Motivation

1. Motivation Motivation: a construct used to explain the initiation, direction, & intensity of an individual’s behavior in a particular situation • Theories of Motivation • Computational Theory of Mind • Initial States • Monitoring Processing during Problem-Solving • Goal State • Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Motivation • Distributed Cognition • Instructional Implications

2. Monitoring Processes during Problem-Solving Monitoring Standards Self-Efficacy Ability Beliefs Interest InitialState Goals Means-EndBeliefs PossibleEmotions Expectations Values GoalState CausalAttribution EmotionsFelt Computational Theory of Mind

3. Goals: What are they? • Goal= something a person would like to accomplish by engaging in a particular activity • Tend to direct or guide behavior • Often start off vague • Only start directing behavior after more specific • Often remain implicit until queried • Types • Learning vs. Performance • Academic vs. Social • Computational Theory of Mind: Goals are presumed inherently cognitive (they are mental representations of some future state of affairs)

4. As individuals age, they seem to shift from learning goals to performance goals (ouch) Learning vs.Performance Goals • Learning goals = to understand something, gain mastery over a skill, feel competent • Performance goals = to gain approval of (or look better than) others, gain rewards, avoid criticism Effects on Performance & Learning: • Students with learning goals… • seek challenging tasks that develop their competencies • see teacher as a resource or guide • process information at a deeper level than… • Students with performance goals… • choose tasks that will make them look competent • see teacher as evaluator who will reward/punish • do not process information as deeply

5. As individuals age, they seem to shift from academic goals to social goals (hmmm) Academic vs. Social Goals • Academic goals = being a successful student, learning / understanding new things, doing the best you can, getting things done on time • Social goals = earning approval of others, having fun, making friends, helping others, being dependable / responsible Effects on Performance & Learning: • Specific social goals are strongly related to academic goals • Which?Being helpful, responsible, & compliant • Why? More frequent & positive interactions with teachers & peers  more likely to achieve • Not all social goals are related to success in school • Students with goal of “having fun” in school typically have low GPAs

6. Monitoring Processes • Self-efficacy beliefs = your beliefs regarding whether or not you have the ability to perform some task • Developed through experiences of having their actions produce numerous successes & fewer failures • Older children often feel more self-efficacy than younger ones (duh) • Ability beliefs = your general sense of your skill in an area • Combine hierarchically to form individual’s self-concept • Self-concept becomes increasingly differentiated with age • Self-concept declines during adolescence & then rises again  Effects on Performance & Learning: • High self-efficacy leads to greater effort, persistence & quality of problem-solving tasks • accounts for 14% of variance in academic achievement in schoolchildren • High ability beliefs leads to greater willingness to choose challenging tasks & greater persistence in fact of failure

7. Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Motivation • Intrinsic Motivation = engaging in the behavior to feel competent, gain mastery, or satisfy their curiosity • Extrinsic Motivation = engaging in the behavior to receive praise, gain tangible reward, or avoid punishment • Locus of Control: • When intrinsically motivated, YOU are in control. • When extrinsically motivated, OTHERS are in control. Effects on Performance & Learning: • People are naturally inclined to seek feelings of competence, gain control over their environment, set challenges for themselves, & satisfy curiosity • BUT its relatively easy to make someone intrinsically motivated into someone extrinsically motivated – frequent introduction of external rewards (tangible or intangible), punishments, use of competition and/or social comparisons

8. Distributed Cognition • Goals • A student’s goals & intentions are socially & culturally situated • Need to examine relationships between the learner (identity) & the community of practice (context) • Motivation • NOT a ‘factor’ with ‘components’ inside the person • It is an emergent property between the learner & their context • NOT a matter of high/low, intrinsic/extrinsic • ALL learners are motivated – they just may not be motivated in the ways that educators want them to be • It is an issue of engaging learners in activity when there are competing or differing goals & intentions The official learning goals may not be compelling to learnersor may be at odds with their identities as learners (e.g. Scollen, 1981)

9. Instructional Implications Computational Theory of Mind • Help students acquire and coordinate appropriate goals(learning goals, academic & social goals) • Provide devices to help them monitor their progress(charts, assessments, & other forms of feedback) • Point out to students their control over their successes(develop appropriate expectations, high self-efficacy) Distributed Cognition • What kinds of identities does your learning environment engage with? What kinds of identities might your students bring to it? • How might your goals align or conflict with learners’ goals? Are there ways to get them better aligned? • How do the activities in your classroom intersect with students’ lived experiences outside of class? X

10. Activity Let’s compare two learning environments – one informal, one formal.

11. Informal Learning Environment: MMOGs • Highly graphical 2- or 3-D videogames • Online social interaction • Persistent virtual worlds • Real-time, perpetually accessible • Loosely structured by open-ended (fantasy) narratives, but… • Players free to do as they please • “Escapist fantasy” yet emergent“social realism” (Kolbert, 2001) A learning environment?!

12. They are sites of distributed social & material cognition. Socially & materially distributed cognition

13. Collaborative Problem Solving Complex collaborative problem-solving.

14. Where meaning is negotiated… Negotiation of Meaning

15. Within comm.of practice Within / across emergent communities of practice.

16. So, yes, they ARE learning environments. Complex & challenging ones, in fact. Apprenticeship & Enculturation

17. cigarette And they are so motivating, psychiatrists worry about ‘addiction.’

18. Critique of school Yet, no one worries about ‘addiction’ to school.

19. But more compelling Why would an informal learning environment(like an MMOG) be so much more engagingthan a formal one (like the K-12 classroom)? Compare / contrast the two.

20. general competence academic non-academic math english history etc. social emotional physical Ability Beliefs 

21. Self Concept  (Marsh, 1989)