Driven to Learn: All Children?

We had a professional development day last week, led by our amazing student services coordinator.  She presented on the physiology of ADHD and the strategies that can be applied to negate some of the executive functioning deficits that are often associated with the diagnosis.  Towards the end of her presentation she referred to a common catch-phrase question the many educators use when talking about student motivation, "Have you ever encountered a young child (2 or 3 year old) unmotivated to learn?"  The thought goes that children are born with an intrinsic motivation to learn, and we, as an educational institution, tend to squash that "love" of learning.  In the past, I've taken this point as fact and believed in a child's love of learning and curiosity, but for the first time, I had my doubts.

Don't get me wrong, I still believe that children are curious and eager to learn.  They will continually explore their world to increase their understanding of it.  However, this learning is strictly relegated to an exploratory and self-driven act.  When a child is asked to learn something, i.e. washing their hands, using the toilet, brushing their teeth, they might not be as eager.  Why?  Are we presenting the material incorrectly?  Maybe?  But maybe it's just that the subject matter doesn't interest them.  Maybe, just maybe, they would rather be doing something else, learning about something else, than the thing which we want.

That's where school comes in to play.  It's our job, our privilege, as educators, to provide students with a wealth of knowledge and skills that will allow unlimited opportunity in the future.  Some of those skills, and some of that knowledge, may not be what a student wants to think about, explore, and learn about.  Therefore, it's not us, it's not the institution, that kills the desire to learn, it's simply human individuality.

We must continue to make learning fun, engaging, and relevant to students, but we must not beat ourselves up because we've killed a child's motivation to learn.  We have exposed a person to a new topic or area of study, that may, one day open up a door to their future.

Solving Equations

As I've mentioned before, I'm teaching the same group of kids that I had last year.  This is good and bad.  Good because I have established relationships, know what they can do, and know what we covered and how we covered it last year.  It's bad because, let's face it, sometimes a student (and a teacher) needs a fresh face.

Knowing that we solved one-step equations last year in our 6th grade class, when I approached this topic this year, I thought that I'd have the kids teach each other.  Therefore, I broke the class into groups of 3, and assigned each group a different equation to solve.  They all came to the white board and began solving the equation.  After 1 minute, I had the groups rotate and continue the work of another group.  This continued until all groups had worked or reviewed each equation.  Next, I had the groups return to their original equations and see if the workings made sense, and if they agreed with the final outcome.

My hope in doing this was that each student would see the various types of one-step equations, they would improve on their ability to critique the work of others, and it would get them out of their seats.  These goals, for the most part, were accomplished.  I also made a rule that the same person could not write on the white board twice in a row, forcing everyone to participate.

After we had solved all of the equations, I had the whole class look at a few choice ones and do a bit of critiquing.  My idea was to create a whole class dialogue about the different methods to solving equations, how we communicate our thinking clearly, and how we can check each other's work.  Unfortunately, the whole class discussion didn't progress as I had hoped, and we just reviewed equation and tried to clarify any misconceptions.

Although the lesson wasn't perfect, I enjoyed the different approach to presenting the topic.  It did get all students out of their seats, and most of them were working on and talking about math which was great.