MOTIVATION AND SELF ESTEEM
RAQUEL S. DAVID
Confidence is necessary for being and staying motivated so that we persevere with and achieve tasks. In turn, having a belief in ourselves and having confidence that we can fulfill our deepest personal needs, aspirations and goals feeds into our self- esteem.
The most common- and in fact , nearly universal – teacher – reported effect on students was an increase in motivation. Teachers and students are sometimes surprised at the the level of technology-based accomplishment displayed by students who have shown much less initiative or facility with more conventional academic tasks. Teachers talked about motivation from a number of different perspective.
Some mentioned motivation with respect to working in a specific subject area, for example, a greater willingness to write or to work on computational skills. Others spoke in terms of more general motivational effects- student satisfaction with immediate feedback provided by the computer and the sense of accomplishment and power gained in working with technology. In many of these classes, students choose to work on t heir technology – based projects during recess or lunch periods. Teachers also frequently cite technology’s motivational advantages in providing a venue in which wider range of students can excel. Compared to conventional classrooms with their stress on verbal knowledge and multiple- choice test performance technology provides a very different set of challenges and different ways in which students can demonstrates what they understand( e.g., by programming a simulation to demonstrate a concept rather than trying to explain it verbally).
A related technology effect stressed by many teachers was enhancement of students’self esteemed.Both the increased competence they feel after mastering technology- based tasks and their awareness of the value placed upon technology within culture, students clearly take pride in being able to use the same computer- based tools employed by professionals.
As one teacher expessed it, “Students gain a sense of empowerment from learning to control the computer and use it in ways they associate with the real world.”
The author is Teacher II at Sindalan High School