What Underachieving
Middle School Students
Believe Motivates them to Learn
Middle School Students
Believe Motivates them to Learn
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Middle School Students Believe Motivates them to Learn |
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Chapter 1: The Challenge
to Educate Everyone
Chapter 2: A Review of Literature Chapter 3: Methods Chapter 4: The Results Chapter 5: Discussion |
I conducted a pilot study (Muir, 1998a. See Appendix A) relevant to this project. The study involved two students and some of their teachers at a regional middle school, serving six towns in rural New England. Both primary subjects for this study were boys on the same academic team. One was in seventh grade, the other in eighth. Students were interviewed separately, at school, away from other people and distractions. To improve my confidence in their responses, I encouraged them to expand on and clarify their answers, conducted about 10 hours of classroom observations, and interviewed one of their teachers. Six strong key issues emerged: learning styles; active, hands-on lessons; trusting, respectful relationships; the gap between what schools do and what could be done; student co-processing and multitasking; and a focus on compliance instead of learning. The pilot study generated implications for this study. Foremost, it showed that middle school students have plenty to say about how they think they learn well. The pilot study also raised several questions: What would students on a different team have to say? At a different school? What would girls say? Further, these two boys’ answers were very similar; would interviewing other students also produce similar results? The pilot study provided the author the opportunity to test and revise interview questions and the interview protocol. |
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Send questions or comments to wilder@somtel.com Last updated April 25, 2001 |
Assistant Professor of Education University of Maine at Farmington 104 Main Street Farmington, ME 04938 207.778.7179 wilder@somtel.com http://violet.umf.maine.edu/~mmuir |