Motivation- Week 10
Merrian-Webster's dictionary defines motivation as the act or process of giving someone a reason for doing something. I challenged myself at the beginning of the week to motivate my students. I had recently gone through grades to check on my students progress. I had come to find six students "failing" (69% or lower) in my classes. Our marking period ends on March 23rd, so I thought, "How can I motivate my students to work harder and care more?"
Throughout my student teaching experience I have had other teachers in the profession share with me lessons, videos, and weekly advice. I had a person share with me a video called "What Students Really Need to Hear." This video is a six minute long reflection on a single teacher's thoughts that speaks for many in the profession. On Monday I decided to share the video with my students.
In the video it mentioned how students are failing the major event of school. The major event of school is not the academics (although academics are important). The true major event of school is learning how to deal with adversities. Failing to deal with adversities looks like quitting or giving up. For example, when students choose to not pick up a pencil because a fraction is to hard, or they feel they can't do it because they aren't smart enough. Every time a student chooses to pick up a pencil they are choosing to face adversities!
Adversities prepare students for everyday life. Students might say that teachers do not understand how hard it is to do two hours of homework when you have a part-time job, play sports, and try to be social with family and friends. Why wouldn't a teacher understand adversities? A teacher gets up at 5am, goes to work from 7-3, might coach a sports team, be the advisor for a club, come home to cook dinner, clean, and take care of a family. Teachers and parents understand that there are greater adversities in life than a fraction to complete off the board.
I had this discussion with my students after the video was over. I then asked my students to be honest with me. I asked every student to raise their hand if they have ever failed a class before? Almost every student raised their hand. I asked them if they noticed my hand was raised? I explained how I have failed a class before; however, I did not quit after failing my class because I believe that fail is an acronym. Fail stands for FIRST ATTEMPT IN LEARNING!
After failing students can choose to quit or learn to succeed. For example, I had a student that other teachers told me was "lazy." He did not care about school and his parents felt the same way. He took my first quiz and got a 32%. I thought to myself "Yikes, maybe those teachers were right." But, I still did not give up on him. He took my second quiz and got a 66%. Still not great, but he doubled his score! I was proud of him and I shared my happiness to him. Finally, it comes to the third quiz and he got a 97%. He now talks to me everyday. He ask me for help or sometimes he just makes casual conversation. I learned to not quit and I hope my students learn the same thing. What students really need to hear is teachers care about their successes. We hope every students graduates, gets a job, and is happy in life because they learned how to face adversities!
I encourage anyone to use this video as motivation for their students! I provided the link below:
Throughout my student teaching experience I have had other teachers in the profession share with me lessons, videos, and weekly advice. I had a person share with me a video called "What Students Really Need to Hear." This video is a six minute long reflection on a single teacher's thoughts that speaks for many in the profession. On Monday I decided to share the video with my students.
In the video it mentioned how students are failing the major event of school. The major event of school is not the academics (although academics are important). The true major event of school is learning how to deal with adversities. Failing to deal with adversities looks like quitting or giving up. For example, when students choose to not pick up a pencil because a fraction is to hard, or they feel they can't do it because they aren't smart enough. Every time a student chooses to pick up a pencil they are choosing to face adversities!
Adversities prepare students for everyday life. Students might say that teachers do not understand how hard it is to do two hours of homework when you have a part-time job, play sports, and try to be social with family and friends. Why wouldn't a teacher understand adversities? A teacher gets up at 5am, goes to work from 7-3, might coach a sports team, be the advisor for a club, come home to cook dinner, clean, and take care of a family. Teachers and parents understand that there are greater adversities in life than a fraction to complete off the board.
I had this discussion with my students after the video was over. I then asked my students to be honest with me. I asked every student to raise their hand if they have ever failed a class before? Almost every student raised their hand. I asked them if they noticed my hand was raised? I explained how I have failed a class before; however, I did not quit after failing my class because I believe that fail is an acronym. Fail stands for FIRST ATTEMPT IN LEARNING!
After failing students can choose to quit or learn to succeed. For example, I had a student that other teachers told me was "lazy." He did not care about school and his parents felt the same way. He took my first quiz and got a 32%. I thought to myself "Yikes, maybe those teachers were right." But, I still did not give up on him. He took my second quiz and got a 66%. Still not great, but he doubled his score! I was proud of him and I shared my happiness to him. Finally, it comes to the third quiz and he got a 97%. He now talks to me everyday. He ask me for help or sometimes he just makes casual conversation. I learned to not quit and I hope my students learn the same thing. What students really need to hear is teachers care about their successes. We hope every students graduates, gets a job, and is happy in life because they learned how to face adversities!
I encourage anyone to use this video as motivation for their students! I provided the link below:
Heather, I love the positive acronym that you have put on the word FAIL, and how you are incorporating this valuable life lesson into your classroom. Congratulations on connecting with a difficult student, and hopefully that student will be the first of many that you can help transform from failing into success stories. Please share how the video and discussion impacted the students that were struggling and if any of them were able to get their grade up by the end of the marking period.
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