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Offer a Choice of Rewards

Page history last edited by Mallory Burton 13 years, 1 month ago

Offering A Choice of Rewards is a UDL strategy presented in Chapter 6 of Teaching Every Student in the Digital Age.

Key Concepts:

1. Students have different preferences for rewards

2. External rewards are often ineffective and inappropriate

A team leader in year 1 of the project, was recently honoured for her work with students with special needs by the National Inclusive Education Association. Dr. Beth Sparks is a learning assistance teacher in the public school system. Her passion for education provides a powerful intrinsic motivation.

Sample (Business) Lesson

Daniel Pink reveals some surprising facts about motivation in this TED talk. The research on motivation is surprisingly robust but rarely applied in business or education:

1. Extrinsic if-then motivators work in a narrow band of circumstances (mainly routine tasks with simple solutions where there is no intrinsic or altruistic motive to thwart).

2. Extrinsic rewards often inhibit creativity, intrinsic and altruistic motivation.

3. The drive to do things because they matter is more effective than extrinsic rewards.

In the talk, he cites Wikipedia and Google as examples of new models of organization that have applied the principles of autonomy, mastery, and purpose to great advantage.

Discussion:

	Autonomy: the drive to control one's own direction In the project, teams have consistently reported increased engagement, better work, and increased ownership of learning when students are provided with choice. Has that been your experience?
	In an ideal situation, teachers would not merely supply supports for students but help students decide which tools work best for them so they can continue to advocate for themselves and use these tools in lifelong learning. Ira Socol explains this brilliantly in his Toolbelt Theory.
	Mastery: the desire to improve at things that matter Do your students believe in their own ability to learn and improve through effort or do they believe that talent is simply fixed? To what do they attribute their success? How do you encourage persistence? How do you get kids to understand why it matters to learn something? whatdoyouthinkofthisasawaytostartaconversationwithkidsaboutwhyweuse conventionssuchasspacingpunctuationandspellingwhenwewrite Here's a great example of how Dann Meyer got his kids to buy into the need for scientific notation. Are you using "essential questions" and "big ideas" in your teaching? Flickr CC photo (and story behind the photo) by Lab 2112
	Purpose: the drive to contribute to something larger than one's self Today's students are often involved in activities which promote the social good such as fund-raising, green initiatives, or anti-bullying campaigns. Is it beneficial to help students move from "studying for the test" to "lifelong learning"? Is it beneficial to help students move from "sounding out words" to understanding why literacy is important in our society"?
	Video games use great graphics, incremental levels and immediate feedback to motivate the player. In many video games, a player is competing against himself, trying to improve his own score. Bruce Tulgan believes this is another aspect of their success. Scot Osterweiler, at MIT's Education Arcade is leading a group attempting to design educational games that will be as engaging as other video games. Here's a link to their Labyrinth game and an audio clip in which he discusses the game. Should we apply these principles in education? Here's a great Ted Talk about the "game layer" we're starting to build by consciously applying gaming principles in the next decade.
	Why is motivation important? How is motivation related to sustained engagement? How do you foster sustained engagement in a UDL classroom? How is sustained engagement related to "flow" or the "zone of proximal development"? How is flow related to mastery?