Marzano Ch 4-Reinforcing Effort & Providing Recognition
Written on August 5, 2008 – 5:53 pm | by Ed Warkentin
The series continues…
Research has shown that people generally attribute success at any given task to one of four causes:
1. Ability – seemingly helpful, but what if you don’t believe that you have the requisite skill? In this case, students might sabotage their own success!
2. Effort – what we’re hoping for students to believe
3. Other people – not helpful
4. Luck – not helpful
Generalities from the research on Reinforcing Effort:
1. Not all students realize the importance of believing in effort.
-This might seem obvious to us, but not so for students!
2. Students can learn to change their beliefs to an emphasis on effort.
-Therefore, it’s a challenge for us to teach them to make the connection! It’s heartening that it IS POSSIBLE for them to change this belief.
Classroom practice – Ideas for how teachers can help students learn to change their beliefs to emphasize effort.
Share examples of times that people succeeded by continuing to try even when things got difficult. These could be personal examples, or stories of well-known athletes, educators, and political or social leaders. Some ideas are: the movie Rudy, the book The Little Engine that Could, or this lesson plan idea about the Olympics that I hope to use at the beginning of this school year:
For a week (this year, it’ll be the first week or so of school), give no “normal” homework. Instead, assign students to watch the Olympics every night all week. Have them pay particular attention to the “up close and personal” stories about specific athletes. They should look for examples of ordinary people who achieved extraordinary things because they believed that sustained effort would lead to achievement of their goals. The first 5 minutes of each period that week, then, use to let people discuss, in small groups and as a class, the stories they hear and the different strategies that the athletes used to keep believing in themselves. By Monday, each student should come up with a way to remind themselves to keep trying when things get difficult in class.
There was an interesting rubric that you might want to use for helping students make the connection between their own effort and achievement. You may download it here.
They could have titled this section “praise” or “rewards,” but either of those would not have been technically accurate. In fact, in some studies about “praise,” it was found that there was a very minimal, or even negative effect on achievement. Therefore, it’s important to take note of exactly what is meant by “recognition.”
On page 56, there is a very helpful list of Guidelines for Effective Praise vs. Ineffective Praise. You may download the list here.
Generalities from the research for Providing Recognition:
1. Rewards do not necessarily have a negative effect on intrinsic motivation.
2. Reward is most effective when it is contingent on the attainment of some standard of performance.
3. Abstract symbolic recognition is more effective than tangible rewards.
