Nate Drees
English Argument
12-8-95Literacy helps people function in society. Our civilization is based on the ability to read and write. Without these basic skills, one does not fit comfortably into our society. Many high-paying jobs require advanced literacy skills. One of the goals of today's education system is to provide students with basic and advanced literacy skills. Despite the fact that every child is guaranteed an education, not everyone gains these literacy skills. Lack of student motivation can play a big part in this. Literacy and Motivation
John Ogbu noticed that some minorities have high concentrations of illiteracy, and decided to find out why. He focused his research on the black Americans, specifically those in Stockton, California. There, the young people blamed the school system for their failures because the previous generation had been discriminated against. The previous generation had to work twice as hard as their white counterparts to acquire the same employment. These blacks conveyed messages of hopelessness to their children, by complaining of the system's unfairness (Ogbu 16). The youngStocktonians hear media reports of an intense job ceiling, which cause many to simply give up after a minor failure. This lack of motivation plays a major role in the illiteracy of these students.
So what can be done about this lack of motivation? A common nation-wide method used for providing motivation is rewarding students for reading. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich put this principle into practice, by implementing a program called Learning by Earning. Gingrich paid students in a Washington D.C. classroom $2 for reading a book and answering questions about it. Gingrich told reporters "We do everything we can to get our kids to read. The poorest children in America are having their futures stolen by illiteracy." Gingrich also claims that paying students demonstrates to them that learning to read is important (Seelye 1).
Similar programs that offered rewards have been implemented elsewhere to motivate students to read. Book-it was one of these, sponsored by Pizza Hut. After reading a set number of books, the child was rewarded by receiving a star, and a free personal Pan Pizza. This opportunity to earn a free pizza arose every month.
Unfortunately, rewards are not the best way to motivate students to read. Sarah Freedman, director of the National Center for the Study of Writing and Literacy at the University of California at Berkeley, objects to paying students to read. "You want to get kids to read because of what's inside books, not because they want money. There are multiple ways to motivate kids to want to read without paying them (Seelye 1)." This method in particular also has other drawbacks. Someone has to pay students to read, which would become quite expensive at $2 a book. Also, students would only read when they felt they needed the $2. If a student felt he/she had enough money when a book was assigned to be read, then there is no longer any motivation.
Rewards in general are a poor way to motivate students. "The offer of rewards can elicit temporary compliance." (Kohn 2). A student who has been promised a reward for reading "has been given every reason to stop... when there is no longer a reward to be gained." (Kohn 2). These children have no reason to read for pleasure, since there is no reward offered for doing so.
Students who have grown up being promised rewards tend to read worse than those who have not. One explanation for this is that "rewards cause people to lose interest in whatever they were rewarded for doing." (Kohn 2). Because of that Alfie Kohn, a skeptic of rewards, states that the methods of motivation should be reevaluated. Kohn breaks motivation into two categories: intrinsic and extrinsic. He defines intrinsic motivation to be a genuine interest in completing the task. Extrinsic motivation is a desire to complete the task to obtain something else. Intrinsic motivation can be accomplished by "giving students a safe caring community in which to discover and create, and a significant degree of choice about what they are learning." (Kohn 2-3).
Clearly, motivation must be genuine, in that the desire to read and write, must not be brought about by various forms of bribery, but rather by allowing the child to pick a book that interests him/her. Motivation does not work if it comes in the form of rewards or bribes. This form of motivation is only temporary, and the desire is to obtain the reward, not to put the best effort into completing the task. Extrinsic motivation also limits creativity because it often requires that the student put more time into the task. This theory applies more to the writing aspect of literacy.
Now that the methods of motivation have been established, who is responsible for motivating the student? Traditionally it has been the parents' responsibility to motivate the students to read, with the emphasis on the mother (Bowditch,178). Family structure and responsibility has changed over the past twenty years. There has been a dramatic increase in the number of single-parent households. There has also been an increase in the number of households with two working parents. For the most part, mothers are no longer available to guide their children's study habits and provide the motivation that was once available (Bowditch,178). Mothers or single-parents are blamed by schools for not "valuing education or being sufficiently involved." (Bowditch,178). Many times the schools' attempted solution "focuses on ways to help (or coerce) single-parent or dual-earner families (Bowditch,179)" to conform to the expectations of being able to constantly supervise a child's learning. Unfortunately, the only way working mothers or single-parents can accomplish this is by "limiting involvement in their involvement in the labor market (Bowditch,180)." This is not usually a realistic option, so another solution must be found.
With primary education especially, teachers should play an important role in motivating the student (Bowditch,180). Parents should not be excluded, but rather included when they are available. Teachers should be aware that parents cannot always provide educational supervision, especially when assigning homework. Homework should be assigned only to reinforce what was learned already, rather than teach new material. Parents should be given opportunities to participate in their child's education, but not chastised or blamed when they cannot take part (Bowditch,178).
As the student gets older, another option is to allow the student to take responsibility for motivating himself or herself. School systems can aid the students in self-motivation by allowing students to make choices concerning their curriculum. There are three major benefits to this practice. 1) It develops the student's sense of responsibility. 2) It allows the student to challenge himself/herself, by choosing courses at his/her level. 3) It allows the student to be somewhat independent (Dultz 75). The same principle can be applied to literacy. If a student in a reading or English class is occasionally allowed to choose what he or she reads, then the student will be more motivated to read that rather than always reading what is handed to him/her.
The following analogy helps illustrate why students must be allowed to make decisions concerning reading materials as well as the classes they take:
I'll ask you, the reader, to accept a proposition that you wish to engage in some sports activity next weekend. A friend of yours, who has the same idea in mind, insists that you play tennis with him. He gives you unlimited options and choices if you will do so. He tells you that you may pick the time, the place, and the duration of the match. You may freely select a racket from his collection, pick the side of the court you you wish to play on; and you may even elect to keep score or simply hit balls back and forth to one another. Certainly, in this example, you are given many choices, and at first glance, it would appear that your friend is being very good to you. However, what if you have no interest in the game of tennis; have found that you have no aptitude for it, and furthermore, you had your heart set on swimming? (Dultz 75-6)The analogy provides a clear illustration of how some parameters restrict the decisions a student makes about his education without appearing to do so at first. This leads to unhappiness and lack of motivation on the part of the student. In order for students to motivate themselves to learn, they must "choose their own subject matter to be learned and to formulate their own learning procedure. (Learning procedure encompasses such things as which books a person will read and which studying aids he will select, what thoughts he will think, which persons he will learn from, what studying techniques he will develop, which learning goals he will assign himself )." (Dultz 76). When students are allowed to choose their reading material, they are free to explore their interests and are able to motivate themselves to learn.Student motivation directly influences his/her ability to read and learn. Without motivation, students will have great difficulty reading and learning. A common misconception is that offering rewards will promote the desire to read, when in fact, it simply increases the desire for the reward, and once the reward is achieved, the student has no reason to continue to read. The best method of motivation is to promote a genuine interest in reading, by occaisionally allowing students to read what interests them. This can be done by giving students a list of scholarly works and/or authors and they can then choose something from the list, or of equal merit. It is not always possible for a student to pick a reading that is of interest, but it should be the case whenever possible.
Mothers have traditionally been responsible for motivating their children and overseeing their studies. Changes in the traditional family structure do not always allow mothers today to supervise their children's' education. Teachers should help the students motivate themselves, by allowing the students more choices when it comes to their education. When students are properly motivated, literacy becomes a much easier task.
Nate Drees is a freshman at Carnegie Mellon, in the Carnegie Institute of Technology. He is originally from Meyersdale, PA, and he's just an all-around cool guy. His email address is < drees+@andrew.cmu.edu>Click here to return to the class's home page.