explain, when their teachers “maximize a sense of choice and volitional engagement” while minimizing students’ feelings of coercion and control. Students feel competent, they say, when their teachers give them tasks that they can succeed at but that aren’t too easy — challenges just a bit beyond their current abilities. And they feel a sense of relatedness when they perceive that their teachers like and value and respect them.

The aim is to get the students actively involved in seeking this evidence: their role is not simply to do tasks as decided by teachers, but to actively manage and understand their learning gains. This includes evaluating their own progress, being more responsible for their learning, and being involved with peers in learning together about gains in learning. If students are to become active evaluators of their own progress, teachers must provide the students with appropriate feedback so that they can engage in this task. Van den Bergh, Ros, and Beijaard (2010: 3) describe the task thus: Fostering active learning seems a very challenging and demanding task for teachers, requiring knowledge of students’ learning processes, skills in providing guidance and feedback and classroom management. The need is to engage students in this same challenging and demanding task. The suggestion in this chapter is to start lessons with helping students to understand the intention of the lesson and showing them what success might look like at the end. Many times, teachers look for the interesting beginning to a lesson – for the hook, and the motivating question. Dan Willingham (2009) has provided an excellent argument for not thinking in this way. He advocates starting with what the student is likely to think about. Interesting hooks, demonstrations, fascinating facts, and likewise may seem to be captivating (and often are), but he suggests that there are likely to be other parts of the lesson that are more suitable for the attention-grabber. The place for the attention-grabber is more likely to be at the end of the lesson, because this will help to consolidate what has been learnt. Most importantly,Willingham asks teachers to think long and hard about how to make the connection between the attention-grabber and the point that it is designed to make; preferably, that point will be the main idea from the lesson. Having too many open-ended activities (discovery learning, searching the Internet, preparing PowerPoint presentations) can make it difficult to direct students’ attention to that which matters – because they often love to explore the details, the irrelevancies, and the unimportant while doing these activities. One of Willingham's principles is that any teaching method is most useful when there is plenty of prompt feedback about whether the student is thinking about a problem in the right way. Similarly, he promotes the notion that assignments should be primarily about what the teacher wants the students to think about (not about demonstrating ‘what they know’). Students are very good at ignoring what you say (‘I value connections, deep ideas, your thoughts’) and seeing what you value (corrections to the grammar, comments on referencing, correctness or absence of facts). Thus teachers must develop a scoring rubric for any assignment before they complete the question or prompts, and show the rubric to the students so that they know what the teacher values. Such formative feedback can reinforce the ‘big ideas’ and the important understandings, and help to make the investment of

Creating “Correct” Children in the Classroom One of the most popular discipline programs in American schools is called Assertive Discipline. It teaches teachers to inflict the old “obey or suffer” method of control on students. Here you disguise the threat of punishment by calling it a choice the child is making. As in, “You have a choice, you can either finish your homework or miss the outing this weekend.” Then when the child chooses to try to protect his dignity against this form of terrorism, by refusing to do his homework, you tell him he has chosen his logical, natural consequence of being excluded from the outing. Putting it this way helps the parent or teacher mitigate against the bad feelings and guilt that would otherwise arise to tell the adult that they are operating outside the principles of compassionate relating. This insidious method is even worse than outand-out punishing, where you can at least rebel against your punisher. The use of this mind game teaches the child the false, crazy-making belief that they wanted something bad or painful to happen to them. These programs also have the stated intention of getting the child to be angry with himself for making a poor choice. In this smoke and mirrors game, the children are “causing” everything to happen and the teachers are the puppets of the children’s choices. The only ones who are not taking responsibility for their actions are the adults. Another popular coercive strategy is to use “peer pressure” to create compliance. For instance, a teacher tells her class that if anyone misbehaves then they all won’t get their pizza party. What a great way to turn children against each other. All this is done to help (translation: compel) children to behave themselves. But of course they are not behaving themselves: they are being “behaved” by the adults. Well-meaning teachers and parents try to teach children to be motivated (translation: do boring or aversive stuff without questioning why), responsible (translation: thoughtless conformity to the house rules) people. When surveys are conducted in which fourth-graders are asked what being good means, over 90% answer “being quiet.” And when teachers are asked what happens in a successful classroom, the answer is, “the teacher is able to keep the students on task” (translation: in line, doing what they are told). Consulting firms measuring teacher competence consider this a major criterion of teacher effectiveness. In other words if the students are quietly doing what they were told the teacher is evaluated as good. However my understanding of ‘real learning’ with twenty to forty children is that it is quite naturally a bit noisy and messy. Otherwise children are just playing a nice game of school, based on indoctrination and little integrated retained education. Both punishments and rewards foster a preoccupation with a narrow egocentric self-interest that undermines good values. All little Johnny is thinking about is “How much will you give me if I do X? How can I avoid getting punished if I do Y? What do they want me to do and what happens to me if I don’t do it?” Instead we could teach him to ask, “What kind of person do I want to be and what kind of community do I want to help make?” And Mom is thinking “You didn’t do what I wanted, so now I’m going to make something unpleasant happen to you, for your own good to help you fit into our (dominance/submission based) society.” This contributes to a culture of coercion and prevents a community of compassion. And as we are learning on the global level with our war on terrorism, as you use your energy and resources to punish people you run out of energy and resources to protect people. And even if children look well-behaved, they are not behaving themselves They are being behaved by controlling parents and teachers.

Ditching textbook mindsets means that we can give students freedom of choice. And as students work in their digital realms in our classrooms, we can motivate them by offering them differing levels of autonomy.

if we do nothing more than replace textbooks and encyclopedias with Google or Bing, or use the computer or tablet for nothing but writing exercises, technology in the classroom is not as motivating as using these tools to SEEK, find, and use information for problem solving and creativity.

learners’ beliefs about the kind of instruction that is best can influence their satisfaction and success. The grammar translation approach is useful for the study of grammar and vocabulary and can be valuable for understanding important cultural texts. The audiolingual approach with its emphasis on speaking and listening was used successfully with highly motivated adult learners in intensive training programmes for government personnel in the United States. However, there is little classroom research to support such approaches for students in ordinary school programmes that must serve the needs of students who bring different levels of motivation and aptitude to the classroom.

It is what human beings do. We compare ourselves to those in the same situation as ourselves, which means that students in an elite school—except, perhaps, those at the very top of the class—are going to face a burden that they would not face in a less competitive atmosphere. Citizens of happy countries have higher suicide rates than citizens of unhappy countries, because they look at the smiling faces around them and the contrast is too great. Students at “great” schools look at the brilliant students around them, and how do you think they feel? The phenomenon of relative deprivation applied to education is called—appropriately enough—the “Big Fish–Little Pond Effect.” The more elite an educational institution is, the worse students feel about their own academic abilities. Students who would be at the top of their class at a good school can easily fall to the bottom of a really good school. Students who would feel that they have mastered a subject at a good school can have the feeling that they are falling farther and farther behind in a really good school. And that feeling — as subjective and ridiculous and irrational as it may be — matters. How you feel about your abilities — your academic “self-concept” — in the context of your classroom shapes your willingness to tackle challenges and finish difficult tasks. It’s a crucial element in your motivation and confidence.

The motivation to ditch that textbook isn’t only—or even mostly—driven by a desire to go paperless or create technology-powered lessons; it’s about purpose. What do you want to do with the powerful platform you’ve been given?

Isn’t it strange then that the focus in our profession is on teaching techniques and classroom activities, not learning techniques, motivation and self-study activities? The focus in course books, training courses, workshops, articles and websites tends to be on supporting teachers in creating effective classroom events (teacher goals) rather than supporting students in achieving their ambitions with the language (learner goals). Good lessons will always help students, of course, and can contribute to student commitment to learning the language, but if we focus exclusively on lessons, we will miss the opportunity to leverage the potential every student has to practise more and make quicker progress.

certain other aspects of language—for example, individual vocabulary items—can be taught at any time. Learners’ acquisition of these variational features appears to depend on factors such as motivation, the learners’ sense of identity, language aptitude, and the quality of instruction, including how learners’ identities and cultures are acknowledged in the classroom.

For example, in Quebec, responding to pressure from parents, the age at which instruction in English as a second language began was lowered in recent years from about age 9 or 10 to age 6, but the total number of hours of instruction was not increased. Rather, the number of minutes of instruction per week was spread over more years (Lightbown, 2012). Thus, after years of classes, learners who have had an early start may feel frustrated by the lack of progress, and their motivation to continue may be diminished. Clearly the age at which instruction begins is not the only variable that determines success in the second language classroom.

They were divided into four categories that are described below along with examples of the motivational behaviours included within each. 1     Teacher discourse: arousing curiosity or attention, promoting autonomy, stating communicative purpose/utility of activity 2     Participation structure: group work/pair work 3     Activity design: individual competition, team competition, intellectual challenge, tangible task product 4     Encouraging positive retrospective self-evaluation and activity design: effective praise, elicitation of self/peer correction session, class applause. In each lesson, the learners’ motivation was measured in terms of their level of engagement. The proportion of students who paid attention, who actively participated, and who eagerly volunteered during activities was calculated. A three-level scale was used to measure engagement in each observed lesson: very low (a few students), low (one third to two thirds of the students) and high (more than two thirds of the students). Learners also completed a questionnaire about their motivation levels specifically related to their EFL class. The researchers found significant positive correlations between the teachers’ motivational practices, the learners’ engagement behaviours, and the learners’ self-reports on the questionnaire. The researchers acknowledge that correlation results do not indicate cause–effect relationships. Nevertheless, the findings are important because this is the first study to provide ‘any empirical evidence concerning the concrete, classroom-specific impact of language teachers’ motivational strategies’ (Guilloteaux and Dörnyei 2008: 72).

Goals have been set and a plan of action agreed upon; this constitutes the setting up period of the programme and will take some time at the beginning. The coach’s role now shifts to one of monitoring the learners as they pursue their goals and practise English as they have planned to do. Just as the weight watchers weigh themselves at each meeting, students need to measure their progress, celebrate success and, when they don’t achieve their goals, reflect on why. The coach is there to lend support and guidance. For this to happen, lessons should now regularly address the learners’ language lives outside of class. This needs to be established as part of the routine of the classroom. Decide when and how often you wish to coach them, but we suggest a minimum of 10% of class time devoted to it. That means at least 20 minutes a week if you have lessons 3 hours a week. In this time, you can: •  let your learners share how they are feeling about English. Revisit the activities in the Motivate! section. •  let learners share their favourite activities and techniques for learning English. One format for letting learners do this is suggested in the activity 'Swap Shop'. Another is to nominate a different student each week to tell the class about one technique, website, activity, book or other resource that they have used to practise English and to talk about why and how they use it. •  set specific activities for language practice from the Student’s Book •  tell students to try out any activities they like from the Student’s Book •  demonstrate specific activities and techniques from websites and other sources. This can be more effective than just telling them. If they see how good it is and try it out for themselves in class, they will be more likely to do it on their own.

Keep These Things in Mind While Enrolling For A Professional Online Course While online courses are gaining in popularity due to the conveniences they offer, you must consider a few things before enrolling in one. Not all programs are suitable for everyone. Not everyone is good at learning online. There are a lot of conditions that must be satisfied to make such learning successful. It is better that you consider everything carefully before starting your e-learning course. 1. How Will The Course Help You? There are many online professional programs available from various universities and educational platforms. You must see which one will be most useful for you. If you are working and you need to acquire a skill to get a promotion, then you must choose such a course. It is not just money that you are spending on these courses. You are also investing a lot of your time and effort to successfully complete your learning. 2. Do You Have The Motivation To Learn By Yourself? Getting motivated to study when you are in a classroom full of students is easy. A professor is teaching and also watching you. But in online certification courses, you have the freedom of studying whenever and wherever you want. Many of the e-learning platforms allow you to complete the program at your pace. This can make you lethargic and distracted. You must ask yourself whether you can remain motivated to complete the course. 3. How Familiar Are You With The Technology? You don’t need to be a computer genius to attend online professional programs. But you must be familiar with basic computer operations, playing videos on both desktops and mobile phones, and using a web browser. The other skill you will require in e-learning is the speed of typing on different devices. When there are live exchanges with the professors, you will need to type the queries very fast if you want to get your answers. 4. How Well Will You Participate In Online Classes? It is very easy to remain silent in virtual classes. There is no one staring at you and pushing you to ask questions or give answers. But if you don’t interact, you will not be making full use of online certification courses. Participation is very important in such classrooms. You must also take part in the group discussions that will bring out new ideas and opinions. E-learning is not for those who need physical presence. 5. Who Are The Others On The Programme? Knowing the other participants in online professional programs is very important, especially if you are already working and looking to acquire more skills. There must be people in the virtual classroom whose contributions will be useful for you. If the course has only freshers from college, then it may not give you any value addition. As a working person, you must look at networking opportunities that will help you with career opportunities. To Sum Up….. For working people, virtual classes are the best way to acquire more skills without taking a break from employment. These courses offer you the flexibility that you can never get in campus education. But you must make yourself suitable for e-learning to benefit from it.

In our offices and our classrooms we have way too much compliance and way too little engagement. The former might get you through the day, but only the latter will get you through the night.

I made peace with the fact that I am a habitual procrastinator years ago, once I realized that nothing motivates me quite as effectively as a looming deadline. If a paper is due on Tuesday afternoon, I will most likely be dictating the last few words as I scarf down lunch and transmitting the file to my professor as I enter the classroom. The last-minute rush doesn’t appear to affect my grades, so I’ve learned not to fight it. I seem to do my best work with a deadline staring me down like an oncoming train.

demonstrating that in one manner of thinking the assessment process is coexistent with the motivational process.

Motivation doesn’t always lead to achievement, but achievement often leads to motivation.

Education is not about enacting a prescriptive, boxed sort of curriculum-based classroom, but instead is about passing on a legacy of a love for learning, an independent joy in discovery, a motivation to bring light, beauty, and goodness back into the world of our children.

Handout The Impact of Stress on Learning … When we experience strong emotions (fear, extreme sadness, anger, embarrassment, etc.), our bodies release the hormone Cortisol, known as the “stress hormone.” This activates the rapid, reflexive responses of the amygdala (located at the back part of the brain), and the thinking part of our brain (the prefrontal cortex where the executive function are), shuts down. Reasoning and decision-making become challenging, we have a hard time considering other people’s perspectives, and we have a harder time accessing our memory. The brain goes into survival mode, which is often experienced as fight, flight, or freeze. Without calm: No learning can take place No problems can be solved Empathy for others becomes difficult

Artists usually do well without classroom education. Because we follow what our hearts tell us, and rarely what the textbook says.

It’s not easy teaching these Native kids. They don’t really want an education.” “That seems unlikely,” I insist. “Kids usually want to learn, but sometimes they’re not motivated.” I get back to Erik. “Is he seeing anyone for his social skills?  Or is someone helping him understand how to focus on academics in a distracting classroom?

Creating original mathematics requires a very high level of motivation, persistence, and reflection, all of which are considered indicators of creativity (Amabile, 1983; Policastro & Gardner, 2000; Gardner, 1993). The literature suggests that most creative individuals tend to be attracted to complexity, of which most school mathematics curricula has very little to offer. Classroom practices and math curricula rarely use problems with the sort of underlying mathematical structure that would necessitate students’ having a prolonged period of engagement and the independence to formulate solutions. It is my conjecture that in order for mathematical creativity to manifest itself in the classroom, students should be given the opportunity to tackle non-routine problems with complexity and structure - problems which require not only motivation and persistence but also considerable reflection.

Knowledge is only the first step. It is the foundation of further learning processes.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 102 “Students engage in learning when two conditions are fulfilled. The goals, standards, or objectives must be of value for them. But it is not sufficient that they attribute personal value to the goal: They must be convinced that they can reach it.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 108 “The expertise of a teacher does not consist only of his ability to plan a lesson or a comprehensive teaching unit and put it into practice; at least as important as these basic tools of the teaching profession are knowledge and flexibility regarding how to surmount unexpected difficulties.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 119 “When planning a teaching intervention, the most important question often remains unasked: In what ways does the chosen learning content or skill refer to the needs and interests of the students?” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 122 “Teaching is more effective and learning more successful when students participate in planning and starting the lesson.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 136 “What is a good explanation? Explanations should be clear and well-structured. They should take students’ age and their prior knowledge into account. They are supposed to correspond to the interests of the learners.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 144 “There is an unjustified differentiation between tasks for learning and tasks for testing. • First, all tasks should be meaningful and motivating, not only those destined for classroom practice. … • Second, all tasks have to contribute to an improvement of learning.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 159 “Deepening the learning processes during independent practice should at least prepare the transfer of new concepts or schemata to other situations than those in which the new content first occurred.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 172 “Cooperative learning and problem-/project-based approaches aim at further deepening the new learning content. They offer the learners multiple and motivating opportunities to lead to automaticity of knowledge and skills, and to promote the desired attitudes.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 176 “During the lesson, feedback should have three directions: from teachers to students, among the learners, and from students to teachers.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 199 “During work in small groups, teachers cannot eliminate peer feedback. It occurs as such because feedback is frequent in the life contexts of children, adolescents and adults. Therefore adequate training is of utmost importance not only for classroom learning but also with regard to future professional and private requirements.” – Inez De Florio, Effective Teaching and Successful Learning, p. 210

enthusiasm for their subject to motivate them, to bring their subject alive and make learning an exciting, vivid and enjoyable experience.    It is teachers’ passion for their subject that provides the basis for effective teaching and learning. These teachers use their subject expertise to engage students in meaningful learning experiences that embrace content, process and social climate. They create for and with their children opportunities to explore and build important areas of knowledge, and develop powerful tools for learning, within a supportive, collaborative and challenging classroom environment. (DfES, 2003a: paras 1–

Another practice that has given healthy pride a bad name is excessive praise for the smallest childhood success, from earning tokens in the classroom to the trophy glut at Little League. Many adults are turned off by this overpraise, sensing that the children are being done no favor. In fact, research has shown that many children overpraised for success end up becoming more cautious and less motivated than the kids who were praised only for their amount of effort, successful or not.

In the classroom of life, we take the tests before we learn the lessons. And success is when every day we are moving forward wiser, rather than restlessly striving to correct mistakes of days gone by.

In the early grades, being in positive classroom climates with friendly, considerate teachers is linked to greater self-regulation, less disruptive behavior, and higher teacher-rated social competence among elementary and middle school students. Middle school teachers whose classrooms support increasing student autonomy and competence can build personal relationships in which students feel known, valued, and respected. Gains in middle grade achievement and reduced levels of disruptive behavior are evidence in classrooms in which expectations are clear, time is used well and productively, and teachers respond effectively to variations in students’ motivation and focus. Similarly, strong, positive, and cooperative relationships with teachers increase high school students’ likelihood of graduating.

Deci and Ryan identified three key human needs—competence, autonomy, and relatedness or personal connection. Students feel a sense of relatedness when they perceive that their teachers like, value, and respect them. They feel competent when they work at challenging tasks (Tough, 2013, pp. 74-5). These three feelings are far more effective motivators for students than “a deskful of gold stars and blue ribbons.” Deci and Ryan recognize that throughout the day, teachers convey to their students “deep messages about belonging, connection, ability, and opportunity” (quoted by Tough, 2013).

A good relationship between the student and the teacher is a strong motivator for positive behavior and academic achievement.

This view of motivation, where students invest effort to get good at something, is often seen in out-of-school contexts – learning so as to be a dancer, a musician, a gamer. When in-school experiences lack this sense of purpose, it is most often because of dreary content and grading practices that reward compliance rather than learning. The measurement literature is replete with studies documenting the mixture of considerations that go into teachers’ grades. The majority of teachers use points and grades to “motivate” their students. Contrary to their intentions, this leads to the com-modification of learning and fosters a performance orientation rather than a mastery or learning orientation.

initial interest predicted both mastery and performance goals. Students who were more interested were more motivated both to learn and to perform well.

He had mounted the first three steps of the scaffold, when a young newsman tore forward, ran to him and, from below, seized the railing to stop him. “Dr. Stadler!” he cried in a desperate whisper. “Tell them the truth! Tell them that you had nothing to do with it! Tell them what sort of infernal machine it is and for what purpose it’s intended to be used! Tell the country what sort of people are trying to rule it! Nobody can doubt your word! Tell them the truth! Save us! You’re the only one who can!” Dr. Stadler looked down at him. He was young; his movements and voice had that swift, sharp clarity which belongs to competence; among his aged, corrupt, favor-ridden and pull-created colleagues, he had managed to achieve the rank of elite of the political press, by means and in the role of a last, irresistible spark of ability. His eyes had the look of an eager, unfrightened intelligence; they were the kind of eyes Dr. Stadler had seen looking up at him from the benches of classrooms. He noticed that this boy’s eyes were hazel; they had a tinge of green. Dr. Stadler turned his head and saw that Ferris had come rushing to his side, like a servant or a jailer. “I do not expect to be insulted by disloyal young punks with treasonable motives,” said Dr. Stadler loudly. Dr. Ferris whirled upon the young man and snapped, his face out of control, distorted by rage at the unexpected and unplanned, “Give me your press card and your work permit!” “I am proud,” Dr. Stadler read into the microphone and into the attentive silence of a nation, “that my years of work in the service of science have brought me the honor of placing into the hands of our great leader, Mr. Thompson, a new instrument with an incalculable potential for a civilizing and liberating influence upon the mind of man. . . .

Worse, tests emphasize exactly the wrong skills. They emphasize the memorization of massive amounts of facts that neurologically have a half-life of about 12 hours. They focus on short-term rewards through cramming to compensate for a failure in long-term development of value. It is no wonder we have financial meltdowns caused by successful students. We have to swallow a hard pill. The issue is not how do we make tests better? Or how can we have more or different types of tests? Or how do we arrange for more parts of a school program (such as a teacher’s worth) to be based on tests? The reality is, tests don’t work except as a blunt control-and-motivation mechanism for the classroom, the academic equivalent of MSG or sugar in processed food. In place of schools as testing centers, we have to begin imagining and setting up learning environments that involve no tests at all, that rely on real assessment and the creation of genuine value instead.

One of the greatest challenges educators and parents face is getting students engaged in their own learning. Particularly in middle school and high school, a large segment of students is doing as little as possible to get by. Even some top students take what Ned calls a “station-to-station” attitude, refusing to do anything that doesn’t contribute to a grade.2 We’re not raising curious learners who are motivated to develop their own minds. We’re raising kids who are overly focused on metrics and outcomes. The best thing you can do to facilitate engagement in the classroom may be to give your kid autonomy outside of it.

The Artist's Drawing Book by Katy Lipscomb and Tyler Fisher is filled with numerous art lessons for beginner artists. A self-motivated individual will likely find this an appealing way to learn art, though I think teachers might consider this useful in middle and high school classrooms as well. Seventeen different lessons are presented in this book, and each one builds on the other, helping to lay a strong art foundation. You could buy different art books that may have some or most of these lessons, though I’ve not seen any that provide the sort of succinct and precise approach that this one does. Each lesson is carefully thought out and needs to be practiced by the reader. The text is packed to the brim with information essential to succeed in art. That’s what makes this book so valuable. The lessons are intended to be learned by the budding artist, and so some may take days (or longer) to complete until the user masters the skill. The important thing is not to be in a hurry while working your way through this book. You might want to buy a sketchbook to go along with this, so you can keep your artwork in one place. You might also want to purchase a copy of this book for a friend, so you can practice your art skills together. After teaching art in school for 16 years (grades K-12), I fully understand how The Artist's Drawing Book by Katy Lipscomb and Tyler Fisher is an essential tool for those beginning in art. If you are serious about learning this fascinating subject, then this book is for you. This is an outstanding piece of work.

RECOMMENDED READING Brooks, David. The Road to Character. New York: Random House, 2015. Brown, Peter C., Henry L. Roediger III, and Mark A. McDaniel. Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2014. Damon, William. The Path to Purpose: How Young People Find Their Calling in Life. New York: Free Press, 2009. Deci, Edward L. with Richard Flaste. Why We Do What We Do: Understanding Self-Motivation. New York: Penguin Group, 1995. Duhigg, Charles. The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business. New York: Random House, 2012. Dweck, Carol. Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. New York: Random House, 2006. Emmons, Robert A. Thanks!: How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2007. Ericsson, Anders and Robert Pool. Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016. Heckman, James J., John Eric Humphries, and Tim Kautz (eds.). The Myth of Achievement Tests: The GED and the Role of Character in American Life. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014. Kaufman, Scott Barry and Carolyn Gregoire. Wired to Create: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Creative Mind. New York: Perigee, 2015. Lewis, Sarah. The Rise: Creativity, the Gift of Failure, and the Search for Mastery. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2014. Matthews, Michael D. Head Strong: How Psychology is Revolutionizing War. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. McMahon, Darrin M. Divine Fury: A History of Genius. New York: Basic Books, 2013. Mischel, Walter. The Marshmallow Test: Mastering Self-Control. New York: Little, Brown, 2014. Oettingen, Gabriele. Rethinking Positive Thinking: Inside the New Science of Motivation. New York: Penguin Group, 2014. Pink, Daniel H. Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. New York: Riverhead Books, 2009. Renninger, K. Ann and Suzanne E. Hidi. The Power of Interest for Motivation and Engagement. New York: Routledge, 2015. Seligman, Martin E. P. Learned Optimism: How To Change Your Mind and Your Life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1991. Steinberg, Laurence. Age of Opportunity: Lessons from the New Science of Adolescence. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014. Tetlock, Philip E. and Dan Gardner. Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction. New York: Crown, 2015. Tough, Paul. How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012. Willingham, Daniel T. Why Don’t Students Like School: A Cognitive Scientist Answers Questions About How the Mind Works and What It Means for the Classroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2009.

A school bus is many things. A school bus is a substitute for a limousine. More class. A school bus is a classroom with a substitute teacher. A school bus is the students' version of a teachers' lounge. A school bus is the principal's desk. A school bus is the nurse's cot. A school bus is an office with all the phones ringing. A school bus is a command center. A school bus is a pillow fort that rolls. A school bus is a tank reshaped- hot dogs and baloney are the same meat. A school bus is a science lab- hot dogs and baloney are the same meat. A school bus is a safe zone. A school bus is a war zone. A school bus is a concert hall. A school bus is a food court. A school bus is a court of law, all judges, all jury. A school bus is a magic show full of disappearing acts. Saw someone in half. Pick a card, any card. Pass it on to the person next to you. He like you. She like you. K-i-s-s-i . . . s-s-i-p-p-i is only funny on a school bus. A school bus is a stage. A school bus is a stage play. A school bus is a spelling bee. A speaking bee. A get your hand out of my face bee. A your breath smell like sour turnips bee. A you don't even know what a turnip bee is. A maybe not, but I know what a turn up is and your breath smell all the way turnt up bee. A school bus is a bumblebee, buzzing around with a bunch of stingers on the inside of it. Windows for wings that flutter up and down like the windows inside Chinese restaurants and post offices in neighborhoods where school bus is a book of stamps. Passing mail through windows. Notes in the form of candy wrappers telling the street something sweet came by. Notes in the form of sneaky middle fingers. Notes in the form of fingers pointing at the world zooming by. A school bus is a paintbrush painting the world a blurry brushstroke. A school bus is also wet paint. Good for adding an extra coat, but it will dirty you if you lean against it, if you get too comfortable. A school bus is a reclining chair. In the kitchen. Nothing cool about it but makes perfect sense. A school bus is a dirty fridge. A school bus is cheese. A school bus is a ketchup packet with a tiny hole in it. Left on the seat. A plastic fork-knife-spoon. A paper tube around a straw. That straw will puncture the lid on things, make the world drink something with some fizz and fight. Something delightful and uncomfortable. Something that will stain. And cause gas. A school bus is a fast food joint with extra value and no food. Order taken. Take a number. Send a text to the person sitting next to you. There is so much trouble to get into. Have you ever thought about opening the back door? My mother not home till five thirty. I can't. I got dance practice at four. A school bus is a talent show. I got dance practice right now. On this bus. A school bus is a microphone. A beat machine. A recording booth. A school bus is a horn section. A rhythm section. An orchestra pit. A balcony to shot paper ball three-pointers from. A school bus is a basketball court. A football stadium. A soccer field. Sometimes a boxing ring. A school bus is a movie set. Actors, directors, producers, script. Scenes. Settings. Motivations. Action! Cut. Your fake tears look real. These are real tears. But I thought we were making a comedy. A school bus is a misunderstanding. A school bus is a masterpiece that everyone pretends to understand. A school bus is the mountain range behind Mona Lisa. The Sphinx's nose. An unknown wonder of the world. An unknown wonder to Canton Post, who heard bus riders talk about their journeys to and from school. But to Canton, a school bus is also a cannonball. A thing that almost destroyed him. Almost made him motherless.

The pieces of the classroom management puzzle fall into three broad areas: • Instruction – maximizing the rate of learning while making independent learners out of helpless hand-raisers • Discipline – getting students to quit goofing off and get busy • Motivation – giving students a reason to work hard while being conscientious

When one tries to learn and fails, the experience can trigger uncertainty about one's ability to learn. The resulting loss of "smart status" and fear of future failure can freeze cognition; if this becomes chronic, it can give rise to hopelessness and pessimism in the classroom. When a student is on a losing streak—has fallen into a pattern of what he or she believes to be inevitable failure—it's easy to lose heart and see no option but to give up. If that student is unlucky, a naïve adult or two will decide that if a little intimidation doesn't motivate success in school, a great deal of intimidation just might. This is exactly the wrong approach.

Ask students what norms are important to them in school and in the classroom. Giving them a voice and then listening and acting on their needs gives them a sense of emotional, psychological, and cognitive safety. This trusting environment lessens the chance for stress and anxiety and prevents cortisol (stress hormone) release.

When someone else says: We should teach our teachers about this technology first so they can use it in their lessons. Answer in the following way… We operate on the assumption that teachers love children and are employed to benefit kids. Learning with and alongside students affords teachers an opportunity to see what’s possible through the eyes and screens of their students. Experiencing this potential is a powerful motivator.

People are more motivated and confident when they believe they have more control over their environment. “People with low-power mindsets do less than they otherwise could,” said one motivation researcher (Rigoglioso, 2008). Inviting students to have a voice in classroom decisions—where they sit, what day a test takes place, in what order units are studied, or even where a plant should be placed in the classroom—can help them develop that greater sense of control. An added benefit to this strategy could be fewer discipline issues. William Glasser suggests that power is a key need of students, and that 95% of classroom management problems happen because students are trying to fulfill that need (Ryan & Cooper, 2008, p. 85).

If someone’s baseline rewards aren’t adequate or equitable, her focus will be on the unfairness of her situation and the anxiety of her circumstance. You’ll get neither the predictability of extrinsic motivation nor the weirdness of intrinsic motivation. You’ll get very little motivation at all. But once we’re past that threshold, carrots and sticks can achieve precisely the opposite of their intended aims. (Pink, 2009, p. 35)

Will what I am about to do or say bring me closer or will it push me away farther from the person with whom I am communicating?” (Marshall, n.d.)

None of these points mean that students cannot be recognized and celebrated for their success. The key is to not hold it out as a “carrot” but, instead, to provide it as an unexpected “bonus” (Chai, 2009).

one study has found that it can even be helpful for people to literally “bribe” themselves with rewards if they meet their goals (Kristof, 2009). This can be applied in the classroom by suggesting that students list how they can reward themselves—a night of video games, sleeping in late—if they achieve some of their goals.

To create your comedic MAPP, you start with the purpose. Why are you writing humor? Is it to motivate or to entertain? Is the humor for a speech, a presentation, a comedy gig, or the classroom? The purpose gives direction and meaning to the material.

the Omegas harnessed Prometheus to revolutionize education. Given any person’s knowledge and abilities, Prometheus could determine the fastest way for them to learn any new subject in a manner that kept them highly engaged and motivated to continue, and produce the corresponding optimized videos, reading materials, exercises and other learning tools. Omega-controlled companies therefore marketed online courses about virtually everything, highly customized not only by language and cultural background but also by starting level. Whether you were an illiterate forty-year-old wanting to learn to read or a biology PhD seeking the latest about cancer immunotherapy, Prometheus had the perfect course for you. These offerings bore little resemblance to most present-day online courses: by leveraging Prometheus’ movie-making talents, the video segments would truly engage, providing powerful metaphors that you would relate to, leaving you craving to learn more. Some courses were sold for profit, but many were made available for free, much to the delight of teachers around the world who could use them in their classrooms—and to most anybody eager to learn anything.

If you are teaching in a free-range setting, your learners are probably volunteers, and probably want to be in your classroom. The exercise therefore isn’t how to motivate them, but how to not demotivate them. Unfortunately, you can do this by accident much more easily than you might think.

By concentrating almost exclusively on thesis-support exposition in college composition classes, we are implicitly teaching that the ability to support an assertion is more important than the ability to examine an issue.

In a now-famous experiment, he and his colleagues compared three groups of expert violinists at the elite Music Academy in West Berlin. The researchers asked the professors to divide the students into three groups: the “best violinists,” who had the potential for careers as international soloists; the “good violinists”; and a third group training to be violin teachers rather than performers. Then they interviewed the musicians and asked them to keep detailed diaries of their time. They found a striking difference among the groups. All three groups spent the same amount of time—over fifty hours a week— participating in music-related activities. All three had similar classroom requirements making demands on their time. But the two best groups spent most of their music-related time practicing in solitude: 24.3 hours a week, or 3.5 hours a day, for the best group, compared with only 9.3 hours a week, or 1.3 hours a day, for the worst group. The best violinists rated “practice alone” as the most important of all their music-related activities. Elite musicians—even those who perform in groups—describe practice sessions with their chamber group as “leisure” compared with solo practice, where the real work gets done. Ericsson and his cohorts found similar effects of solitude when they studied other kinds of expert performers. “Serious study alone” is the strongest predictor of skill for tournament-rated chess players, for example; grandmasters typically spend a whopping five thousand hours—almost five times as many hours as intermediatelevel players—studying the game by themselves during their first ten years of learning to play. College students who tend to study alone learn more over time than those who work in groups. Even elite athletes in team sports often spend unusual amounts of time in solitary practice. What’s so magical about solitude? In many fields, Ericsson told me, it’s only when you’re alone that you can engage in Deliberate Practice, which he has identified as the key to exceptional achievement. When you practice deliberately, you identify the tasks or knowledge that are just out of your reach, strive to upgrade your performance, monitor your progress, and revise accordingly. Practice sessions that fall short of this standard are not only less useful—they’re counterproductive. They reinforce existing cognitive mechanisms instead of improving them. Deliberate Practice is best conducted alone for several reasons. It takes intense concentration, and other people can be distracting. It requires deep motivation, often self-generated. But most important, it involves working on the task that’s most challenging to you personally. Only when you’re alone, Ericsson told me, can you “go directly to the part that’s challenging to you. If you want to improve what you’re doing, you have to be the one who generates the move. Imagine a group class—you’re the one generating the move only a small percentage of the time.” To see Deliberate Practice in action, we need look no further than the story of Stephen Wozniak. The Homebrew meeting was the catalyst that inspired him to build that first PC, but the knowledge base and work habits that made it possible came from another place entirely: Woz had deliberately practiced engineering ever since he was a little kid. (Ericsson says that it takes approximately ten thousand hours of Deliberate Practice to gain true expertise, so it helps to start young.)

Great teachers are never born in silent classrooms.

Excessive use of rewards and punishments may lead to a focus on compliance rather than genuine learning, hindering students' intrinsic motivation and long-term growth.

Environmental factors, including the classroom setting, school environment, peer-relationships, and learning formats, play a significant role in shaping motivation and influencing academic achievement.

Constructivist learning experiences may vary in effectiveness, as some learners may require more guidance and support than others, potentially leading to disparities in learning outcomes.

While implementing constructivist approaches demands tailored learning experiences and skilled facilitation, its resource-intensive nature may pose challenges for educators striving to create dynamic, student-centered classrooms.

In transformative teaching, understanding motivation theories such as intrinsic and extrinsic motivation is essential for fostering students' internal drive and interest in learning.

The Self-Determination Theory emphasizes autonomy, competence, and relatedness as key factors in nurturing intrinsic motivation, while the Expectancy-Value Theory links students' expectations for success with the perceived value of tasks, influencing their motivation levels.

Welcoming guest speakers and industry experts into the classroom creates invaluable connections between theoretical concepts and real-world applications, inspiring students and providing them with valuable insights and mentorship.

Integrating arts into the curriculum cultivates creativity, self-expression, and emotional intelligence, enriching the learning experience and nurturing well-rounded individuals capable of making meaningful contributions to society.

Embracing design thinking principles fosters creativity, innovation, and problem-solving skills, empowering students to approach challenges with a fresh perspective and develop viable solutions through iterative processes of ideation and prototyping.

Assigning research projects promotes independent inquiry and critical thinking skills, allowing students to explore topics of interest in depth and communicate their findings effectively, preparing them for success in academia and beyond.