Class-wide academic performance can be increased by overlaying existing instructional and classroom management procedures with supplemental interdependent group-oriented bonus rewards. The bonus reward strategies may be particularly effective for under-motivated, low-performing students. When applying supplemental interdependent group-oriented…

If students at your school are not attending classes or coming to school at all, they may be engaging in school refusal. Understanding what school refusal is, as well as the functions behind it, is key to evaluation and a collaborative school-home approach to intervention.

Wargames and crisis simulations can be useful pedagogical tools when deliberately used. This paper explores the spectrum of pedagogical objectives; what use are wargames for learning? What types of objectives can they explore? How do you align the learning objectives with the right type of game? The paper leverages Bloom's Taxonomy of learning as…

This article discusses the use of behavior-specific praise (BSP), an effective technique for promoting prosocial behavior and managing classrooms. It addresses the criticism that BSP may reduce students' intrinsic motivation and offers directions on how to use BSP to provide students, especially those with challenging behaviors, with useful…

In this article, we provide both a critical analysis of and logical response to a set of the most typical school-based objections to the effective use of positive reinforcement. For example, one objection is that positive reinforcement amounts to bribery. Practitioners are provided with clear and concise arguments refuting each objection and…

The paper picks up from the widespread use by politicians and some educational theorists of maximising (including optimising) notions about those being educated such as 'reach their full potential' or 'make the best of themselves' or 'develop their talents to the full'. The paper discusses then puts some of these ideas on one side to focus on the…

A question asked by many teachers, is "How do we motivate the unmotivated kid?" There are many theories about motivation in the classroom and in order for these theories to work, they must become actionable strategies. These theories can be organized into five different categories: Enthusiasm, Empowerment, Encouragement, Emotions and…

Motivation and engagement in mathematics are important for academic success and are sometimes compromised in students with disabilities who have experienced a history of frustration and failure. This article explains how general and special education teachers can implement three research-supported strategies for boosting motivation and engagement…

Surrounding students with messages that they have the ability to learn and teaching them how is at the core of closing the achievement gap. Teachers can engage in verbal behaviors that counteract the negative messages that children of color receive outside the classroom. Those verbal behaviors can embed these messages for students: What we're…

With more than 35 years of combined experience teaching English language learners (ELLs), Larry Ferlazzo and Katie Hull Sypnieski understand how students learn. Together, they have written a series of books on the topic, and in this article they share their insights. Chief among them is that ELLs require particular instructional strategies to help…

While it may seem almost intuitive that offering rewards to students will yield better results, that is not how it works; the result often is the opposite. The paradox of rewards is that their effect often has a limited impact on students, who then will lose curiosity; it also makes them feel as if they are being controlled--a negative motivating…

Children naturally love to learn, but might not like to be taught in certain ways. Teachers' improper ways of teaching might make a child shut down his or her willingness to learn, which is called "not-learning". Not-learning does not refer to an incapability to learn, but is rather a choice a child intentionally or unintentionally makes…

Students are motivated when they have a constant system of rewards. They have a desire to please others and be recognized. It was with this idea in mind that the Smokey Road Middle School Band in Newman, Georgia, started using the "Power in the Progress System" in 2011. This system, created by H. Dwight Satterwhite, a professor of music…

Physical educators need to make an effort to catch students being good and recognize them for their positive accomplishments. Unfortunately, it is usually the students who act inappropriately who receive the majority of the teachers' attention. In order to help increase learning and improve performance and behavior, the physical educator must…

Students' academic success may be influenced not only by their actual ability, but also by their beliefs about their intelligence. Studies have found that students enter a classroom with one of two distinct conceptions of their intellectual ability: some students believe their intelligence is expandable (growth mindset), while others believe their…