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Motivating Students The motivation a student has is, in my opinion, the most important determinant in whether the child will be successful or not in the class and in life. The motivation instilled into a student not only will help the student get a good grade on the next assessment, but it will also carry over into their other classes, present and future, along with other tasks that come along in life. It is the job of the teacher to impart this motivation for learning onto the students. I would argue that it is the most important job that a teacher has. If at a young age a child finds a love and passion for learning, then they will have an inner drive to do better. They may not always love every second of school, but if they love gaining knowledge then they will be self-motivated to learn for themselves and better themselves. Motivating students can sometimes be a hard task. As bad as it sounds, in certain areas there can be a social stigma against being smart, against learning, against having aspirations. Students are bullied because they are labeled “nerds” by their peers. Students who spend their nights studying instead of partying are looked down upon. That is a major problem when it comes to creating that motivation because it is hard for young students to see what will benefit them in the long run. I have spent time tutoring and teaching young teens, and I personally have found that the simplest way to start to motivate the student is to be very transparent with them. If they do not study, they will fail the test. If they fail the test, they may end up failing the class. If they fail the class, they have to repeat the class and so on. If you lay out in front of them the path they will be on if they choose to disregard school and learning and knowledge, something seems to click for them. I talk about being transparent with them like it is some easy fix to the problem of education, but it is not. Telling the students that learning is a necessity isn’t going to completely change their mentality about learning. You, as the teacher, have to bring something else to the table. You have to bring your passion, your love, your drive for furthering your education to the classroom and show the students that you care. If you come into the classroom and you are enthusiastic and driven and excited about what you are teaching, then the students will respond positively to that environment. As a teacher, you have to be motivated to help the students learn in the best way possible before the students will ever become motivated themselves. Whether you bring your own passion into the room by keeping the energy high or by bringing new and innovative ways to learn into the classroom, the students look to you as a role model and if they see you acting in this way it will change how they look at learning. In conclusion, it is the job of the teacher to instill a passion and motivation for learning into the students. It is the most integral part to the students continued education, so it should be taken very seriously. Being transparent with the trajectory of a young adult’s life if education isn’t made a priority, is a way to get the ball rolling, but the true way to inspire these students is to show them your love for learning. If you become a role model for how they should approach learning, then they will begin to yearn for more and want to be better. That is why teachers are some of the most important people in any society because they are the ones that are in charge of motivating the future leaders.
