Understanding Teacher Motivation to Adopt Student-Centered Learning Practices

• In Event: Lessons About Teachers’ Motivation From Teacher-Researcher Collaborative Research on Student Motivation

Abstract

A three-year researcher-teacher collaboration to develop integrated literacy and inquiry lessons in kindergarten had motivation focus. In response to research on teachers’ science instruction, we sought to increase teachers’ efficacy to teach science and use informational, non-fiction books, and their value perceptions to do so. Our goals were for teachers to: see value in integrating science inquiry into their enacted curriculum; feel confident in doing so; and see value in using dialogic strategies. Teachers volunteered to participate in the project

Objectives. We analyzed four kindergarten teachers’ instructional practices and their beliefs related to those practices across the three years and again two years after the intervention ended. The results helped us understand why, despite teacher change during the intervention project, the instructional changes were not maintained after the project had finished.

Theoretical perspectives. The intervention was initially framed in terms of teachers’ self-efficacy and value. Although these constructs remained useful, our understanding of the data benefited from adding a socioculturally based “three planes” perspective (Turner & Patrick, 2008) to the analysis.

Methods and Data sources. We videotaped classroom lessons regularly throughout the three year period, and analyzed teachers’ dialogic and inquiry practices during science lessons. We also conducted individual, semi-structured interviews with teachers at the end of the first and last years of the project, and two years after the project had finished.

Results. In contrast to research findings, the teachers did not lack efficacy for teaching science despite not having a strong science background; they chose content they were comfortable with (“If it was something I didn’t know much about, you know, we didn’t cover it.”) Issues related to teachers’ continuation of the instructional practices after researchers’ involvement ended included, among others, beliefs about: the purpose of kindergarten (e.g., “Kindergarten is introduce. There’s no mastery, there’s no develop. It’s introduce. It’s hit it, give them the – an idea and go on”); what children should learn (“Usually we make this HUGE cut-and-paste Sparky the fire dog with the rules. And it’s one of THE highlights, of the whole fire safety unit. They take this dog home that’s 3 feet tall, but we don’t have time now to get it done. That’s the kind of thing they should be doing”); necessary prerequisite skills (e.g., children need to be able to write before they can record in their journals, “I don’t think for them there was any meaning in putting it down on paper”); and, what children are interested in (e.g., informational books aren’t interesting for young children).

Significance. The intervention resulted in considerable changes in both teachers’ observed practices and in the way they spoke about their teaching. However few of these changes were maintained two years after the intervention had finished. Identifying issues related to teachers’ practices not being sustained will provide useful information for researchers who wish to affect teacher change. It also informs motivation theories in terms of teachers’ motivation to adopt new instructional practices in their classrooms.

Authors

• Helen Patrick, Purdue University

• Panayota Y. Mantzicopoulos, Purdue University