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Old 07-11-2012, 07:16 PM
 
Location: Florida
7,195 posts, read 5,705,767 times
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If you're dangling a carrot in front of the kid, that's not helping them to become intrinsically motivated to learn. While unfortunately many people are stuck in jobs where they have to rely on external motivation, adults and children should, hopefully, find some sort of internal motivation when it comes to learning. Actually, I hope beyond hope that my own kids find careers that fulfill them to the point where the external motivation is secondary to their own passion and internal motivation. I can't imagine not having the desire to constantly learn new things.
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Old 07-11-2012, 07:22 PM
 
32,516 posts, read 37,088,332 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AnotherTouchOfWhimsy View Post
If you're dangling a carrot in front of the kid, that's not helping them to become intrinsically motivated to learn.
Exactly my point and very nicely said.
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Old 07-11-2012, 08:22 PM
 
Location: outer space
484 posts, read 968,562 times
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Motivated??

We live in a society that downright does not accept science:

Level of support for evolution - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_o...tific_literacy

So how do we motivate in this environment?
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Old 07-11-2012, 08:24 PM
 
Location: Whoville....
25,386 posts, read 35,466,787 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DewDropInn View Post
Nope.

That doesn't do anything to teach the kid that someday Dad is not going to be there and Junior is going to have to be responsible for his own car payment when he's an adult.
It did get him to learn enough chemistry to get a B. That's more than some of my students managed.
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Old 07-11-2012, 08:25 PM
 
Location: Whoville....
25,386 posts, read 35,466,787 times
Reputation: 14692
Quote:
Originally Posted by AnotherTouchOfWhimsy View Post
If you're dangling a carrot in front of the kid, that's not helping them to become intrinsically motivated to learn. While unfortunately many people are stuck in jobs where they have to rely on external motivation, adults and children should, hopefully, find some sort of internal motivation when it comes to learning. Actually, I hope beyond hope that my own kids find careers that fulfill them to the point where the external motivation is secondary to their own passion and internal motivation. I can't imagine not having the desire to constantly learn new things.
But we've already established that we can't get them to be intrinsically motivated to learn because they don't see the relevence in an education. So, carrots will have to do until they can.
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Old 07-11-2012, 08:35 PM
 
Location: Denver 'burbs
24,012 posts, read 28,399,744 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ivorytickler View Post
But we've already established that we can't get them to be intrinsically motivated to learn because they don't see the relevence in an education. So, carrots will have to do until they can.
Who is "we" and who is "them"? And "can't" again? For all of "them"? Perhaps that's the problem....the "us" vs "them" mentality. Both the students who embrace that as well as the teachers who see things that way. When my kids were in HS, the teachers that made the biggest and most positive impact on them, presented as part of a team. "Us" was inclusive of both teacher and students. It wasn't a battle against each other.

Last edited by maciesmom; 07-11-2012 at 08:54 PM..
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Old 07-11-2012, 09:42 PM
 
2,265 posts, read 3,695,476 times
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Originally Posted by Ivorytickler View Post
It did get him to learn enough chemistry to get a B. That's more than some of my students managed.
I earned every C I got in high school Chem. It was a fun class, but I absolutely hate math and suck at it horribly.
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Old 07-12-2012, 04:48 AM
 
Location: Whoville....
25,386 posts, read 35,466,787 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ReblTeen84 View Post
I earned every C I got in high school Chem. It was a fun class, but I absolutely hate math and suck at it horribly.
Chemistry is math with beakers...

I find the students who earn their grades learn the most no matter what the grade. Most of my A students are A students because they were well prepared coming into the class and the memorize well not because they learned a lot in my class.
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Old 07-12-2012, 06:12 AM
 
Location: Florida
7,195 posts, read 5,705,767 times
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Originally Posted by Ivorytickler View Post
Chemistry is math with beakers...

I find the students who earn their grades learn the most no matter what the grade. Most of my A students are A students because they were well prepared coming into the class and the memorize well not because they learned a lot in my class.
Exactly!! The kid who earns a C and learns a lot owns that part of his education. The kid who sails through and earns an A by memorizing, regurgitating and forgetting, doesn't learn much at all.

Which kid is going to be discouraged by his grade, though? If you put your all into a class and didn't hit that dangling carrot (the A), will it make you want to work as hard the next time? Now, obviously if he got a C (and handed in all assignments), then he didn't master 25% of the class's requirements. Maybe he would have benefited from a class that went at a slower pace. Maybe chemistry for him could have been split into two years instead of one. Whatever the case may be. But when we make every kid take the same class at the same pace, discouragement happens. This happens for many kids when they're in the 1st grade and don't read or add as well/quickly as their peers. Over the course of 12 years, I can see how browbeaten young adults are coming out of schools just wanting to get all of this learning business over with, already. This is why you have kids who simply don't care going into high school science (or whatever) classes... they've tried before and were simply assigned a mediocre or failing grade; why would this be any different?
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Old 07-12-2012, 06:29 AM
 
Location: Whoville....
25,386 posts, read 35,466,787 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AnotherTouchOfWhimsy View Post
Exactly!! The kid who earns a C and learns a lot owns that part of his education. The kid who sails through and earns an A by memorizing, regurgitating and forgetting, doesn't learn much at all.

Which kid is going to be discouraged by his grade, though? If you put your all into a class and didn't hit that dangling carrot (the A), will it make you want to work as hard the next time? Now, obviously if he got a C (and handed in all assignments), then he didn't master 25% of the class's requirements. Maybe he would have benefited from a class that went at a slower pace. Maybe chemistry for him could have been split into two years instead of one. Whatever the case may be. But when we make every kid take the same class at the same pace, discouragement happens. This happens for many kids when they're in the 1st grade and don't read or add as well/quickly as their peers. Over the course of 12 years, I can see how browbeaten young adults are coming out of schools just wanting to get all of this learning business over with, already. This is why you have kids who simply don't care going into high school science (or whatever) classes... they've tried before and were simply assigned a mediocre or failing grade; why would this be any different?
THAT is the fault of society. Society says a C is a bad grade. I don't.

In college, my dean had a plaque on his wall that said:

Be nice to your A students....because some day they will return to you as a professor
Be nice to your B students....because some day they will design a new wing for you
Be nice to your C students....because they will build it for you.

I, certainly, am not the one saying that anything short of being the intellectual who gets A's is unacceptable. In fact, I'm kind of enamored by my B students. They're either busting their buts to learn or, the type I admire the most, have the common sense to say "That's too much work" once in a while. I have to respect that.

I chased grades in college and I think it hindered my learning. I was in my second masters degree before I looked at an assignment and said "That's too much work" and did what I had to to get the B. As an undergrad student I thought B's were failing grades.

We really need to change how we look at grades. We should be far less impressed with A's (More often than not, A students are just good rule followers. You do get a few who are just stand outs but most are not. Most have, simply, learned to play the game well.) and far more impressed with B's and C's. My B and C students are the ones who work for their grades. Working hard is a GOOD thing.

Edited to add: During my senior year in college, I was taking 18 credits and working 24 hours a week and driving an hour one way to get to work. I ditched my usual lab group and hooked up with a C student who was also carrying a heavy load and working. Why? Because I knew he'd pull his weight. I did most of the work in my old lab group and didn't care because I like things my way. But when I knew I would need help, I found someone who was used to working for his grades because I knew he would work for his grades.

BTW, he's one of the best practical engineers I know. He could figure out how to make things work in spite of the antiquated condition of the equipment in our senior Chem. E lab. It didn't look like the schematic when he got done but it did the job. He was a life saver that term. Unfortunately, I pissed off a few friends who were used to me doing the work. I wish they had understood that that was the term that *I* needed the help. I pullled a 3.5 that term. IMO, that 3.5 stands taller than any of my 4.0 terms.

My assessment is that A students know lots of things, B students have learned lots of things and C students work hard when the going gets tough. Seriously, if I owned a business, I'd prefer B and C students over A students who are most likly A students because things are easy for them. You don't grow when things are easy for you. I learned more and grew more in my classes where I got B's than I did in most of my classes where I got A's. The classes where I got B's asked me to stretch beyond my comfort zone. I may or may not have stretched at all in the classes I got A's in. Some of them I worked for and some were just easy.

Last edited by Ivorytickler; 07-12-2012 at 06:54 AM..
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