Positive Classroom Climate

Do you like your classroom now?
Do you feel motivated to be there?

Before you answer those questions, let's see a video about 'Postive Classroom Climate' below

Those questions lead me to think weather I motivated or demotivated in my class now. Actually I really enjoy my classroom environment, because I feel comfortable to follow the learning process in my class. The best reason why I love my class is because my lecturers and my friends are really cooperative in making an agreement about class regulation, make up class schedule, and group for the assignments. I just realized that those kinds of things are part of climate variable, and what is climate variable? In the last session, my friends and I were discussing about climate variable. Based on Weissberg et al ( 2004) climate variables is the important variables that support motivation environment in the classroom and there are four aspects that have to notice by the teacher to make the learners feel motivated in their classroom.

The first is order and safety where the teacher and learners make a deal for the secure feeling in the classroom, and my experience above is one of the example of order and safety variable. The second variable is how to increase the learner s’ self-efficacy or the learners’ confidence about their autonomy competence and this variable called as success. In success variable the teacher tries to maintain learners’ self-efficacy by some ways such as, begin the class with open-ended questions to know learner’s prior knowledge, giving the high quality examples in the learning process, etc. Probably I really common with those kind examples of success because my lecturers often use that way in my learning process ,so how lucky I am.

The third variable is challenge where the teacher able to scaffold the learners to mastery the task. Well, I will illustrate the example case of challenge variables. When the teacher gives the difficult task to the learners and the learners complain to the teacher because of the task is too difficult, the teacher should scaffold the learner to mastery the task and not decrease the difficulty level of the task. This way should be applied by the teacher to motivate the learners reach their goal because if the teacher decreases the difficulties of the task the learners’ competence will stuck and wouldn’t develop.

The last variable to maintain motivation environment in the classroom is task comprehension. At the first time I heard about task comprehension, I thought about the assignments directly probably it happened because my schemata about task. In the other hand, task comprehension here is not only about the assignment and task but also the learners have to aware about the value and responsibility of the task itself, so if I get the task or assignment from my lecturer I will not only completed the task but also understand the value of the task. Well, this is my reflection about climate variables in the classroom. Hopefully by knowing those things I can boost my students’ motivation in the classroom later.


Sources:
Eggen, P., & Kauchak, D. (2010). Educational Psychology: Windows on Classrooms (8th Ed). New Jersey: Pearson Education International.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvv-URrlVFs&noredirect=1

Read More...

Content of Mastery and Performance Goals

Children with a mastery orientation have learning goals – they are concerned with increasing their competence and abilities while mastering new tasks over time. Conversely, children with a performance orientation have performance goals – they are concerned with eliciting positive judgments about their work.

There is strong evidence that a mastery orientation can boost children’s academic performance, in the short- and long-term. In an experimental study, Elliot and Dweck (1988) manipulated fifth graders’ orientation by highlighting either performance goals or learning goals, and by providing feedback indicating either high or low ability on a task. They found that in response to obstacles, mastery-oriented children tended to view challenging situations as an opportunity to acquire new skills or extend their mastery. This response caused them to seek challenges with a positive attitude and high persistence. Performance-oriented children, on the other hand, sought to avoid others’ unfavorable judgments. They avoided failure by avoiding risk and difficult/challenging tasks. In response to failure, performance-oriented children were more likely to give up, because they saw failure as evidence of low competence (Elliott & Dweck, 1988).

In one study, Wolters (2004) found that junior high students who adopted mastery goals were more motivated and engaged; they procrastinated less and persisted more and used more effective learning strategies than students with performance goals.

The Example of Mastery Goals and Performance Goals

Source:
Tauck  Family Foundation, (2012). Mastery Orientation. Tauck Family Foundation. Retrieved October 18th, 2013, from http://www.tauckfamilyfoundation.org/outcomes/child-outcomes/mastery-orientation

Read More...

Infogram Theories of Motivation in Learning

Here is an infogram about theories of motivation in learning, hopefully this infogram can help you in understanding abut the theories.

Source:
Eggen, P., & Kauchak, D. (2010). Educational Psychology: Windows on Classrooms (8th Ed). New Jersey: Pearson Education International.

Read More...

Theories of Motivation in Learning

Motivation is the internal and external state or conditions (need, desire, want) that activate or organize the behavior and direct people to achieve their goal (Kleinna, 1981). There are two kinds of motivation; they are external and internal motivation. External motivation deals with the factors and things come from outside that can make people desire to do something. Where internal motivation is the reverse, and deals with the factors and things come from within themselves. If extrinsic and intrinsic motivation can be attained in the learning process, the student might perform better in the classroom. Thus, teacher has the important role to make the situation and condition where extrinsic and intrinsic motivation can grow. There are several theories that influence motivation, such as :

• Behavioral    :

Behavioral theory deals with the reinforcement that given by the people around in order to build a behavior in learning. Reinforcement such as praise, comment and good grade can increase the motivation from students to learn (Schunk, 2008). Thus the teachers need to shape behavior of students to be able to cooperate well in the classroom.

• Cognitive     :

Humans’ cognitive develops step by step start from the early ages. This theory explained by Piaget (1997) in his equilibrium theory. People need the scheme to understand the new concept that they obtain, when they have the new information with the scheme that they have before, people will be motivated to learn.
It brings the idea to create the learning process which is meaningful for the real life, because the students will feel motivated to learn new things with their existing knowledge and current understanding (Greeno, Collins, & Resnick, 1996). Thus, it is important to understand the development of students’ cognitive.

• Humanistic     :

Humans have the needs that they need to fulfill as a human being. These desire to According to Abraham Maslow (1970) there are five stages of need, they are psychological needs, safety needs, social needs, esteem needs, and self-actualization. These needs are not always in sequence, because in several cases, people might achieve the fifth stage (self-actualization) when they haven’t achieved the psychological needs.

• Socioculturalist     :

Vygotsky’s description of zone of proximal of development has explained that by interacting in society, people are motivated to learn. Social interaction can be the source for individual development and to constructs knowledge. Society can scaffold students to achieve their goals and it can motivate students because they know that they have more expert people   to ask for help.

Source:
Eggen, P., & Kauchak, D. (2010). Educational Psychology: Windows on Classrooms (8th Ed). New Jersey: Pearson Education International.

Read More...