Motivating Students Who Don’t Care: Proven Strategies to Engage All Learners - 2nd Edition

[00:01] Announcer:

Welcome to Principal Center Radio, helping you build capacity for instructional leadership. Here's your host, Director of the Principal Center, Dr. Justin Bader. Welcome everyone to Principal Center Radio.

[00:13] SPEAKER_00:

I'm your host, Justin Bader, and today I'm honored to be joined by Dr. Alan Mendler. Dr. Mendler is an educator and school psychologist who specializes in approaches for helping youth with learning and behavior problems to succeed. Dr. Mendler is a speaker, trainer, and the author of numerous books and other publications, including Motivating Students Who Don't Care, Proven Strategies to Engage All Learners.

[00:38] Announcer:

And now, our feature presentation.

[00:40] SPEAKER_00:

Alan, welcome to Principal Center Radio.

[00:42] SPEAKER_01:

Thank you, Justin. Good to be here.

[00:44] SPEAKER_00:

Well, let's start with kind of a big premise. Is it even possible to motivate students who are unmotivated? We hear a lot about intrinsic motivation versus extrinsic motivation. What's actually possible? If we have a student that it seems like just doesn't care about school, doesn't care about anything that we're interested in getting them to care about, is it even possible for us to make a difference?

[01:04] SPEAKER_01:

Yes, it's absolutely possible. I'm of the opinion and from my observations of life, actually, that we are intrinsically motivated from birth, actually. Pretty hard to find an unmotivated infant or an unmotivated toddler. In fact, you know, kids who are real little are so motivated to learn that parents often have to erect barriers to keep them from learning. So to my way of thinking, it's not about motivating from the get go. It's about really getting kids reconnected.

[01:38]

to learning and pointing them in directions that will enable them to continue to grow what their natural desire aims towards.

[01:48] SPEAKER_00:

You talk in the book about creating confidence and hope. And as you just mentioned, curiosity, a desire to explore, a desire to learn, those are all natural things that we're born with. What has happened in a student's life when they come to us and they seem just incredibly unmotivated about life? What's been interfered with in that natural curiosity?

[02:10] SPEAKER_01:

Well, I would say 70, 80, maybe even up to 90% of challenging behavior, which includes poor motivation, really have to do with factors outside of school. And we can sort of list a litany of what those look like. So really, my message is that we're really dealing with a whole bunch of factors that are really too large to spend a lot of time on this show discussing. My focus is really on taking the 10, 20, maybe 30% of the influence that belongs to us teachers and maximizing those. Because what I've discovered is that really no matter what's going on in students' lives, we have a voice. And if we make that voice as interesting, melodic, harmonious, call it what you may, that can get kids really reconnected to what comes naturally, which is wanting to learn.

[03:05] SPEAKER_00:

I'm glad you gave those rough percentages. Even if our influence is only 10, 20, or 30 percent, the overall picture for a particular student, that's not nothing. We don't control everything, but it's not nothing.

[03:17] SPEAKER_01:

Exactly. And that's why we're competing with a lot of other forces out there. And that's why really our voice is On a daily basis, we need to make that voice of ours as interesting as we possibly can. That captures kids' spirit, because if it doesn't, there's a likelihood that somebody else's voice as well.

[03:35] SPEAKER_00:

I feel like, Alan, as educators, often the people who go into education, more often than not, tend to be people who found school interesting, who did well in school. And as a result, I think we tend to more naturally connect with the students who do well in school, who are motivated, who are excited to be there. And it can be a little bit more of a stretch for educators to really identify with and empathize with students who seem not to care about school at all. How can we build that relationship and build that empathy When it seems like we care about very different things and it's almost, you know, to educators, it can be kind of mind boggling. How could you not think this is fun? Oh, I love school.

[04:15]

How could you not?

[04:16] SPEAKER_01:

Well, I think it's I think it's important for educators to understand the factors, the characteristics that make us motivating. When I go to schools, I usually on a random basis, I'll ask kids, tell me who your best teachers are, you know, and then, you know, I'll just basically randomly ask that question and then I will go and observe those teachers. just to see what they do. And from there, you can see characteristics if you're looking for them and then share with other people. You know, that's basically what I've done throughout my life. I think there are some teachers that are naturals, you know, some relatively small percentage of us are just like really connect and we're, we just get it somehow or other.

[05:01]

Most of us aren't necessarily built that way, but all of us, are able to get better at what we do and by understanding what we can do on a regular basis that can connect with kids and make a difference and get them excited and enthusiastic about learning, we can do those things if we're committed to doing those things. And I find that most teachers are committed to doing those things when they understand what those things are. What's of interest to me is that a number of the quote unquote naturals, they can't articulate what they're actually doing. You know, I mean, they just sort of do it. And to them, it's like no big deal. But, you know, people like me who are studying it, you know, are able to hopefully articulate it well enough and then put it in books for

[05:53]

other people to read about it and, you know, by through practice, get better at doing those very things.

[05:59] SPEAKER_00:

To me, a lot of it seems like it has to do with acceptance, right? If as educators, we're sending the message that the only students that we care about are the kids who come in already knowing the right answers and the kids who are happy to be there, and the other teachers' kids, I feel like that sends a very powerful message to the students who might not be as naturally motivated. What do students need to hear from us to know that they are cared about, to know that they can succeed if they've not had a lot of success in school so far?

[06:30] SPEAKER_01:

Well, you know, teachers who are the most successful with kids, for the most part, understand the importance of building a relationship with them. You know, it's a goal of theirs to do so. They may not, once again, articulate it, but it's just something that they do more naturally. So they will, you know, for example, say hello to kids in the morning and have a smile on their face and, you know, seek to understand what that student's interest might be so that maybe, you During the class, they might make a comment or two that connects that interest to some curricula that they're teaching about. They also, you know, they use encouraging language, even highlighting the benefits of mistakes. You know, that was a really good effort, man.

[07:14]

I thought your example was really well done, even though maybe you didn't get around to doing the other three. But, man, you did that one really pretty well. Boy, this was a tough assignment. I appreciate the effort that you put in. You know, doing sort of things like that on a regular basis can really make a difference. There are folks who show up filled with optimism, believing that on a regular basis those kids can succeed.

[07:39]

While they have high expectations, they have right expectations. Meaning that it's not necessarily a one size that fits everybody. There tends to be more of a focus on the effort that kids are putting forth rather than the outcomes that are being achieved. And they reward kids as much for their effort as they do for their actual outcome. It's also about being patient. It's about understanding that change takes time.

[08:15]

If kids have learned to be unmotivated, it takes time to relearn how to reconnect to being motivated. When kids revisit their unmotivated ways, which is not unusual, for them to do, those teachers don't give up on them. They remind them that they've been successful in the past and they can be successful in the future. I like to use an analogy like, you know, somebody who's on a weight loss program that sees jelly donuts in the faculty room, you know, usually they grab for one and yet, you know, they don't for maybe the first half hour until finally, you know, they just succumb and they eat one, you know, and Rather than, you know, somebody nearby saying, gee, weren't you on a diet? You know, how come you're sort of, you know, losing your focus?

[09:07]

You know, that person says, you know, I noticed that for the first half hour that you were really, you know, you put up a strong fight, you know, and that was really pretty cool. Before they finally, you know, got those jelly donuts grabbed you, you know, like, what do you do? to be able to say no? What did you do to be able to sort of defend yourself and continue to do what it was that you wanted to do? So the bottom line here is that there are a lot of little things that we educators can do on a regular basis that really don't require a whole sort of reimagining of schools. And then there were also some big things that do require some reimagining.

[09:49]

You know, like, for example, I'm a strong proponent that that when kids are graded, considerable percentage of their grade really needs to be about the effort that they're putting forth. Did they get better today than they were yesterday? at spelling or at math or whatever it is that's being measured. Because if kids are just held to a certain standard that might be too far removed from where their capacities are, then they're going to give up. Most kids are more willing to look bad or look unmotivated than they are to appear stupid in front of their classmates.

[10:32] SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, well, let's talk a little bit about that because, of course, standards-based grading is ascendant, and there's a lot of interest in taking things like effort or behavior or assignment completion out of grading and limiting grades to, did the student actually master the standards? You're saying it's important to really emphasize effort and those building block actions that kids take, even if they're not fully proficient with the concepts yet.

[11:00] SPEAKER_01:

Yes. Well, I think, for example, that it's virtually impossible to measure everything through one grade. And so, you know, for example, maybe there ought to be at least two grades that exist on a report card of sorts. You know, and one grade is maybe related to where a student is with regard to mastery at the grade level. And another grade is related to where they were and where they are. you know, at this particular point in time.

[11:30]

Because, you know, if a student sees on a report card that they're doing like, you know, they got an A or a B with regard to their improvement, even if they have a D, you know, with regard to where they are in a standards kind of place, you know, you can sort of soften the blow in a way. I mean, if I'm a teacher, I can say, hey, you know what? I mean, you keep this going here. You keep doing this sort of BA stuff. You know, that other piece is going to really continue to move up, you know, so keep it going. You're doing a great job.

[12:00]

You know, you can't really, you can't come to that place if you're trying to measure everything through one grade. So my point is that I don't necessarily have a one specific answer for every single school to follow. But what I do believe is that each school district needs to find ways, showing how improvement through effort at least as important as the outcome that's achieved.

[12:26] SPEAKER_00:

I think probably Carol Dweck's work on mindset has kind of brought that awareness to the profession that if we're only about right answers, if we're only about you know, getting things correct on a test, then that's not only bad for our students who are struggling, it's bad for our high achieving students as well to only be praised for the outcome.

[12:46] SPEAKER_01:

Right. I'm a strong admirer of Carol Dweck. I think she's done some great work. And, you know, I like to think that a lot of my work dovetails, you know, very, very much so with hers.

[12:58] SPEAKER_00:

I wanted to ask about another point of view as well, because I was reading an article by Alfie Kohn recently. And of course, Alfie Kohn has long been opposed to anything that looks like rewards or punishments or any kind of reinforcement of

[13:12] SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I mean, I'm not a huge fan of external rewards. I don't think it's the worst thing in the world, as some people do. But I'm not a huge fan. I much prefer to connect to what intrinsically motivates kids. And so, for example...

[13:29]

With regard to the use of external rewards, I'm a bigger fan of rewarding the group in honor of an individual. So rather than going to an individual and rewarding just that person for what that person's effort or achievement was, everybody gets in on the action. So instead of, hey, Billy, that was a really great job. Here's your piece of candy or whatever it might be. It's good up, everybody. You know, Billy has really achieved something special for himself today.

[14:02]

And he wants to tell you what that is. He can, you know, but for him. The bottom line here is in Billy's honor today, we all get five minutes extra of whatever. It's like we all get something as a result of Billy doing something. As a result of Billy taking notes today, not necessarily am I going to say to the class, well, Billy took notes today. That's a great job.

[14:31]

But to celebrate that, Billy's achievement today. And in my mind, and I've quietly told Billy and praised him for coming prepared today because he did, you know, usually he doesn't, today he did, you know, everybody, you know, sort of gets a reward. Then, you know, sort of other kids may be jump on the bandwagon and start thinking gee maybe i can you know maybe i i'm more incentivized to motivate billy because i get you know something as a result so you know when it comes to rewards i'm kind of more a fan of looking for how does everybody benefit as from an individual's achievement or improvement rather than just that individual him or herself. I'd like to think that the intrinsic improvement that they experience will carry the day for them and will generally speaking be enough.

[15:24]

But I don't necessarily see anything really, as Alfie Cohen might, I don't see anything that's terrible about adding in some of those external rewards when everybody can benefit.

[15:37] SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I'm really intrigued by that because it seems to me that that type of approach changes the relationship between that student who may be the least successful student in the class, who may often be getting attention for negative behaviors. You're really changing the relationship of that student to their peers.

[15:56] SPEAKER_01:

Exactly. Exactly right. By giving others, giving peers, by incentivizing them to really kind of look after each other, you're adding a whole new layer of motivation. You're adding a whole new population of people there that you can sort of look to to motivate your students. You're looking at them as resources to motivate each other.

[16:20] SPEAKER_00:

Powerful. And often the class culture in a really great teacher's classroom is something that's a little bit hard for us to pick up on as administrators or observers. But it seems like that culture and those relationships between peers do a lot of the heavy lifting and motivating kids to work together, to work hard.

[16:39] SPEAKER_01:

It's huge. You know, it's huge. And, you know, a lot of times you see some of the, again, teachers that are identified as quote unquote best. I mean, you know, it's not unusual in those classes to really have kids looking out for each other and affording each other's efforts as opposed to looking at each other as potential competitors. You know, if you think about it, I mean, you know, to be successful in the workplace, you know, you need to get along with other people and cooperate with them and, you know, acknowledge their effort and how their effort dovetails with yours. And I think we have to kind of look to that and simulate that in our classrooms in order to really bring out the best in everybody.

[17:24] SPEAKER_00:

Well, Alan, I wonder if we could talk a little bit about the design of the book, because we're touching on some big picture ideas from psychology and our philosophy of education. But the book is immensely straightforward. Talk to us a little bit about how educators are using the book. This is the second edition. How have people used the first edition? And what's your hope as the second edition gets into people's hands?

[17:47]

How will they use it? How can they refer to it to better support their less motivated students?

[17:54] SPEAKER_01:

Right. Well, you know, the book is light on theory and it's very heavy on practicality. So I lay out the theory for why we ought to do various things that we do. And then there were certain characteristics of teachers that are successful in motivating their kids that are really highlighted. you know, like each chapter or each section can really be read by itself, you know, gazillions of activities that really follow. So, for example, talk about way of emphasizing effort, you know, like what are some strategies that teachers can do on a regular basis that put the focus on effort?

[18:38]

You asked before about, you know, or you suggested the importance of confidence and having a sense of hopefulness. And so, You know, with kids who struggle to experience success, which is really what builds confidence. How do you really highlight that? You know, like for example, one of the strategies that we call on a roll, you know, so not on a roll, but on a roll. So, you know, when kids are improving relative to themselves, you know, they can be recognized as being on a roll, you know, and things like that, you know, can create cumulative amounts of that sort of stuff can really help kids reimagine and revision who they are. One of the sections is about, well, how do you involve students in the decisions that affect their lives?

[19:27]

You know, like, how do you make it their classroom not just your classroom but their classroom how do you get kids for example involved in developing the rules of the classroom maybe even identifying the consequences of what those classroom ought to be what kinds of responsible jobs can each student have that makes them feel you know a sense of importance we have a whole section on specific ways of building relationships you know like for example with your especially challenging to reach students, one of the strategies that we talk about is what we call the two-minute intervention, which means taking two minutes on a daily basis for 10 consecutive days to really just focus on building a relationship with that particular student. And, you know, so a lot of teachers will ask, well, like, when would I be able to do that?

[20:21]

And so we talk about how you sort of build some some moments within your classroom, like, for example, when kids are working with each other or they're reviewing for the test or they're working in there on their projects and you're cruising around the room. You know, maybe you take that period of time to have your two minute intervention with a an identified student. And then one of the sections is really about sparking enthusiasm. You know, how do you bring excitement to the classroom on a regular basis? You know, how do you access your own sense of humor? How do you have joy and fun?

[21:00]

How do you make it a a goal of yours to have fun on a regular basis in class, to tell a story or share an idea that for you, you know, is enjoyable. Maybe you want to bring in drama or music or, you know, for example, connect to the music that kids are listening to, you know, like But do you know a little bit about their music so that maybe you can have a conversation with a kid and make mention of the fact that you're, how can Drake be somebody that you listen to? I don't understand a word that this guy says. You know what I mean? It's like showing your own ignorance even to kids. You have some knowledge of what their awareness is.

[21:45]

So anyway, just different ways of sparking enthusiasm for yourself as well as for your subject. And so the book is really organized in that sort of way.

[21:56] SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, so again, immensely practical and very specific and concrete and not especially difficult things that we can do to build those relationships, to rebuild students' confidence and spark their enthusiasm for learning.

[22:11] SPEAKER_01:

Correct. I would say probably 80% of the book are a lot of very practical ideas that don't require a certain philosophy. The other 20% are, let's call them more creative strategies, things that are perhaps unconventional and a little bit unusual.

[22:29] SPEAKER_00:

And one way I want to encourage our listeners to maybe use this book is to think about a classroom where maybe a lot of struggling students are not doing well. You know, we have maybe a struggling teacher who is just not reaching a lot of their students. One way I think this book could be incredibly valuable is just open to the table of contents and read through it real quickly and say, what is this teacher currently doing and not doing? And what might be one quick thing that they could start doing that would make a big difference? And, you know, like Alan earlier, you mentioned greeting students at the door, just welcoming students into the classroom in the morning as something that could make a huge difference.

[23:06] SPEAKER_01:

I'll throw out another simple one. We were talking about creating hope and confidence. The three R's, redo, retake, revise. Build that into your classroom. Give kids opportunities more than one to redo, retake, or revise a piece of their work. Don't make it a done deal.

[23:25]

Don't shut down learning. Well, that was that in Now we're on to a new unit. Give kids opportunities to be successful, to show them, reward them for improving by keeping the door open to kids continuously showing their improvement and upping their grades when they do so.

[23:45] SPEAKER_00:

So the book is Motivating Students Who Don't Care, Proven Strategies to Engage All Learners. And Dr. Allen Mendler, if people would like to get in touch with you, learn more about your speaking or training, where's the best place for them to go?

[23:58] SPEAKER_01:

Probably the best place is for them to email me, almendler at gmail.com, or they can Twitter me at almendler. Those would probably be the best options.

[24:12] SPEAKER_00:

Well, Alan, thank you so much for joining me on Principal Center Radio. It's been a pleasure. Thank you, Dustin. Appreciate it.

[24:17] Announcer:

Thanks for listening to Principal Center Radio. For more great episodes, subscribe on our website at principalcenter.com slash radio.