Motivating+Students

** 2011-2012 **
 * Professional Learning Communities In-Service **

** 1. **** SMART Goal ** ( ** S ** pecific, ** M ** easurable, ** A ** ttainable, ** R ** ealistic, and ** T ** imely):

Increasing student motivation through relevant, relatable lessons within the related arts courses.

** 2. **** Rationale: ** Through classroom observations we have noticed that students lack motivation and interest in learning content. They seem to either want to skip right to the hands on activity or not want to have anything to do with the lesson at all.

** 3. **** Action Plan **
 * **Activity** || **Person Responsible** || **Timeline** || **Outcome** ||

** 4. **** Group Member Names: **

Lori Jones, Debbie Corso, Chris Collister, Kristen Wollenberg, Debbie Ziegelman

** 5. ** ** Which Middle School goal does this impact? **

Goal # 2

The discussion went to "tweaking" the goal of this group. Lori Jones joined our group, and gave us info about her PLC in the high school last year. After much discussion, we are considering changing the focus more to researching students' motivation and appreciation of the arts classes in this school. Students this year seem "stuck" in our classes since they are not having any study halls in the schedule. We as teachers are "stuck" with students that do not want to be there. A suggestion to hold the students more accountable by grading their class participation on a regular basis was brought up.
 * __ September Meeting (September 21, after school) __**

How can we get our kids to appreciate our classes?

**__ October Meeting (October 10th, during the In-Service) __** The discussion opened up with the question of how this goal can be measurable. While this idea is extremely valid and important to us, the idea of having our students appreciate and understand the importance of what we are teaching them, we find it a difficult thing to measure. Questions posed and dissected were:
 * What is appreciation? And will students' appreciation have them focus more in the classes?
 * How can we have the students focus on the activities and assignments in class? Is the idea of appreciation too subjective to measure?
 * How are we going to measure this goal?

We discussed a specific issue: "students getting done early because they did a sloppy job and they don't want to do any more". What do you do with that student? Lori and Debbie developed a section of the students grade (Lori: //Progress//, Debbie C.: //Studio Processes//) where students are graded regularly on their behavior, their conduct, how they are moving along in the projects and how they follow directions. Lori counts it at 10% of the students' grades. Debbie C. counts it as 20% of the students' grades. We find that to be helpful in motivating the students somewhat. Jenn C. came in to help us. She suggested polling, interviews, essay, surveys as a means to measure. Polldaddy.com is a Website providing a format to create polls online. So the next time we meet, we're going to compile some formats as a means to measure the students' appreciation based on Jenn's recommendations.

**__ November Meeting (November 23rd, before school) __** We discussed what our objectives were from the last meeting: to compile some formats as a means to measure the students' appreciation based on Jenn's recommendations. We explored Polldaddy.com, and created a survey that we are going to have the students complete. The questions that will be asked are:


 * 1) 1 Do you think you can learn something in this class that is valuable or important to you?


 * 1) 2 If you answered yes to question #1, write what you think you will learn that is valuable or important.


 * 1) 3 If you answered no to question #1, what would you recommend so that you ARE able to learn something that is valuable or important.

We will discuss our results next time we meet. Hopefully, the poll will create an open dialogue between the students and the teachers so we can find so ways that we can increase student interest.

We also were discussing the disadvantages of the existing schedule and how it affects the students' motivation and interest. Some issues with the schedule is that none of the arts teachers are on a team and do not have the same peer support as the other teachers. It is difficult to create curriculum connections that may increase student interest since we teach students from all the teams. Nor do any of the teachers know what arts teachers even do since we do not meet with them regularly, so team teachers cannot even "promote" what students are learning in our classes. Another issue is that the 7th and 8th grade students didn't have a choice to take the semester "electives"; they HAVE to. Any students that don't play an instrument or sing HAVE to take those courses. In addition, the interest levels vary tremendously. (For example, an 8th grade student chose to not play in band this year because they wanted to take Graphic Design instead, versus a student who may need a study hall cannot have one, and is forced to take the elective courses.)

**__ December Meeting (December 15th, before school) __** We were discussing the thought of changing our FOCUS to something more POSITIVE, since many times at the meeting we find that it becomes a complaining session without any solutions, strategies or plan. We decided to switch the focus to MOTIVATION...how can we MOTIVATE the STUDENTS in our class. One way that was discussed was through theatrics and humor; to entertain the students. And "sneak the lesson in" as the students are having fun. Debbie Z. researched in an education book that the NUMBER 1 element that motivates students is CREATING RELEVANT LESSON PLANS. We should create lessons:
 * that relate to the students feelings
 * that students can make connections in their lives to
 * that students can create personal associations with
 * that students can apply to in real-life scenarios

We can MEASURE MOTIVATION through OBSERVATION:
 * the art classes have MOTIVATION as one of the categories on which the students are grading for each assignment.
 * create a SURVEY to give to the students (In PARTS OF THE LESSON, have the students respond if the LESSON was BORING/OK/INTERESTING/EXCITING)

· We edited our wikispace with our new smart goal and new action plan (still in progress). · We discussed briefly discussed Lori’s measurable goals – quiz results comparing first marking period to second marking period. We will discuss this further next week. · With the end of the marking period we will work in compile more data through interviews and surveys, to get student feedback as to interest level and motivation.
 * __ January Meeting (January 18th, after school) __**


 * __ February Meeting (February 15th, before school) __**

· We investigated and researched various Web sites about motivating middle school students in order to prepare to complete our Action Plan. We discussed items such as measurement tools, the value of surveys, ways to motivate students through the use of technology. Chris Collister distributed a survey to question students the following about motivation: At the next meeting, we will discuss the results.
 * What motivated them in school (to do well).
 * If not, what would motivate them.
 * What motivates students outside of school.


 * __ March Meeting (March 14th, after school) __**

We found based on the results of the surveys distributed after last month's meeting that: To motivate students as well as incorporating some technology, we were brainstorming ways to highlight students' achievements via the television downstairs. We, as specials teachers, can select a student, gather his/her visual achievements, and create a presentation to showcase on the television. We can do this once or twice a month.
 * Students generally lack intrinsic motivation.
 * Students are motivated by sports, money, family pressure, friends' acceptance, lunch, general consequences (taking things away), and college (scholarships).
 * Students are motivated when teachers do things in a fun way.


 * __ April Meeting (May 1st, before school) __**

We read and discussed the article, "Kids Speak Out on Student Engagement" (sent from Jennifer).