The question that I researched this year was, "How can I motivate seniors?" This question is probably universal to every high school in the United States, but it is especially relevant to me as I teach all senior courses and I notice a significant drop in my students' level of motivation as spring draws closer and college acceptance letters start being received in the mail. I believe that senior year is the time when my students are best prepared to do their finest academic work, and I am not content to simply let them slide off into summer and graduation. Thus, understanding that seniors are unique creatures in the high school environment, I was determined to find unique ways of motivating them to stay focused and productive right up to graduation day.
My research was conducted throughout two semesters using two different courses that I teach. First semester I taught a Political Science class. This class is an introduction to American government course that focuses on teaching the Constitution, the structures of the federal government and current issues in American politics. The class is composed solely of seniors and is a semester elective course. The students enrolled in political science bring a wide variety of academic skills with them to the class. The majority of the students are college bound and have a genuine interest in law and politics; most of these students are on high academic tracks. A significant portion of the students however, are low achieving students who need one more social studies credit to graduate high school. Demographically, most of the students (approximately 85%) are white and are middle/upper class children. The remaining 15% of my students are Hispanic and African-American, some of which who come from families living at or near the poverty line. This mixture of student demographics and academic abilities possess some unique instructional challenges and opportunities.
Second semester I taught a psychology course. This class is essentially an introduction to the field of psychology as most students have never taken a psychology course before. Among the topics the class examines are: the history of psychology, research methods, the brain, sensation and perception, learning and memory, personality and identity, and abnormal psychology. The class is composed primarily of seniors, though sophomores are eligible to enroll in the course and many do. Out of a class of 25 students, I will usually have 3-5 sophomores enrolled. The majority of students who take this class are college bound, high achieving students. Recently, however, more academically challenged students have begun to take the course. Demographically, the course is nearly identical to the political science course described above.
After reading several articles about student motivation, and after reflecting on methods of teaching that I believe are engaging and effective, I decided that the focus of my study this year would be to try to motivate my students by challenging them to participate in "real world" projects. "Real world projects" is a term I use to describe the learning activities that I created for my students to work on during the semester. It was my hypothesis that if I reduced the amount of traditional classroom instruction and evaluations (i.e. lecture and exams) and increased the number of alternative assessments (student centered projects), that I ultimately would find my students more motivated to complete my coursework. Thus, my work this year centered around me designing and implementing real world projects into my curriculum to attempt to increase the motivation my students' had for learning my course content. The process and results of this work are detailed on the following pages.
Process Data Examples of Real World Projects Reflection