Motivation for long-term success
As educators we know all about motivating students, or do we? We know that positive reinforcement is key. Yet we still struggle sometimes with student engagement and behaviour management. We fall in the trap of using rewards that are effective short-term yet detrimental long term. Ultimately, children do what they do because they are driven by both external and internal forces. The internal forces are stronger and more long term so if we want to really motivate them effectively we need to know how to employ intrinsic motivation strategies.
Extrinsic motivation vs intrinsic motivation
Extrinsic motivation comes from the outside environment and is typically a short-term reward for a certain behaviour e.g. participate in this activity to get a sticker. Intrinsic motivation, on the other hand, comes from within and is usually based on a long-term value or belief system e.g. feeling accomplished from completing a puzzle.
A famous research study on extrinsic motivation vs intrinsic motivation placed children in three groups, and were all asked the draw with “magic markers” - which is an inherently fun activity for children. The difference was that first group was told from the beginning that they would get stickers for drawing; the second group were not told about stickers but still got them unexpectedly after they’ve finished drawing; the third group were not told about nor did they get any stickers. Two weeks later, the teachers again put out the magic markers, and observed how much time the children chose to spend with the activity, when there was no longer any tangible reward available.
What happened? The first group who had previously expected to receive the stickers showed significantly less interest — in fact, half as much — as they had before the study. So, contracting for a reward to do this initially interesting and attractive activity subsequently had a negative effect on their interest. The misuse of rewards or the use of superfluous awards undermined intrinsic interests, turning an attractive activity into something the child would only want to do if there was a payoff.
When to use what kind of motivation
Extrinsic rewards is not all bad. Rewards, in fact, are neither good nor bad. There are good and bad uses of them. So, how can rewards be used most effectively, without undermining interest or in order to achieve other positive ends? Consider these questions: First, is the reward necessary or superfluous? Is the reward needed to get the children to engage in the activity? If the activity itself is interesting to the children then they don’t need any reward. But when a child will not engage in an activity without some reward, they may have a positive effect by getting children started in the task. If you start by doing things that encourage the child to engage in the activity enough to come to appreciate that it’s fun, that may be a legitimate use for rewards.
Secondly, does increased engagement in the task help build new skills? In the case of reading, if you can get kids to engage in activities that are relevant to eventually developing this skill, then in the end they will have acquired a skill that has intrinsic value that they didn’t have before.
Finally, if you have to use rewards in cases where you want to encourage children to do something, will the child perceive the reward as a bribe or a bonus? If so, refrain from using such rewards as it would be counterproductive in the long run.
Use rewards that help to create a feeling of competence and accomplishment in the child, rather than for social control or as a technique of discipline. Praise for specific behaviour and encouragement are all helpful extrinsic motivation, which will eventually develop into intrinsic motivation once the child develops competence.
Five “C’s” for turning work into play
Consider the five “C‘s” for turning work into play to motivate children to work hard. The first is Challenge. There is a lot of evidence that children — as well as the the rest of us — will seek out challenges, that if you give children tasks of different levels of difficulty, they’ll look for one of intermediate difficulty — the one where they’re not certain they’re going to succeed, but it’s not impossible. They think they can improve and learn and become better.
For the next “C,” remember children search for Competence, evidence that they’ve accomplished something at a high level, or that they’ve improved. Children feel competence when they succeed, and when they feel like effort, skill and ability entered into the success.
The third “C” is that people of all ages like to be in Control. They like to feel like they’re in charge, that they’re determining their own fates. So give children choices in what they do and autonomy in how they accomplish their tasks.
The fourth “C” is Curiosity. We often seek out things because we’re curious, because they’re mysterious and complex, things we sort of understand but not quite. The incongruity makes us want to learn more. Good teachers are adept at bringing out this sense of wonderment.
And finally, the fifth “C” is Context, which refers to the fact that we often get great pleasure from engrossing ourselves in imaginary environments — listening to stories, reading books, going to movies, watching TV, playing video games. Identifying with characters has a very powerful effect.
