Social Emotional Learning Topic: Self-Motivation
/SELF-MOTIVATION: 5 Key Lesson Takeaways
Self-motivation consists of finding the things that interest you and motivate you to want to work towards the ultimate goal.
Take the time to learn about your child/student’s interests so that you can incorporate these things into their education. It will help them learn the things they aren’t interested in or struggle with if it is related to something they are passionate about.
Teach them how to use technology in a positive way (ex: look up answers to things they are curious about). Parents/Adults can be role models in this sense by looking up answers to questions their children have.
It is important to give your children space in which they can make their own decisions while also setting boundaries. Children feel respected when you allow them to make their own decisions because they feel a sense of responsibility and trust.
Self-motivation takes a lot of practice for parents, teachers, and children, but listening and valuing your child’s voice can help them develop their values and self-confidence.
Book Recommendations:
This is the story of a persistent problem and the child who isn't so sure what to make of it. The longer the problem is avoided, the bigger it seems to get. But when the child finally musters up the courage to face it, the problem turns out to be something quite different than it appeared.
A powerful story for young girls. This book follows Grace, who decides she wants to be the first female president, and to do so, she’ll need hard work, courage and independent thought.
Teaches the valuable lesson that there’s no one “right way” to do things — it’s ok to be creative and different!
A little girl and her fury friend set out on a mission to make something magnificent but meet discouraging roadblocks on their way. Children can relate with the frustrated little girl and learn from her canine companion about perspective.
Transcript for Podcast Lesson on Self-Motivation with Kate
Jenny Woo [00:00:50] We are here sitting next to Kate James to talk about self-motivation. Kate is an educator and designer who runs the preview program at the new view innovation school in Cambridge Massachusetts. There she engages five to eight-year-olds and design studios where they learn to think through problems, make things, and talk about their work. Kate recently completed a master’s degree at the Harvard Graduate School of Education with a focus on arts and education. She also has a Masters of Science and visual studies from M.I.T. and worked for many years as a design researcher and product designer.
Jenny Woo [00:01:35] Welcome Kate. Thank you so much for having me. So tell us what does self-motivation mean to you?
Kate James [00:01:43] I was thinking about what self-motivation is and I was actually thinking of it in reference to just finishing this program at Harvard. I had this impulse to go check my grades and I was wondering because that's actually counter to what I believe in. I don't really think that grades are a great register of people's talents or skills but I had this feeling like I needed to find out what these professors thought of my work. I think in terms of what self-motivation is it's the lack of needing to do that. It's when you actually don't need to go check your grades because you've gotten feedback from yourself and others that comes without the carrot and stick model that comes without either being rewarded with the A or punished with the C or things outside of grades. The feedback that comes from the world in a more organic way allows you to find things within yourself that make you want to keep working and keep moving towards goals.
Jenny Woo [00:02:45] Kate you're also a mother of three and so you know the realities of parenting are it's rather hard when we're not dangling the carrots and the rewards. So tell us what are some of the things that have worked for you in terms of planting the seeds in our children and valuing those things within themselves and finding those values and validating them.
Kate James [00:03:09] So I actually find that self-motivation is a skill that needs to be almost practiced. So to begin I think with my own children and also with the students that I teach, I find that the first step is like really listening to what the child values to really hear what they care about and use those stakes that they have as a way into work. Using what they care about and what they love to get them started on a road towards something. Then if they practice that skill of working towards a goal in the area of something they love then they get used to the process of working towards goals and then they can kind of deploy that in areas where maybe they're less naturally interested but they kind of get used to the skill of working towards something and being persistent and finding ways around problems. That makes sense.
Jenny Woo [00:04:06] So having that self-discipline and seeing the benefits of sticking to a goal. Give me an example. You've done a lot of work in maker space area design studios. What if for example, my child is so into that stuff, making things, but I also want to motivate him. Maybe at math, at school and I hate to bring up the grades right. Also that as well.
Jenny Woo [00:04:32] What can I do to channel his passion for making things and relating that to academics.
Kates James [00:04:41] You start in a space where somebody is really passionate.
Kate James [00:04:46] I know my son is really passionate about building things and building spaces and building things out of Legos and that kind of thing. So we actually started to do some 3D modeling on the computer and then you kind of run into math. It's there and you can't avoid it. You get to a point where you're like well I need to figure out the proportions of this hamster that I'm trying to 3D print so I need the head to be this big and I need the body to be this big. You kind of just bump up against it. I think if it's in an area where kids are interested and passionate then they tend not to see it as a stopping point where they might in a school situation. I think the problem that we run into at school is when things start to show up as rote worksheets and problems that don't relate to their real life or their real interests. It's a tough gap to bridge. But it's an important one to bridge. If we can kind of find the threads that could maybe join these things up like the things that they care about and the things that they have to understand, then that's where we really need to start weaving things together.
Jenny Woo [00:05:57] Tell me more about the thread right. So I can’t help but feeling overwhelmed at times. Right. There's only so much time I have during the day for us to have that quality time with my children. But then on top we have school homework, activities, and readings and how do I bridge that thread without killing myself.
Kate James [00:06:18] It's a tough question and I think as mothers we certainly always feel kind of a pull. Where is the proportion of my time being spent and should I be reallocating it and questioning that all the time it comes back to listening. It comes back to where you really need to have just a few moments here and there where you pause and really listen to what your kid is saying.
Kate James [00:06:42] I think as a society in general it's really easy for us to kind of bowl over that and be like get your homework done, get to your activity, finish your sports practice, do all the things on your list but then the child's voice is often really lost in that and where you can start to build threads into more academic topics is when you're really listening to what the child cares about how they feel about math for example.
Kate James [00:07:09] Kids can have really complicated relationships with math and they can feel self motivation to do math if they are doing it in a way that resonates with them and that is interesting to them. I know my son the way that he was doing addition was just it seemed completely quirky and fascinating to me that if he was doing 19 plus 13 he would take the heat. He felt more comfortable with eights and twos. So he would take a one off the 19 and it would take a one off of the 13 and then he could add 18 and twelve and get thirty and then he would ask his two straggler friends to come back and make the thirty two. That really unique kind of way that he was doing math, once we were working in his method he was way more interested in doing his math homework.
Jenny Woo [00:08:02] That's such a good point. You know it's almost like it is listening but it's also being open, being open minded to what they like and how they like it and there are unique ways. That is so incredibly important to truly help us understand who our children are so that we can help them to get to where they like to be. You know actually your example reminded me of this one morning. You're right. It doesn't take a lot of time just to have that little amount of time that quality that you can get into. This other day in the morning we were eating mini pancakes because you know I just don't have time to make pancakes pancakes from scratch.
Jenny Woo [00:08:47] So I buy the overpriced mini pancakes.
Jenny Woo [00:08:50] And interestingly it was before school and we had about five different mini pancakes and someone, one of my three children just started slicing them into halves a lightbulb just came up I was like Oh this is fraction right.
Jenny Woo [00:08:50] And interestingly it was before school and we had about five different mini pancakes and someone, one of my three children just started slicing them into halves a lightbulb just came up I was like Oh this is fraction right.
Jenny Woo [00:09:06] Yeah. So we did pancake fractions.
Kate James [00:09:15] Ben actually wrote on his homework sheet it says like what did you study and how did you practice it. He actually wrote pancake fractions.
Jenny Woo [00:09:22] I love it. Right.
Jenny Woo [00:09:24] It's those little things and it's so interesting because we started dividing it into fourths and 16th’s and all that stuff. I started linking it to the concepts of piano notes. So you have the whole no quarter no half no 16 note. Then what we did with that was we started clapping with how the pancakes were structured and to like a song. So needless to say the pancakes were gross by the end of it, did not eat it, but that was a learning self-motivated learning experience.
Kate James [00:09:56] That's beautiful. And I love the exploratory nature of it because you can kind of start like how do pancakes relate to math and then how does math relate to music and then it just all kind of links up in a much more holistic way. The kids don't even realize that they're learning. It's just kind of happening and it's interesting and it peaks even more curiosity I think and it starts to make them see connections between things that they might not see otherwise.
Jenny Woo [00:10:23] Yeah yeah. I like how you say it piques curiosity. I have another small example and I love your advice on this one. My five-year-old started using the word “I wonder'' and the first time I heard that I paused and I was like wow that is so beautiful. But it was really to basically ask after you know going to number two. He said I wonder where do my poos go. I was like oh okay.
Jenny Woo [00:10:52] We should look that up or something. But then we ran out of time and you know something else came up like what can we do in moments of wonderment like that.
Kate James [00:11:08] I think anybody with a five-year-old has probably been asked that question.
Kate James [00:11:11] Yeah these little moments of curiosity I wonder how you can kind of grasp them and not let them just drift by and be forgotten. I almost wonder if we could have a curiosity log or something. That's a good idea. That keeps track of all the things that they're curious about because I know it feels like rapid fire questions a lot of times especially my three children are eight, six, and three. They're asking me tons of questions all the time and they're at different levels so they're all different levels of questions. It can often feel like a firing squad. This is maybe where technology is so amazing like 20 years ago we would have had to stop and really do something like deep research about plumbing systems and answer that question. Now we can ask Siri about plumbing on the way to school which is amazing. Maybe using technology in that way is a really fruitful way to kind of get at kids core questions really quickly and then move on with your day. I don't know if we'll ever be able to keep up with our kids' questions and curiosities but I think that effort that we put in to answer their questions is noted by them.
Kate James [00:12:25] And I think it's valuable. It's one way that we show them that we love them and value them as individuals.
Jenny Woo [00:12:32] Yeah that's true. I can see that as they get older and just being in this habit of looking it up then they are in power themselves to look it up. Which is great.
Jenny Woo [00:12:43] So just some parting questions so how. Tell me some tips.
Jenny Woo [00:12:47] How do you motivate your kids at home to do the stuff that they don't want to do.
Kate James [00:12:54] Oh yeah so this is always a topic in development. I have not been above bribing my children to do their homework.
Kate James [00:13:05] I'm not infallible but what I've actually found to be the most effective way of getting my kids to be self-motivated to do things is actually counter-intuitive. It's actually to give them space.
Kate James [00:13:20] While my husband, for example, has a tendency to want to say put on your pajamas, put on your pajamas, put on your pajamas seventy-five thousand times until my child will put on his pajamas. I actually find that if I just say like we're going to go to bed at 9 o'clock and that's when the lights get dimmed and if you aren't wearing your pajamas I guess you're sleeping in your clothes. My children will get their pajamas on every time before that happens because I've respected them enough to give them credit for making a decision. Yeah. I've expected something of them and they want to do the right thing. I just need to give them a space to do it in and respect that they'll make that decision.
Jenny Woo [00:14:05] Yeah that makes sense. This leads me to flip that question a bit and ask for those kids who you know I hate to use your word. I sort of respect the opposite of maybe not them listening to have not had as much space at home right. How do you see their behavior is manifested when they come to your studio? What does that look like?
Kate James [00:14:30] Yeah we have had a few students that it's been really challenging doing some behavior management. I had one little boy who asked to go to the bathroom last year and he painted the entire bathroom purple at the school.
Jenny Woo [00:14:44] Oh wow.
Kate James [00:14:45] Which we didn't find until the school day was over. That was interesting.
Kate James [00:14:50] I would say that with those kids the times that we've managed to get them to refocus their attention and get real work done, really interesting creative work done, is when we again kind of really carefully like spend some one on one time with them listen to what they're interested in and then sort of steer them in a direction based on that.
Kate James [00:15:15] So this little boy who painted the bathroom purple was really into weaponizing everything. He wanted to build swords, he wanted to build guns, he wanted to build things to hurt other children with them. While that was not acceptable behavior where it did lead us was to a conversation where I said maybe what can we do that would be a really cool launching thing. Then we can build a target and maybe we can find a way to launch things at the target. Oh interesting. We're not hurting other kids but we are a building kind of sort of a weapon not not quite a weapon but an interesting device that can launch a ball across a room. He was so into that project. It was like a switch flipped for him and he was really motivated. The next week he came with all these sketches for different kinds of weapons and again steered a little bit to the right of that and ended up doing some really interesting devices that he was building that were mechanical and made things move and I think fulfill those desires that he was having without that kind of disruptive behavior or the harming of others.
Jenny Woo [00:16:26] Yeah. Yeah. It's such a good example especially for boys. You know there are times where my kids are doing this drawing and I'm like there's something wrong. Is there something wrong with me.
Jenny Woo [00:16:39] He’s not drawing flowers like my other kids or the rainbows.
Jenny Woo [00:16:43] That's such a great example to showcase how you can channel into the inner deep intrinsic motivations of the fascination with something into a learning experience. I love that. So any parting words for us.
Kate James [00:17:02] I would say that self motivation is definitely something that has to be cultivated and that it can be a really challenging thing for parents and for teachers to tap into and it can require a lot of like one on one attention and it can require the time to really listen. But even if that kind of listening and valuing of your child's individual personality can come in small doses it adds up. It's super important for developing their own intrinsic value of themselves too.
Jenny Woo [00:17:39] Great. Thank you so much for being here, Kate!