Hi Maureen,
Good way to end the challenging class days because the students leave with an action plan for success in the next class meeting. This way they know success can be theirs once they return and do the "do-over" so they can continue their progress toward their career goal.
Gary
In a culinary technical setting reinforcement is key to creating meaningful motivation in students. Often times skills are learned over time so incremental results need to be celebrated and when a skill is mastered attention must be paid to the path and commitment it took to get there. On a daily basis I look for opportunities to praise growth in my individual students and in our class as a whole. If we have a particularly good day we spend more time on how great it went. When we have a day for which we would like a "do-over", we do one verbally and leave with an action plan for success on our next adventure.
It must be used often and it must be believable. There are a number of ways to use reinforcemnet to motivate students: (1) grades (the most obvious), (2) written feedback on assignments, (3) verbal feedback, (4) passing competencies, (5) encouragement, and (6) being singled out for recognition for outstanding performance. I found the most powerful reinforcers to be verbal and written feedback as well as encouragement. Never understimate the power of encouragement!!
At the beginning of the course, reinforcement should be quick, believable and frequent. As the semester progresses, reinforcement should be related to accomplishing tasks, reminding students of how much knowledge they have gained, and how much further they need to go.
Although grades are often a powerful reinforcer, I found feedback from the instructor to be more powerful. This feedback, of course, is related to rapport - the greater rapport you have with your students, the more powerful the reinforcing feedback. Without reinforcing feedback, your students will lose heart, become discouraged, and may drop out of your course prematurely. I think it is reinforcement that pushes students to excel, aquire the knowledge they need to succeed in their professions and keeps them from dropping out. If anything, reinforcement is one of the keys (in addition to rapport) that produces retention.
With the adult learners, what I have seen, is sometimes this is the only praise they have ever received in their lives. It really does help them to grow and feel better about themselves. I see, also, that it makes them want to strive to gain more praise!
I believe that positive reinforcement is a good way to motivate my students. I allows them to get some positive feedback on what goals they have accomplished in my course up to that point. It then makes them eagar to learn more and better continue with the remainder of the course.
Dr. Meers:
Reinforcement is the only way a student knows that they are on the right track in your class. Positive reinforcement even so slightly, gives them the motivation to continue to try. Negative reinforcement forces them to reassess what they did, but may not motivate them.
I agree with what you have to say. In college, motivation and reinforcement is much more important than trying to change behaviors. Everyone likes praise and showing the students what worked and giving them advice on how to improve is important. Thanks
By remaining positive and consistent in reinforcing students' knowledge, commitment to learning and understanding that you are available to assist them, students will come to feel safe and successful. Positive reinforcement should be frequent and clear. When I was in college earning my teaching degree, I understood that intermittent reinforcement was the strongest in terms of shaping behavior. In career colleges, I think it is much more important to reinforce learning than to attempt to shape behavior.
Personal and public praise to a student's acheivment has worked for me in class. Everyone loves to have the sense of success personally and most do publicly. I like to play little games in class that show case student's talent. I look for the things they do right constantly to point them out.
By using positive reinforcement you can show students what they are doing correctly making them more confident and motivating them to learn more.
