Improving Student Motivation

                When it comes to making sure my students find jot in their learning as a teacher I will need to raise the level of student engagement and buy in within my classroom.  For my students to be have the best opportunity to learn and enjoy the learning process, it is necessary for me to find ways to engage them on a level I currently have trouble getting them to.  I have found success building relationships with my students through interaction on a number of different levels.  The first way to I optimize the relationships in the room is to engage with my students in the classroom.  The second is by finding different interests they may have and talking with them about them in a genuinely interested way. 

                I think with all teachers there are times and situations in which we could effectively engage our students on a higher level.  My classroom is no different.  I am constantly trying to find new ways to work with my students, and still fall short on occasion.  Simply moving around the room and making sure they are on task helps some of the kids.  I also do a very good job of using eye contact during class discussions to help kids feel as if they are part of the class.  The real struggle comes when some of my go to techniques fail, and students just do not get into what we are doing.  The one thing I need to improve on that would do the most good would be making my lessons and goals more transparent.  There are times when I do a very good job of communicating these ideas to my students, but just not on a consistent enough basis. The video below is pretty simplistic, but does a good job of talking about some of the things I struggle with in my room at times as far as getting students to engage in the learning process.

                I really believe by using blended learning my students would have a better understanding of what it is I am asking of them.  For example, by using a flipped classroom model students would be able to view lesson materials on their own time, giving them an opportunity to control when and where they learn the material.  Through this method, students would also be able to watch lessons multiple times in order to have the material make sense.  In the classroom, the students can engage inn work and ask questions throughout the process.  Having time in class, which is not solely dedicated to information gathering, allows more time to understand what exactly I am wanting out of them in the lesson.  There is more time dedicated to asking questions and filtering through information they have watched outside of the classroom.  This style of learning opens the learning environment up so thoughts and ideas are freely exchanged.  Through the blended learning environment, I will be better able to give my students to opportunity to understand what the expectations are in my room.  The flipped classroom also gives me the opportunity to be more of a facilitator in the classroom rather the using the time giving information through differing techniques.