Marti Maguire, staff writer for The News&Observer, shares an interview with a homeschooling mother of two. The interview is a positive portrayal of homeschooling, but one of the questions left me wondering a bit about how much we are conditioned to think in public school terms.
What motivates your children to work without being graded?
Going back to my days as an education major and studying a bit of B.F. Skinner and others key to the behavioral approach, I learned the difference between a primary reinforcer and a secondary reinforcer. Primary reinforcers are those things which are inherently rewarding to the organism. Sorry, child. Things like social affirmation, treats, comfort and mental stimulation. A secondary reinforcer is something that the organism…um, child…learns to associate with something positive over time.
The classic example of a secondary reinforcer is the bell Pavlov used in his experiments. Ringing a bell will not usually elicit any particular behavior in an animal. However, Pavlov found that if he rang a bell and immediately offered his dog food, over time, the dog began to associate the bell with food. At the ringing of the bell, the dog would salivate, even without any food presented. It had become a secondary reinforcer.
A grade in school is a human equivalent. It is meaningless to a child. Even a first grader (remember, I had a room full of them) has only a limited understanding of exactly what a grade means and isn’t particularly motivated by it, yet. For most children, however, certain grades are consistently associated with primary reinforcers the child is willing to work for, such as a smile and compliment from the teacher, a sticker and special privileges at home. Children are thus conditioned to view the grade as a reward as well.
In school, grades are an important tool to communicate a child’s achievement to parents and for record keeping. For an older child who has been properly conditioned, they can also serve as a secondary motivation. But in the homeschool? And for a nine and six year old?
One of my more interesting instructors once said that one of the greatest achievements of public education was its ability to take a “child full of wonder, curiosity and questions and turn him completely off of learning within three to five years.” One way to do this is through an over-emphasis on secondary reinforcers to control and motivate a student.
Homeschooling families have the delightful advantage of being able to use primary motivators (and, more importantly, intrinsic motivators) to engage our children in learning: our time, our attention, and their own interests. Grades may be important for record keeping, but have you ever thought of them as a motivating factor in your teaching?
—Albert Einstein
For more on motivation, I actually have several posts on the topic:
Motivation, Defined
Extrinsic Motivation, A Myth?
Motivation and Self Government
The following explore the spiritual needs of the child as introduced in the above entry:
Significance
Confidence
Acceptance
Purpose
Clipart: Pavlov’s Dog, Grade
Related Tags: homeschooling, grading, motivation, grades
Oh, I just had to share a Marissa-ism.
I was surprised at one parent-teacher meeting to learn that Marissa was failing spelling. She has savant like language skills. Any word she sees once, she can spell.
When I got home, I asked her, “What’s up?”
“Of course I am failing spelling. I don’t do the homework. Spelling homework is for kids that don’t know how to spell and need the practice. I already know how to spell.”
I didn’t know how to respond. She was right. She didn’t need to do spelling homework. It was a waste of her time and mine. I learned that I was too motivated by grades ~
At one point along our homeschooling journey my kids demanded that I give them grades. They wanted to know how they were doing. It was somehow important for them to be able to benchmark themselves. They valued doing well.
There was some satisfaction for them to know that they could obtain a good grade, and with a bad grade they knew that they had to work a little harder. of course we never moved onto something else until they mastered what they were learning.
It is easy to give a grade on concepts or problems that are either right or wrong. Like math questions, grammatical errors, historical or geographical facts. I have always had difficulty grading anything that was an opinion or conceptual in nature. It becomes, in that case, more of whether or not they presented a convincing case, had their facts and put forth a logical explanation of things.
Of course discussing grades, what they mean to whom, and what their purpose is, with your kids is a lesson in and of itself.
Julie, that sounds like what you’ve described of Marissa! I think I’d be the same way as you.
Judy, I certainly don’t have a problem with grades. Particularly older kids seem to have a desire to know how they measure against whatever standard. And an older child may tend to be more motivated simply to improve in a subject. I just thought the question was odd, particularly given the age of the two children in question.
btw, I haven’t started grading, yet. I might next year, just for the sake of having a better record than a list of concepts that have been mastered or need additional work. We don’t move on until a thing is mastered, but I agree…grading on some things is way easier than others.
Thanks for this post…very informative and I look forward to reading your other posts you linked. “To grade or not to grade” is something I haven’t even given a thought to yet…of course, our oldest just turns 5 next month, so it’s not like I’m in a big hurry. But definitely good food for thought…:)
I agree. Grades are good motivators. I think it’s good if we introduce it to our kids as early as possible. It could added in their list of motivations.
take a “child full of wonder, curiosity and questions and turn him completely off of learning within three to five years.”
This definitely describes the problem we have by homeschooling like they do in school. You are right about how conditioned we are to think in public school terms. I have been struggling with this for the past year. I am learning that the public school ideal may be good for, say, well, I can’t really say who it’s good for, definitely not the active, creative types like I have.
Of course, I live in CA where my record keeping doesn’t have to be as intensive as it does in other states so we are very fortunate.