In the slide show Motivating Middle School Students offers insight into what motivates middle school students along with a look into why they can be unmotivated in school.

Some things middle school kids are interested in:

· Friends

· Sports

· Lunch

· How they look in front of their friends

· Socializing

· Extracurricular activities

Some things that motivate students:

· Getting good grades

· If the subject is interesting

· Fun activities

· Competitions

· Being with friends

· If the topic is relevant

Additionally, it is stated some possible reasons that can be impacted student motivation. It touches on the poverty rate, single parents raising children, homelessness, child abuse, and juvenile courts.  All of the topics I listed have rose to an all time high than in the past.  Additionally, the USA incarcerates more of its youth than any other country in the world. The nation’s poverty rate rose 15.1% in 2010 the highest since 1993.  In other words students are worrying about where they are going to live, how they are going to eat, and if a family member is going to jail rather than staying motivated and thinking about academics.

It all comes back to building relationships with students. In this article it states that students will do anything you ask of them if you have a positive relationship with them. However, successful relationships require two things RESPECT AND TRUST. There is a connection between self-esteem, motivation, and engagement.  It shows in this slide that as students grow older they lose their self-esteem.

Maslow’s Hierarchy

Safety

· Love and belongingness

· Esteem

Students’ basic needs were also covered:

· Need for Competence and Self-worth

· Need for Relatedness

· Need for Affiliation

· Need for Approval

· Need for Achievement

In the article: Student Motivation: Age Old Problem Gets New Attention, it focuses on the many factors that impact student motivation. One area that this article touches on that others I have read did not is the problem that students do not know when to come to adults for help and when they should be doing things on their own. This article from Education Week suggests that this is one of the main conflicts in regards to student motivation. US schools are working toward a 90% graduation rate by 2020 and policy makers are looking at how to improve student motivation to keep this number growing. Even the White House has launches initiatives on ways to improve students’ academic mindset and boost student motivation.

Another focus of this article was making time to build character. With the focus of federal and state testing accountability there’s less time in the classroom to build students’ motivation and perseverance. A 2013 CEP analysis found four academic mindsets that contribute to a student’ motivation belief in the student's own competence; ownership of his or her learning; interest in the subject or at least understanding of the value of learning it; and a feeling of social relatedness to the school and community. In other words, it has been proven that academic mindsets do have an impact on student achievement.

A question that was looked at through out this article was “ Can motivation be taught?” it was stated that motivation skills could definitely be taught in the classroom. Although those skills can be taught, it would be better if students were motivated by teachers so much that it becomes second nature to continue with their motivation skills on their own. Teachers can cultivate this by having students take charge of their own learning and make decisions.

The dark side of the focus on motivation is a focal point in this article.  Research studies by Stanford University psychologist Carol S. Dweck, Harvard University economist Roland G. Fryer Jr., and others, have found short-term efforts to motivate students to meet external goals,providing cash or prizes for behavior or improved test grades, could damage their motivation in the long term.  Additionally, making sure to inject realism for students can also keep students motivated.

The results:

· Teacher behavior influences students’ perceptions of their interactions with teachers

· Teacher behavior influences student engagement

· Students who have low engagement will receive less teacher support

The student is the first key ingredient when it comes to motivation. It is stated that the students’ role in education is most important because ultimately we would not be having this conversation without them. Students are intrinsically and extrinsically motivated. However, students are not motivated by just a few things. It is a very complex subject area when discussing what motivates students, therefore, it cannot be narrowed down to a few areas. What really stood out when talking about the students were the basic needs. It stated that students could not learn unless they feel safe in their environment and they were not hungry or tired. I can relate to this area of the discussion because many times in my 4 years of teaching, I have had students who have not had breakfast or were asleep in the classroom. If we really think about it, how can students really focus on learning when their basic needs have not been met?  I’m surprised at how this has not crossed my mind before now. Additionally, students have to make connections with what it is that they’re learning. It has to be presented in a way that interests them. If they’re not interested why would they put their effort into learning and doing well? When it comes to motivation I know that some students already come with the intrinsic piece that was talked about earlier.  However, another point that was well made in this article was about efficient use of energy and focus. I know as a young child and even young adult most of everything had to be taught to me. Not everything comes naturally. So in this case it is imperative that students are trained to know how to be efficient and focus their energy. 

The second ingredient that I am going to talk about was also the most interesting

to me. The teacher is the second ingredient to student motivation and when really thinking about it, it makes sense. It was emphasized throughout this article that students display more motivational benefits from teachers that they like over teachers they dislike.  Additionally, that teacher’s knowledge of their subject area also makes a difference in the classroom. In this article, college students are focused on but this also has bearing and connection to all students and teachers in the education field.  Giving tests was another an area that was talked about in this article. Teachers must know how to give tests that motivate students and really evaluate what students know on particular areas. If tests are harder than what was covered in class this has a negative impact on student motivation. The areas of this ingredient that stood out to me were making sure to get to know your students and focus on their strengths. I know that sometimes as teachers we lose sight of just how motivating we can be. Everything we do in the classroom is noticed by our students even when we don’t realize it.  By making sure to be motivational and positive in our actions we are promoting motivation in our classrooms. When students see that their teacher is excited and enthusiastic about topics they too become excited.

Content is the next ingredient. It must be relevant, accurate, and useful. Students

must feel that they are able to use this information in their life. It reminds me of the most frequent question asked “ When are we going to use this in the real world?”  When we think about motivation we know that we all must experience success in order to become and stay motivated. As we know we all experience failure but if we were to only experience that we would lose our motivation. Teachers must make sure that students experience success because it creates self-confidence.  Another way to ensure continued motivation growth is to make sure that students make decisions that allow them to take ownership of their learning. Which leads to the point of making sure students have the opportunity to make choices in the classroom. This also leads to increased motivation because it is self-directed. Including technology is almost always a motivator in my experience. In the world we live in students have everything at their fingertips. They’re constantly entertained and can listen to music, pull up video clips, and access social networks in a matter of a few minutes.  This is why it is imperative to incorporate technology to increase motivation in the classroom.

The next ingredient to success is method/process, which is the way the content is presented or taught to students. It was described in this section of the article that educators should use incentives and self-learning in the classroom. When I first read this I immediately thought of how expensive incentives can be. However, this article made a good point that incentives can be used differently. For example, time can be an incentive in the classroom by allowing students to spend their time on something that is important to them.  I have now realized it is important to think outside the box.  It goes on in more detail to talk about different learning styles, positive peer social interactions, and praise in the classroom.

The fifth and last ingredient to increase motivation is the environment. We are in the teaching environment everyday and some say it can even take on a spiritual presence. The environment must first be available and accessible to all students. When mentioned earlier, the environment must be safe and make students feel comfortable to make mistakes and learn from those mistakes. Most importantly, there is not one way to motivate students.  No one theory seems to solve motivation in the classroom. One must keep an open mind and take in all information that is learned and continue to incorporate new strategies in the classroom.

In addition to human motives, he talked about how everyone should continue to move forward when it comes to how they think about motivation. Once we all realize that motivation cannot be separated into two categories of intrinsic and extrinsic, we can start to really focus in on what really motivates our students.  Once we know that it is not as simple as a student doing or not doing something justbecause of one reason we can change our way of thinking to improve our teaching.

Later in the article it was stated that students who came from higher economic status appeared to be more likely to succeed just based off of their interests. Students from lower economic status could be just has successful, but with more guidance when choosing a career path. Most often students who come from lower economic status choose a path based on financial situations and do not take into consideration that they need to be interested in that subject area to be success long term. This is an area of motivation that I would like to include in my research because it surprised me and left me wondering more about student success.

Another aspect of success that was discussed in this article was student expectations. Student expectations are imperative and linked to their success. Students from all socioeconomic backgrounds can be successful if they have expectations set.  Additionally, it is important for teachers and parents to set expectations for students that are difficult but obtainable and they will meet those expectations.  

While reading How Motivation Affects Learning and Behavior, I learned that all students are motivated in some way. It may not always be the way we want, but they are motivated in one way or another. I never realized this before and it has definitely made me look at motivation differently. This article talks about how some students may be motivated socially in school wanting to interact with friends, some are motivated in academics, and others athletics. Additionally, some may be motivated to avoid all of those aspects of school in general.

Throughout the article it talks about several ways that motivation affects learning and behavior. Firstly, the motivation a student has directly determines the specific goals that the learner strives toward. It really impacts the choices that students make. The example that was given in the text was whether a student enrolls in physics or art is directly related to their interest and motivation toward it.

Here are the others effects that were listed:

· Motivation increases the amount of effort and energy that learners expend

· Motivation increases initiation of and persistence in activities. 

· Motivation affects cognitive processes. Motivation affects what learners pay attention to and how effectively they process it 

· Motivation determines which consequences are reinforcing and punishing.

· Motivation often enhances performance.

The article titled, To Reward or not to Reward: Motivating Students to Learn, was eye opening to me and gave me a viewpoint that I hadn’t thought of before. I read this to get an idea of how rewards should be used and if they should be used at all to increase student motivation.  When we think of rewards in the classroom, we think of the traditional prize boxes and candy. In this article it debates if rewarding can be used to increase student motivation.

  In this article, many points were made in support of using rewards in the classroom. It was stated that teachers could use rewards in the classroom to help children learn. To really use rewards effectively, one must not use rewards if they are not earned. People would reward or praise others to build up self-esteem and it is stated that this is not a correct way to use rewards in the classroom. The most important note that I read in this article was that rewards could be in the form of encouragement and feedback to make learning a rewarding experience.  I really want to do this in my classroom.

 While reading the article, How to Motivate Students to Work Harder, I could relate to every point that was being made.  The main goal in public schools is to close the gap of achievement and while that is the focus the standards fail to address the most important factor to learning: the psychological barriers that students face.  When students doubt their academic abilities and if they belong they are more likely to fail regardless of their intelligence or quality of teaching they receive. In an additional article from The Journal of Experimental Psychology they completed a study with students who had to write a paragraph about a personal hero. They had teachers write their usual notes while grading the papers and then included post it notes on some of the other papers. The post it notes had positive remarks and told the students how much better he or she could do. Then the teachers gave the students an opportunity to revise their essay and turn it back in. 87% of the students who had received the encouraging messages turned it back in.

I enjoyed this article the most out of all the others I found and read. I can relate to the points first hand. I keep thinking of myself as a student and how I reacted more positively to teachers that I respected and knew genuinely cared about me.  This study goes on to describe the importance of positive interactions with students. This was my favorite quote from this article “When students feel "dumb," the solution is not to tell them they're "smart" but to make them feel as though being "smart" or "dumb" is irrelevant to success.”