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Understanding Motivation

Explore the factors that influence student motivation in the college classroom and learn strategies to enhance motivation and goal-setting. Understand how sociocultural context, internal factors, and attitudes impact student behaviors and academic performance.

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Understanding Motivation

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  1. Understanding Motivation What is Motivation?

  2. Student Motivation in the College Classroom What factors influence it? Sociocultural Context Classroom Environmental Factors Internal Factors (Beliefs/Perceptions) Motivated Behavior

  3. Understanding Your Own Motivation • Evaluate your behaviors in three areas: • Choice of behavior • Level of activity and involvement • Persistence and management of effort

  4. Sociocultural Context • Cultural Factors can influence your motivation Attitudes, beliefs, and experiences you bring to college based on your sociocultural experiences that influence motivation and behaviors.

  5. Internal Factors • Goals you set: • Serve to Motivate Behavior • Affect Mastery and Performance • Ask yourself, what are my goals? Are they defined goals in Long and Short Terms? Are they clear and well defined? Are they set goals different life areas?

  6. 5 Major Ways Goals Enhance Your Performance • Effort • Duration and Persistence • Direction of Attention • Strategic Planning • Reference Point

  7. Effects on Effort • Goals setting influences what you do and how hard you maximize your performance • The more difficult the goal—the harder you work towards attaining it.

  8. Effects on Duration or Persistence • Without goals, it easy to be • Distracted • Attention drifts • More easily interrupted • Stop work without task completion • With goals, you have defined point of performance • Know when to quit the task

  9. Effects on Attention • Goals direct your attention toward the task • Goals direct you attention away from distractions

  10. Strategic Planning • To accomplish a goal, you need • An action plan or strategic planning • Goal setting encourages strategic planning and helps determine how you proceed

  11. Reference Point • Identifies where you are headed • Allows you to receive feedback from that point • Determines any further actions that need taken

  12. Mastery Goals Oriented toward learning as much as possible Performance Goals Focuses on comparison and competition Two Types of Goals

  13. Mastery Performance

  14. How do you value different academic courses and tasks? • Values and Interest • Play an important role on academic behaviors • Affect student activities • Affect level of persistence • Affect student choices

  15. Can You Do Well on Different Academic Tasks? • Self-Efficacy plays an important role • How you evaluate your own abilities or skills to successfully complete a task • Rating your self-efficacy • A rating too high or too low can be detrimental

  16. Causes of Successes and Failures Discuss • How can a “C” grade on two individual term papers be interpreted as both a success and a failure?

  17. Why the two different responses? • Goals • Attribution • Explains why people respond differently to outcomes. • Perception about the cause of success and failure • differ

  18. How students perceive prior successes and failures is an important determiner of how they approach their next tasks.

  19. I did well because I’m smart. I studied hard for the test, but it wasn’t enough. The test was easy. I was lucky. The professor was fair. I did poorly because I’m stupid. I studied hard for the test but still did not get it. The test was hard. I was unlucky. The professor was unfair. I was tired. Rate the Responses as Positive or Negative

  20. Respond to these questions • When I perform poorly, do I attribute my performance to uncontrollable factors? • Are there alternative explanations for the causes of my academic performances?

  21. What are some factors that can negatively affect your performance? Boredom Anxiety Worry Self-Doubt

  22. Negative Impacts on Performance • Boredom • It is not a reason—it is an excuse!!! • Often implies that the learner does not understand the material

  23. Negative Impacts on Performance • Anxiety • Can negatively impact performance 4 ways: • Disruption in mental activity • Psychological distress • Misdirected attention • Inappropriate behaviors

  24. Negative Impacts on Performance • Worrying can be a major factor • Has a strong negative impact academic performance • Negative beliefs • Troubling thoughts • Poor decisions

  25. Negative Impacts on Performance • Psychological distress • Emotionality • This seems to diminish after a test begins; whereas, worry continues

  26. Inappropriate Behaviors • Procrastination • Test anxiety • Lack of persistence until task completion

  27. Covington’s Theory of Self-Worth Strategies that protect against inferences on an individual’s lack of ability Procrastination Unattainable Goals Underachievers Anxiety

  28. In Class Exercise

  29. Assignment • Select two (2) different courses you are currently taking—one difficult and one less challenging or one that you like and one that you don’t like. Analyze your motivation in the two classes by discussing IN DETAIL each of the following factors that determine your motivated behaviors. • Use a graph like the example that follows:

  30. Motivation and Goal Exercise

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