Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Grade Fog? Or Effective Grading?

Grade Fog? Or Effective Grading?



Thoughts on Autonomy...

Pink's book, Drive, describes three elements of Motivation. The first being Autonomy. The concept of autonomy is based on the fact that for individuals to truly be motivated to do their best work, conditions must be provided so that a great deal of freedom and choice is available to reach individual goals. This requires those in leadership positions to understand that individuals have different desires, so the most effective strategy to increase motivation would be to figure out what is important to individuals. Therein lies a concern that autonomy may discourage accountability. Pink (2009) states that "Motivation 2.0 assumed that if people had freedom, they would shirk--and that autonomy was a way to bypass accountability. Motivation 3.0 begins with a different assumption. It presumes that people want to be accountable--and that making sure they have control over their task, their technique, and their team is a pathway to that destination."

How does Pink's belief in autonomy relate to students in a classroom? How does the belief in autonomy relate to educators in public education? How would an educational environment based on freedom benefit/hinder student motivation and growth? How would an educational environment based on freedom benefit/hinder staff motivation or growth? What are your thoughts regarding autonomy?

Saturday, January 23, 2010

"The Death of Education, the Dawn of Learning..."

http://www.dontwasteyourtime.co.uk/video/video-learning-to-change-changing-to-learn/?utm_source=feedburner

Very intriguing video! How do you feel when you watch this video? I feel quite anxious when I realize the direction we need to go with education and how slow we are moving...How much time do we engage in technology each day/week compared with our students? I know how many hours I spend reading and researching and I know it is no where near the time our students spend using available technology! How do we begin to "catch up" with what our students are capable of doing online?

Monday, January 18, 2010

Motivation...

I am currently reading Daniel Pink's book Drive. He states that we are all born intrinsically motivated. He provides evidence of this by describing a baby who falls down over and over when they are trying to learn how to walk, but yet continues to get back every time! There have been several companies that offer opportunities to work at home and even devote some of their work day to solving problems that do not pertain to their careers. This practice has developed a more intrinsically motivated staff and they actually work outside their normal work day for the sheer sense of accomplishment and self-improvement. There is no belief in the practice of "doing the least amount of work possible." Could this practice be replicated in public education? There obviously becomes a time when some people lose that intrinsic motivation, or it begins to disappear. When and why does this happen? If we worked to find this answer and stop doing whatever it is that tends to make this happen, what would the future look like for our students?