Out of all the motivation theories we covered in class, I found the use of extrinsic motivators to be the most useful for me as a special educator. As I mentioned in class, I feel as though sometimes one must "open the motivational door" so to speak with an extrinsic motivator before we can even begin to build intrinsic motivation. This is especially apparent for students with learning disabilities, who often lack any intrinsic motivation in the classroom; if they did, then would special education even be necessary?
As a special educator, one of our primary goals is to build student motivation to achieve our behavioral and academic goals. One of the best examples I can think of actually happened to me fairly recently. In my practicum experience at Fulton High School, I sat in on a student's IEP meeting. I have this student in class for about 2 hours every day for math, and appropriate behavior is a daily struggle. This student rarely finishes any work as a result. So, as part of a behavior intervention plan on the IEP, an agreement was made between the student and the wellness teacher that if he finishes a certain amount of work in my class every day and displays appropriate behavior, he can be rewarded with 15 minutes of gym time. Because special educators often have students for larger chunks of the day, great rewards like this can be used as motivation.
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