Failure to Motivate

If an online course fails to keep the attention of the students, review of the target audience, instructional practices, and curriculum need to be analyzed to determine the cause.
For this discussion I will assume we are discussing a class of non-traditional students in an online program such as ours. As Dr. Jeanne Ormrod discussed in this week’s presentation, adult learners will have much different factors contributing to their motivation. This makes the reasons for class apathy different than those seen in more traditional settings. Non-traditional students have formal education and real life experiences that shape perception of the online class and its instructional content. A 19 year old freshman with no work experience is less likely to disagree with instruction than a 40 year old person seeking a graduate degree in a field he has worked in for 25 years.
According to Dr. Ormrod and our text, in order to maintain high levels of motivation, students need arousal, competence, self-determination, and relatedness. These psychological needs are recognized in the ARCS Model of Motivational Design. Without knowing the true reason for declining interest in a course, the four components of ARCS can be analyzed to determine possible areas for improvement.
First, if the problem is related to attention or arousal, the curriculum may need to be redesigned to include more inquisitive activities. Non-traditional students need to be challenged with meaningful and thought provoking ideas. The activities should be varied and dynamic to prevent a monotonous pattern of instructor driven assignments. Students should drive the debate and lessons could be altered with their ideas in mind.
Relevance is a more important issue with non-traditional. Older students who have worked in a field and decide to pursue a related degree will have real life experience standing in the way of instruction that sometimes exists only in a perfect world situation. How do you motivate a student who believes the ideas will never work in the real world? The activities need to be authentic in delivery and execution. A student majoring in Graphic Design should feel everything they do in the production of their assignments is true to that career. Assignments should present clear objectives and goals are clearly defined by the instructor or students.
Student confidence can also affect motivation. Students need to be aware of course goals and objectives. Activities should be described in detail and expectations should be clear. Grading policy and deadlines cannot be ambiguous opening the door for feelings of unfair treatment and confusion. Success should be achievable at various levels. Small accomplishments will lead to large ones. Consistent feedback and constructive criticism are needed to push students in the right directions for success. In a middle school setting, new teachers who do not consistently apply classroom policies and procedures will often discover their mistake and take the Thanksgiving vacation to develop a strong set of policies and start the year over that Monday. This shouldn’t be an issue in graduate level courses.
Satisfaction can lead to a positive experience in class that provides great motivation for students. Assignments should be authentic and students should feel that they not only successful in their course work but are developing the skills to be successful in the real world. They should have opportunities to use newly acquired knowledge in real life situations. Feedback should be authentic and reinforce desired behaviors. Equity in standards expectations is very important to motivation in students.
Determining the issues with students in an online course and applying the correct adjustment with basic psychological needs and ARCS model in mind will increase the level of participation in class.