A Motivation Conundrum

                      My class and I had an in-depth discussion on motivation the other day, they are a notoriously hard to motivate bunch. Intrinsic motivation is not in their collective vocabulary yet. I passed out sticky notes to each one and had them make me a list of things that would help inspire them to do their best. The only restrictions being, "No field trips, not a lot of money, and easy to prepare." Boy, they sure gave me a list to chose from. The best part is that they really surprised me with some of the options. At the end of each quarter my school has what we call "Read and Feed" the kids wear pj's, bring snacks and drinks, and just read for a half a day. Apparently they really enjoy that! An extra "Read and Feed" scored 7 votes out of 22. The most popular by far was an extra recess, free and easy so I told them to consider it done. Electronics time was also popular with the majority of them, those game boys and iPods are addicting. I can probably swing that as well one afternoon for half an hour with no problem.

           There was a collection of requests for snacks so I'm working on a way to bring something in each day of the testing to keep them going. I saw a link on Pinterest, (the most wonderful place in the world) for some great printables to use as encouragement during testing. I followed the link on over to this website http://www.technologyrocksseriously.com/ and ended up adding another blog to my reading list in the process. The author has some of the cutest printables available! I followed her link to the Teachers Pay Teachers site and downloaded copies of her Sweet Notes of Encouragement. Luckily there were enough for each day of testing, the 5th grade level has six days total. I plan on using the "Blow the top off the test" with bubble gum, "Work EXTRA hard", "Hugs and Kisses for putting forth your best effort", "Every teacher wishes they had SMARTIES like you", "Lets not have an SNICKERS, do your best!", "A BURST of energy to do your best", "2-4-6-8 we know your tests will be just great!" A few additions to my grocery list and some color copies = instant daily motivation with minimal effort on my part. Thank you to technology rocks, seriously!

                       My lovely husband has made it an annual event the last few years to bring in pizza and Andy's Frozen Custard after the testing to reward them for doing their best. I love his desire to get involved with my classes and he enjoys getting to connect names with faces after hearing about them for seven months or so. Last year he was challenged to take the 50 state map ID test the kids had just completed, he was only able to finish about half so he's been studying for this year!