Why?

The mark of a true profession is one that spends just as much time asking why as they do ask how. Teachers can, and do, fill conferences with session after session on how we can grade, how we can make kids comply and how we can get kids to score well on tests.


But at some point, if we truly care about making things better, we have to stop focusing simply on resigning ourselves to the status quo. Just as the best doctors don't just keep doubling the dose of the initial prescription, the best teachers are those who routinely stop and reflect on why they do the things they do.

Ask a parent what their long term goals are for their children, and they will often reply with terms that describe a child's character - they want their kids to be creative, kind, thoughtful, hard working and just. You'd be hard pressed to find a parent who will say that their long term goals for their children involve being compliant, docile, silent and dull.

And yet, many traditional classroom practices encourage exactly that. Grades silence kids from thinking deeply about their learning, while behavior programs are happiest when the kids are seen rather than heard, and testing labels collaboration as cheating. We send all kinds of conflicting messages to kids when our long-term goals are at odds with our practices.

True professionals temper the urge to gain short-term gains such as compliance because they know nothing is worth sabotaging our long-term goals.

A forever home for motivation

I consider this to be one of the most powerful anecdotes that I have ever heard that shows how important motivation truly is:

A foster child loads his hockey equipment and himself into the minivan with his foster mom. 6:00 am hockey practices come early.

Just as the foster-mom puts the car into drive to pull out of the drive way, the foster-child turns and says, "I think this will be my forever home." (In Foster-child lingo, a forever home would be the foster home they would never leave - their foster-parents would become their 'forever' parents)

The mom, being surprised by such a huge statement, turns and asks, "why do you say that?"

"Because you are the first foster-mom to take me to my hockey practices without bringing your mileage book."

Do you think it mattered to the kid why his foster-mom was taking him to the rink?

Why the why matters

If I told you that a student returned a lost wallet to the office or a foster mom drove her foster child to his 6:00 am hockey practice, what would think of these acts?

Your first reaction may be something that reflects approval. These sound like people who are doing good things for others; however, do any of these statements provide the people’s motivation for doing what they are doing?

And do you care?

What if I told you the student only returned the wallet because he figured out the reward was worth more than the contents of the wallet, or that the foster mom was only driving the foster child to hockey practice because she got paid mileage?

When you are privy to these individual’s motivations, does this change your impression of their actions? In each situation, these people are doing what seems like good things; however, we all know that people can do the right thing for the wrong reasons.

If we prescribe to use extrinsic motivators to gain compliance from students, we are really saying that we don’t care why people are doing things; we are willing to manipulate children with rewards, control through seduction, or punishment, control through fear. Despite this argument, some teachers and parents may suggest starting with the extrinsic, and then simply remove it. The idea being that the extrinsic is needed in order to initiate an interest in the student. But this doesn’t translate into anything but the ol’ bait-and-switch, and I think we can all envision the greasy, used-car-salesmen who probably invented this innately disrespectful tactic.

As a professional, I am convinced that the use of extrinsic motivators is morally objectionable, dehumanizing and a form of educational malpractice.