It's not enough to ask students to do something just because you want them to, they need to be motivated.
How do we motivate the students in our care?
In education this is a real-time debate. I believe that if we are to help our students in the long term then we need to foster their intrinsic motivation. If we constantly motivate them extrinsically through rewarding them for doing what they should be doing, we run the risk of them expecting to be constantly rewarded. This is not a 'real-life' situation. As adults we understand that sometimes you just have to do things because there is an expectation.
When considering motivation with students who are exhibiting challenging behaviour our goal should be to ensure that we foster their intrinsic motivation at all times. If we are not consistent in this then we will not be able to help them. I am in no way campaigning against rewards but highlighting another approach. There can be times when rewards are appropriate but that is not the topic of this post.
In order to achieve sustainable behaviours in our students we need to let them know that we care. By caring we open up our minds and theirs, to working together for a mutually acceptable result... appropriate behaviour.
If we recognise challenging behaviour as an indicator that something is not okay, then we show our students that we value them as individuals and that we are concerned about their difficulty. This facilitates opportunities to discuss the issues and work together towards a solution, while developing their acquisition of new skills. These new skills will enable the student success in meeting expectations more often, which is much more rewarding for them in the long-term.
In his book 'Lost and Found - Helping Behaviourally Challenging Students' Ross W. Greene quotes an Assistant school Superintendent (Tom) as he stresses that we should not become frustrated by our students challenging behaviour, we should 'get curious'. We need to explore the Why? How? and What? of the issue. Why is the student exhibiting challenging behaviour? How can I help them? What can I do?
Through the showing of concern and understanding we can attempt to work together with and help the students in our care collaboratively.
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