Sunday, August 6, 2017
Since Pink is categorizing Type I Behavior as being dependent upon three elements I wanted to really reflect on these elements to see if they are the nutrients that nurture my motivation. According to Pink autonomy, mastery, and purpose are the essentials. Passion and true motivation lives within me when there is a true purpose in the work I'm doing and I'm driven by a moral obligation that will benefit the masses. I have to believe in the purpose of the work in order to be intrinsically motivated first and foremost. Once I'm connected to do the work in a moral sense I automatically engage in brainstorming solutions to try and reach some type of "mastery". In essence, I do believe that I require all three elements in order to be intrinsically motivated. When each of you reflect on what motivates you, do you require all three elements? Do you need more or less of one?
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I think I need all 3, however, Mastery seems to be one I don't need as much of as the other two. I think Purpose and Autonomy are the ones I need the most of. I don't know if this means I don't work to the best of my ability or if it's more about not needing to be a perfectionist. Maybe it's the realization that "it's impossible to fully realize." (p.223)
ReplyDeleteAfter a mix-up with the blog invite being filtered as spam, I am playing catch up on this blog. I read Drive while lounging on the beach during my honeymoon… here are my sun-fueled thoughts on the book!
ReplyDeleteWhen I think about how I use “carrots and sticks” in the classroom, rewards and punishments are connected to expected behaviors I’d like to foster and unexpected behaviors I’d like to see diminish. If I see you sharing with a friend, you earn a ticket for the class bee bucket. If I see you using harmful hands, you sign my appointment book for a meeting before you can play. In kindergarten, I think this is a necessary part of how students learn to function in a school setting. Even though there is the physical factor of earning a ticket, the most important part is the specific praise attached to that ticket.
I actually thought a lot about how my siblings and I were raised compared to how my cousins were raised during Part 1. My dad used to tell us that saying “if you’re going to do something, do it well” whether it was sports, academics, or just cleaning up around the house. Meanwhile, my cousins were bribed with a dollar amount if they scored a goal at soccer and had a sticker chart for “chores” that included things like brushing their teeth. Even as children, my siblings and I would scoff! These days I can describe my siblings and I as fully functional adults while my cousins struggle with motivation in college and the workplace. As teachers, what do we do when we meet children with well-intentioned parents like my aunt and uncle who are focused too heavily on extrinsically motivating their children?
I think the elements of purpose and mastery are a natural fit with the teaching profession. We chose purpose-filled work as educators, and we strive to become better teachers through experience and professional development without an endpoint of mastery in sight. Autonomy is a little more difficult to reconcile. By volunteering for more opportunities like purposeful planning or curriculum writing, I feel I have more of a say in what I teach and how I teach it; however, when our teams pass these lessons or assessments onto our colleagues who were not present in designing them, it can probably feel like another thing to add to the to do list.
When purpose, mastery, and autonomy are applied to my kindergarten classroom, I see the same parallels. Students have this greater purpose to become like the “big kids”- readers, writers, counting to super high numbers! Mastery and becoming continuously better and better at something can be encouraged by comparing writing pieces from September which might have a drawing and a few scribbles to writing pieces in January that have drawings, labels, and a sentence! Autonomy is a little trickier because of the structure of the day and guidance needed at this age; however, I think play is a time for autonomy. I’d love to develop ways to build more autonomy in the day through STEM resources for exploring or building.
The Tool Kit wasn’t as helpful as I was hoping it would be. The 20% time for students is an interesting concept, and I’d be interested in hearing how teachers would seek to incorporate this at the primary level.
I tend to agree that I prefer all three, but I definitely need a purpose. Then autonomy to come up with the best solution for me to follow. I would like to think that I strive for mastery, but I also know that we seem to be pushed on before the mastery is always reached.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed the tool kit section, but I teach middle school reading, so I am able to be a little more flexible than most subject areas. I also found my thoughts drifting to a remedial reading class I teach at GCC. I think my middle schoolers understand that there are some things we "must" do in school, but there are times that I am able to give them choices. What is fun (or sad, I guess) is that when I give the college students that same freedom, they have no idea what to do or where to start. I guess they have not been given the opportunity.
I marked three sections in the Tool Kit:
1. I would like to take a Sagmeister. I have had that conversation with people many times. We always thought it was sad that you are too old to enjoy your retirement, or you should be able to stay home and be "retired" when your kids are young. I like the idea of a Sagmeister too. As teachers, we can get burned out, and a year off to refresh would be wonderful!
2. I like the idea of reverse report cards. I would like to experiment with this in the upcoming school year. We already set goals and evaluate them, so why not a report card to share with the parents? I think I would want to send home the actual student report card, but I will have to think a little more on this.
3. The Type I Fitness Plan confession - I will admit that when I was previewing the book, I read this first. I am in desperate need of motivation to stick to a fitness plan of some kind. While I realize that this was not the intent of the book, applying it here will be good for me, and I can use it in other places in my life.
I had a fourth, but I can't find it. It was the comment about deciding what NOT to do being as important as deciding what you are going to do. I am a list person. I am motivated to be able to cross things off of my list when they are completed. I find it intriguing to list what I am not going to do. And I admit that I had a couple of things pop into my head immediately. I'm going to see how that one goes!