Motivating Students to Learn and Succeed

Introduction

To be an effective teacher, one should be able to engage the students and help them maintain an interest in the subject being taught. While some students are naturally driven and demonstrate interest on their own, most are reluctant and need to be stimulated to learn. The teacher must therefore find ways to motivate these students to learn and achieve success. By definition, motivation is the “process of stimulating people to action to accomplish desired goals” (Kondalkar 245). In this paper, I will illustrate several ways through which I can best motivate my students.

Ways of Motivating my Students

I will take into consideration the unique learning styles of my students when coming up with ways to motivate them. To motivate the auditory learners, I will ensure that the classroom setting is quiet to minimize distractions. I will also incorporate rhymes and jingles to help these students remember the important points in the lesson. By incorporating such techniques, the students will find it easy to remember learned material and they will therefore be motivated to learn (Hedge 43).

To motivate the visual learners in my class, I will make use of teaching aids such as charts and interesting PowerPoint presentations. I will also encourage the students to make flashcards to assist them to remember concepts covered in class. To motivate kinesthetic learners, I will relate the learning material to real-life examples. By doing this, I will help them to visualize the information practically.

Kostelecky and Mark reveal that many students are unmotivated to learn material that appears to be unrelated to their own life experiences and career goals (438). With this in mind, I would ensure that I link the information I am providing my students with to the real-world environment. This can be achieved by the use of concrete examples of how the information or skills I am teaching may be of relevance to my students in the real-world environment.

I will endeavor to create a friendly environment in my classroom and create a good relationship between myself and the students and also among the students. This notion is supported by Hedge who reveals that good interaction in the classroom will help to create a favorable learning environment (13). This move will also motivate the students to take part in class activities since they will have a sense of belongingness. The feeling of belongingness will drive the students to devote full energy to achieving success in my class.

Students need to know what is expected of them in the classroom. With this in mind, I will set expectations for each lesson or assignment. This will ensure that my students know the standard I expect them to reach. Kostelecky and Mark state that showing students standards for their work is critical in motivating them to do their best effort (439). This is because when students know where the “pass mark” is, they will be motivated to work hard to reach it. If they accomplish the goal, they will feel proud of their performance.

Students come from diverse backgrounds and this fact must be taken into consideration when motivating them. For example, our society is becoming increasingly multicultural and the classroom might have students from different cultures. To motivate this multicultural class, I would make sure that my lessons incorporate resources from different cultures (Hedge 78). The students will therefore have a rich experience as they learn from different cultures.

It is also likely that the students will be from varied religious backgrounds. To motivate them, I would need to gain a better understanding of the religious backgrounds of the various students. This will help me to be more sensitive and focused on my teaching. I will also be able to help the students to gain insight from their peers and respect each other’s religion. This will create a friendly environment where students will be able to work together in harmony.

Once I have managed to motivate my students, it will be important to maintain this desire to learn. To accomplish this, I will ask the students to set goals that they hope to reach by the end of the week or month. These goals shall be both challenging and achievable and they will ensure that my students are constantly striving to succeed (Kostelecky and Mark 442). I would then review the outcomes of each student and give them feedback on their progress and commend them on their successes or offer suggestions on how they can reach their targets.

Conclusion

In this paper, I set out to illustrate how I can best motivate my students to obtain positive results in their studies. I began by noting that the learning style of the students will be important in determining the motivation that I use. I then demonstrated how I would make use of the students’ interests to help them learn more. I also reviewed how incorporating diversity in the classroom can be used to enhance motivation. By undertaking all this, I will be able to motivate my students and ensure that they achieve success in their academic work.

Works Cited

Hedge, Tricia. Teaching and Learning in the Language Classroom. Oxford: OUP, 2000.

Kondalkar, Sajd. Organization effectiveness and change management. Boston: PHI learning Pvt. Ltd, 2002. Print.

Kostelecky, Kyle and Mark Hoskinson. “A ‘novel’ approach to motivating students”. Education 125, no. 3 (2005): 438-442. Print.