Monthly Archives: February 2017

Finding the motivation to write this was tough…

Today, I had a lecture on Motivation in the Primary Classroom.

We were given the question….How do we motivate learners? Identify and discuss the key features of motivation and strategies to develop motivated children.

There are two types of motivation:

Intrinsic motivation comes from inside yourself while on the other hand, extrinsic motivation comes from external factors. Both types can be engaged in different ways by the teacher. Intrinsic motivation can be triggered by regular feedback, providing activities that the pupils will find interesting and relevant to them and active learning. Extrinsic motivation is different and can be engendered by praise, but more importantly sincere praise. If this is not the case, children will be expecting praise and will potentially stop trying as hard with work.

As teachers, it is vitally important that we have high expectations and that the work we set children offers them a real challenge but at the same time offers children the chance of being successful. There must be a balance and the ability and level must be taken into consideration. Monitoring children’s progress and letting them know constantly how they are doing through feedback can have a big impact on their motivation.

Thoonen (2011) discussed three motivation factors which:

‘*Expectancy components – pupils’ beliefs about their ability to perform a task (academic self-efficacy)

*Value components – pupils’ goals for doing a task, their beliefs about its importance and their interest in the task.

*Affective components – pupils’ feelings or emotional reactions to the task or school in general.

One other motivation theory was Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs. Maslow had the idea that there were 5 stages of motivation and each one needed to be completed to move on to the next stage of the pyramid. The 5 stages discussed were: Physiological needs, Safety and Security, Love and Belonging, Self Esteem and Self Actualisation. As a teacher, I feel that I can be responsible for meeting some of these needs such as the child feeling safe and secure in the classroom environment and the feeling of belonging the children will have in the class. This can be built up supporting children’s self esteem. Bartlett and Burton (2012, p206) had the idea that to develop a child’s self esteem, children need to be ‘listened to and empowered to make decisions about their own learning’.

Children must be given feedback to show how they are progressing. This in turn will motivate them to keep going and continue progressing.

Getting to know your children in the class is of vital importance for any teacher and building up a good relationship with the pupils can motivate both yourself and the class. There must be mutual respect and you must be modelling your behaviour as a teacher to motivate the class to behave in a positive way.

Hayes (2006, p23) found that children liked teachers:

who like them
who are confident and in control
who provide well prepared lessons
who make an effort to make content interesting.

Ultimately being a teacher who children like, no matter how simple that idea sounds, is one of the most important aspects that will lead to a class who are motivated and a classroom with a positive ethos.

One final thing I would like to mention is 5 powerful motivators that Gonzalez (2016) wrote about and they included: positive relationships with teachers, choice, rewards not being a good idea when tasks ‘involve creativity and persistence’ as this may ‘hamper motivation’, students having the belief that they can complete tasks and finally, relevance to children’s life’s outside of school.

Motivation is a huge factor that all teachers must consider every day. This can not only help develop children’s understanding, knowledge and skills if they are motivated to be learning but it can also give a teacher a better chance of being successful. A motivated class can create a positive ethos and give children a purpose for doing the work they have been given and through positive relationships, learning that is relevant to children and their interests and methods of teaching that engages children and really makes them think will ensure that motivation will be at the highest levels.

Rerefences:

Thoonen, E.E.J., Sleegers, P.J.C. , Peetsma, T.T.D. and Oort, F.J. (2011). Can teachers motivate students to learn? Educational Studies, vol. 37(3), pp.345-360.

Maslow, A. (1943). ‘A theory of human motivation Psychological Review’ 50(4): pp 370-396

Bartlett, S. and Burton, D.M. (2012) Introduction to education studies. London : SAGE

Gonzalez, J. (2016) 5 Questions to Ask Yourself About Your Unmotivated Students. Available at: http://www.cultofpedagogy.com/student-motivation/

Food for thought….

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Last week, our group had our first Food and Textiles input and it was quite an eye opener. I would be the first to admit, my culinary skills are not the best, with microwaving and making some small cakes about as far as it goes. Today has given me more confidence in myself about teaching this subject and this workshop and previous research has now given me simple recipes and lessons I can do with children in order to develop their skills.

It was interesting to learn how simply learning to make different foods can link so much into different areas of the curriculum. We experienced many examples of this during the input, such as:

How making the cakes that my partner and I made – chocolate melting can link to the science of changing form.

cake

How traditional foods made in the class can be linked to traditional dance in another lesson.
How children can represent the food they make through dance and drama, e.g. popcorn.
Simply the health and nutrition aspect of food linking to the health and wellbeing aspects of dance, drama and PE.
Food linking to religious festivals such as Shrove Tuesday and pancakes.

It was an interesting input and one that will hopefully help me become successful at teaching the same to children. It is vital to the curriculum as it can encourage children to become healthy adults and can develop their understanding of how significant eating correctly is to their lives. The subject is so important as it links to several other areas of the curriculum such as expressive arts, mathematics, social studies and sciences.

Scientific Literacy Mini Essay:

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As part of our Science input, we were asked to write mini 500-600 word essays on Scientific Literacy:

Scientific Literacy

AC1 – Scientific literacy is often misunderstood. It goes beyond knowing scientific words and filling in worksheets like most people think. It even goes beyond science as we think we know it, as it concerns more than the subject of science itself. People who are scientifically literate have specific skills that are necessary in understanding the world. Being able to distinguish between the truth and false statements, for example, the comments made by people in the media. Naivety is preventable through science. It enables the pupils to be more aware of the false claims thrown at them on a daily basis. Rather than just knowing scientific terms, scientific literacy is understanding concepts of science and developing skills to enable everyday successful learning. Through science, we can establish skills such as predicting, understanding, analysing, evaluating and observing. These skills are extremely valuable to help make important life choices.

AC2 – People who are not scientifically literate can often fall victim to products that have false advertising. One popular example of this is diet fads such as the tea brand Bootea Teatox. This brand highlights that by drinking their special tea, over different time periods, you will experience weight loss results as you detox your body. It seems that many people already jump at the chance for a product that advertises it can influence weight loss however add some complex scientific language in the advertising and quickly the consumer falls into a false sense of confidence in that particular product. Unfortunately Bootea has left out a few important facts about their ingredients and how they can affect the consumer. The ingredients can actually interact with particular prescription medicines and cause them to fail. The side affects are negative and not highlighted clearly as the ingredients can cause vomiting, nausea and diarrhoea. It has also been researched that the product will only cause a loss in water weight and unlikely to perform in the way advertised. Therefore, Bootea consumers have been led to believe that they will undergo a detox experience when actually according to medical advice it could be affecting their health (Johnson, 2017)

AC3 – Fair testing is a vital part of science in schools. A fair test can be carried out if one variable is changed in the experiment while keeping all other conditions the same. When we are teaching children all about fair testing in the classroom, they are learning and developing vital skills. They learn the importance of being fair in experiments and how this can lead to much more effective results. Linking back to the scientific skills, fair testing can allow children to make use of the skills that can make them scientifically literate such as predicting, observing and evaluating. In experiments, if all conditions are the same apart from one, it will be much easier to determine the effect each condition is having. Looking at fair testing in schools on a wider scale, it will allow the children to understand more deeply the underlying concepts of each experiment and the reasons behind why everything is happening. The skills that children learn in school can of course help them develop a conceptual understanding of what they are learning and be more successful. It can also help children be more successful outside of school and in their future when making important life decisions. It is also important that the experiments link to science topics that are current and can be linked to everyday life. This is linked to the National Science Education Standards (p22) as it is stated that “Scientific literacy means that a person can ask, find, or determine answers to questions derived from curiosity about everyday experiences.”

References

Johnson, K. (2017). Diet Pills Watchdog | Bootea Review, Bootea Scam, Bootea Diet Tea. [online] Diet Pills Watchdog. Available at: https://www.dietpillswatchdog.com/bootea/ [Accessed 1 Feb. 2017].

National academies press (no date). ‘National Science Education Standards 1996’. (p22). Available at: http://www.nap.edu/read/4962/chapter/4#22. (Accessed 5th February 2017).

Megan Freeburn, Alex Allan, Liam Hamilton and Taylor MacInnes.

My Experiences of Music.

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music

Ever since I was in P5, I was always very musical. I started playing the clarinet in P5 when the opportunity arose to take up an instrument. This really excited me and was raring to go. I continued to play clarinet and take part in many school concerts and music festivals until 6th year when I was forced to hand my clarinet back to the school. My experiences of musical tuition have been very positive, I always got on with the instructors. Their methods for teaching all differed but were all very effective in helping me learn and develop my skills. In primary school music for me was usually taught by listening to different music and trying to learn to play different songs on the recorder. I feel, although learning music in school was positive, it still needs a bigger part in the curriculum in my opinion. In primary school, I also played several lead roles in musical concerts and musicals, such as Toad in ‘Wind in the Willows’, Joseph in ‘Joseph and his amazing techni-coloured dream coat’ and Oliver Twist in ‘Oliver’.

clarinet oliver-twist joseph windi

I achieved A’s in National 5 and Higher music. Studying music in high school was different in the way that it was more in depth and was not just playing instruments. It involved listening to different music and learning to recognise musical concepts as well as making our own music. Due to my musical background, I feel as though my music reading is of a good standard.

I have always been very passionate about music, be it playing instruments, singing or learning about music and also just in general, listening to music. Whenever I can, I will always be listening to music. It could be new modern dance or pop songs, or classic songs from years ago. I have always loved music, but the reason I like older music from the 80’s etc. could be due to the fact my dad was a DJ in Spain in the 80’s and still volunteers for a hospital radio station in Kirkcaldy. I grew up listening to older songs, because of my dad’s obsession for music and I am still undecided if that was a blessing or not. My music taste is varied and I will listen to any song, given of course that it is a good song.

headphones

I believe that the experiences and skills I gained throughout those years has lead to me being quite confident in my ability in teaching music in the primary school setting.

However, despite this, I am also of the opinion that you don’t have to be musically talented or naturally musical to be an influential, successful music teacher, and I agree with Mills (2009, p6) who stated that ‘Their advantage is that they already have musical self-esteem‘. This is a vital element that teachers have that can help them be as successful as possible in the classroom.

I believe that music should have a more prominent purpose in the curriculum as it engages children in an activity that can broaden their horizons and give them vital skills for now and later in life. It allows children to enjoy learning and challenge them to critically think about and learn a variety of different music genres, some they may have never heard before.

Overall, I feel quietly confident about teaching music due to my positive experiences and musical backgrounds. There will obviously be struggles along the way and difficulties to overcome, but I believe that by gaining even more understanding and knowledge and further developing skills throughout my course, I have the best chance of being a successful teacher of primary school music.

References:

Mills, J. (2009). Music in the primary school. England: Oxford University Press