Hello Friends,
Greetings from Barcelona ☀️where I presented at my first hybrid conference on Student Motivation in Madrid last week with 20 people in-person and 700 streaming in online. More on that below👇
🙌Many thanks for reading The Quest. Special shout out to Nadia in Montreal, Chris in Brussels, Connie in Toronto, and LinkedIn friend Cindy.
If you are joining for the first time, welcome to our deep dive into all things creativity, facilitation, and learning.
You can catch up on the last edition 💥How to Facilitate Breakthroughs in Conflict and all past editions here.
“How do I motivate my students?”
This is hands down the number 1 question that teachers in my teacher training ask me.
Take Maria, a high-school teacher in Spain. She is an experienced teacher. But she still struggled to get her students to take part in the class. Some were distracted. Others seemed too shy to speak up in class. It was like pulling teeth to try to get students to engage.
Getting students to participate wasn’t her only problem. She described the tense atmosphere in the classroom. It didn’t take long for petty arguments between students to escalate into full-blown fights. She said that COVID has made students feel even more anxious.
She is exhausted. She is under pressure to get through the curriculum to prepare students for high-stakes standardized tests. She said that every day felt like a struggle to keep her motivation up.
Motivating students is one of the most difficult challenges that teachers face. Studies show that teachers are far more influential than parents in motivating students to learn. That’s why that question – “how do I motivate my students” – is one of the most important questions teachers can ask.
You can create conditions that spark motivation. Facilitation is one way to create the conditions that lead to positive attitudes, motivation, and learning. And it brings joy back into learning for teachers and students.
How can you make it easier for students to find their motivation? That’s our Quest for this week🔎
👉What 150 studies say about student motivation
👉10 ways to facilitate motivation in students of any age
👉Ideas for designing a hybrid conference session
And more.
Let’s dive right in!
🤔What Almost 150 Studies Say About How to Motivate Students
An article from The Hechinger Report that summarizes a research report of 144 studies on sparking student motivation. The studies involved 80,000 students from elementary school through university.
Here’s what they found:
- Teachers are far more important than parents in motivating students to learn. Parents are important, but the teacher has more tools to work with for student motivation.
- Students need to feel like they are capable of learning. This is called competence. When students believe they can succeed, they are more likely to believe that their efforts will lead to a better result.
- Students need to feel connected with others. This is called belonging. It supports other research that says learning is a social activity. And that belonging is a basic human need.
- Students need to be able to work independently. This is called autonomy. Autonomy increases when students connect the meaning and value of what they are learning to their needs and goals.
🌿10 Research-backed Strategies for Facilitating Motivation in Your Students
Facilitators are often compared to gardeners. They focus on creating the conditions where safety, conection, and inclusion can take root. That’s why facilitation is such a powerful lever for cultivating motivation.
Here are 10 research-backed strategies for facilitating motivation in your students. I put this together for my hybrid conference presentation last week. I’d love to know your feedback.
How do you motivate your students?
💭Ideas for Designing an Interactive Hybrid Conference Session
I love a creative challenge. Designing a 10-minute interactive panel presentation for the EduCaixa Talk conference in Madrid last week was a juicy challenge. There were 20 participants in-person and another 700 participants streaming in online.
Here’s what I did👇
- Intro & Context. 2 minutes. I introduced myself. I welcomed the in-person and online participants. I shared the aim of the talk.
- Poll. 1 minute. I ran a poll on Mentimeter to get a read on people’s familiarity with my topic. Mentimeter was a brilliant tool for connecting in-person and online audiences. I found out that 91% of the people who answered the poll weren’t familiar with the concept of facilitation.
- What & why. 1 minute. The poll gave me valuable information about the general understanding of my topic. So I took time to answer the question ofwhat is a facilitator and why they should care.
- Experience. 3 minutes. I ran an experiential activity called “Group Rhythm”. I invited a few in-person participants to join me on stage. I invited participants online to join in.
- Reflexions. 2 minutes. I invited participants to share their reflections on the activity. I summarized the key points about how to facilitate motivation. Participants in-person and online shared their reflections on Mentimeter.
- Share resources. 1 minute. I didn’t have time in my 10 minutes to cover all of the ways that teachers can facilitate motivation in their students. So I spent the final minute sharing a link to a PDF with 10 strategies including practical tips and resources.
How do you design hybrid sessions?
🎥Spanish speakers – you can watch a video of the full panel discussion on the EduCaixa website 👉here. The video includes brilliant talks with co-panelists Miguel Pimentel, an expert in metacognition and Juan G. Fernández, founder of research blog Investigación Docente. Big thanks to Quest reader Mamen Salcedo for this opportunity.
📷Photo of the Week
So this is how gardners tend to vertical gardens👇 @CaixaForum, Madrid.
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Creatively yours,
