Reflections based on TED talk “The Puzzle of motivation” by Dan Pink.

Applications of Dan Pink’s Surprising truth about what motivates us in a 21^st Century classroom.

In this post we are going to discover how to transfer Dan Pink’s ideas on the puzzle of motivation to motivate students in the 21^st Century. 

If you want people to perform better, you give them a reward. This, as Dan Pink suggests works well for easy mechanical activities but does not work when a business needs creative thinking. Money, Dan Pink suggests, dulls thinking.

Can this be also applied to education? Is education about easy mechanical activities or about creative thinking? Can we find an equivalent to “money” as a reward?

Can this be also applied to education?

Yes!

Is education about easy mechanical activities or about creative thinking?

Education is about creative thinking, problem solving, generating ideas and communicating them. In the past many teachers’ idea of teaching was to give a boring lecture and ask students to memorize everything. That has been proved to be wrong.

The candle problem* is a very good example of what happens in a modern classroom: teachers encourage students to improve their problem solving skills not to memorize someone else’s solution.

The Candle problem is a cognitive performance test to measure problem-solving capabilities. It was created by Karl Duncker, a psychologist who presented this test in his thesis at Clark University.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candle_problem

Can we find an equivalent to “money” as a reward?

In schools we do not use money to reward our students, but we do use many other type of rewards:  points, stickers, treats, etc.

Some large secondary schools are now believed to be spending up to £30,000 a year on rewards to keep order in the classroom and cut truancy.

Dennis Hayes, professor of education at Derby University, says that too many rewards risk undermining pupils’ ability to learn. He adds: “This has all taken on such a life of its own that children are being rewarded for doing something that should come naturally. This simply takes away children’s natural curiosity – it is giving them something for nothing.” (G. Paton, 2009)

A Prezi presentation of this post.
It is candidate for the Prezi Ideas Matter Contest

As Dan Pink mentions in his TED talk, rewards can narrow our focus. This might be good if we want students to concentrate to follow easy instructions, but does not work if we want them to solve the candle problem.

So: What can we do? Use the Intrinsic motivators!

As Reiss (2010) suggests, the way to motivate people is to address their values. Pink (2009) talks about Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose.

Autonomy is the freedom of choice and control of your own life. As Jim Fay and David Funk (1995) suggest, students want control. Deep down inside they, like us adults, enjoy accomplishing things, but traditional incentives and punishments can make them feel over controlled and then they stop their free ride. Offering students autonomy to work means allowing them freedom to answer these questions:

• What work do I do?
• When do I work?
• How do I work?
• Who do I work with?
• Where do I work?

Jim Fay and David Funk (1995) use these questions as choices.

Mastery is the constant pursuit of perfection in any field.  Students can be very motivated by the challenge of continually improving themselves in a field of study.  Anything that involves struggle also involves huge emotional rewards when your efforts finally lead to success.  The key for success in teaching is to give students opportunities and feedback that will help them pursue mastery in a subject.

Purpose is the reason behind the work.  It is the why behind what someone does something.  Purpose is probably the largest source of intrinsic motivation for people.  It can give students meaning to the hours spent doing homework!

References:

• Fay,J & Funk,D. Teaching with Love and Logic. Taking Control of the Classroom. The Love and Logic Press. 1995.
•  Paton, Graeme. The Telegraph. Educational Section December 2009. Retreived from www.telegraph.co.uk/education/6833871/School-reward-culture-is-harming-education.html
•  Pink, Daniel.  The puzzle of motivation. TED talk Video 2009.
•  Pink, Daniel.  The surprising truth about what motivates us. RSA Animate Video. 2011
•  Pink, Daniel.  Drive: the surprising truth about what motivates us. RiverHead Books. 2011
•  Reiss, Steven. Who we are. Psychology Today. Review June 2010. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/who-we-are/201206/understanding-intrinsic-motivation.