Chapter 12
Which one of the following teachers is most likely to encourage motivation to learn?
Mr. Atara includes very easy and very difficult questions on every assignment.
Which teacher allows fun to get in the way of learning?
Mr. Cook includes details about the extreme eating habits and personal health issues of French monarchs as he lectures about French history.
Which of the following teachers is LEAST likely to motivate students to learn and achieve?
Ms. Armstrong tells her students they must first write each spelling word ten times and then write one complete sentence using each word.
Which one of the following teachers is using the most effective strategy to motivate students to learn and achieve?
Ms. M tells her students, "I know this is not easy stuff, but I have confidence in your ability to do it. The most important thing is to try hard and keep up your good attitude."
Which of the following statements, rated on a scale from strongly disagree to strongly agree, best measures the utility value of going to college?
My life goals could not be met without a college education.
Which one of the following is the best example of a performance goal?
"I'm taking chemistry at our local community college so I can be sure to get a good grade. That will look good on my transcript." A performance goal is focused on demonstration of ability to others and to oneself, and students with performance goals may be concerned about how they appear to others.
Mrs. Clark tells you that she thinks one of her students, Ronnie, needs to focus more on mastery goals and less on the grades he receives for his work. What does Mrs. Clark mean by a mastery goal?
A goal to improve or learn, regardless of outcome. A mastery goal focuses on learning and becoming proficient, rather than rewards or grades.
Four students all failed to solve a math problem. Which one is most likely to benefit from encouragement that says, "Keep going. You can do this"?
A student with failure avoidance.
Which one of the following settings most likely represents intrinsic motivation?
Caitlin is reading a chapter book by her favorite author.
Which one of the following students best exhibits extrinsic motivation?
Charlie takes Latin and French at school because he thinks it will help him get into a selective college.
Ms. Brady teaches algebra in middle school. She wants her students to set mastery goals in math. Which of the following should she do?
Create challenging tasks that focus on learning a specific skill in a relatively short period of time.
Why should educators concern themselves with Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs?
Deficiencies in students' lives can impact their ability to succeed academically.
Which one of the following students is attributing success or failure on a geology test to an internal source and thinks the cause is unstable and controllable?
Duncan said he did well on the test because he studied hard.
Ms. Bronson notices that several of her students seem to have test and performance anxiety; that is, whenever they are evaluated, these students get upset or perform poorly because of nerves. Three of the following strategies should help keep her students' anxiety at a facilitative level in the classroom. Which one is LEAST likely to do so?
Evaluate students' performance in vague, general terms.
Wanda has very little confidence in her ability to do well in her English literature class. Given what researchers have learned about the effects of self-efficacy, we can reasonably predict that Wanda is least likely to do which of the following?
Exert a lot of effort in the class.
Which of the following is true regarding extrinsic motivation?
Extrinsic motivation may be necessary to initially encourage students to engage in certain activities.
Of the following, the best example of a student who has a mastery goal orientation with an avoidance focus is:
Hannah reviews her notes every week so that she doesn't forget what she's already learned. Hannah wants to avoid losing her knowledge (mastery) of the material.
Which of the following statements, rated on a scale from strongly disagree to strongly agree, best measures the intrinsic value of playing video games?
I think it's a lot of fun to play video games.
Ms. Monahan teaches high school Spanish. For the students' final project, they create a diorama of an aspect of Spanish culture in a Spanish-speaking country or write and tell a story in Spanish. Which type of goal structure is Ms. Monahan using?
Individualistic
Samy wants to go to medical school one day, so she is very concerned about her grades. During lab activities and seatwork in science class, she asks her teacher to review every response before she hands in any work, even when it is not graded. However, because she cannot get similar feedback on exams, she experiences a lot of test anxiety and often performs poorly. Which one of the following areas of motivation does Samy seem to have the most trouble managing?
Intensity
Miss Johnson would like her students to be motivated to do their work without bribing them with treats or promises of extra recess time. Which one of the following is the type of motivation she should encourage in her students?
Intrinsic
Which one of the following statements most accurately describes the relationship between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation?
Learners can be high in both, low in both, or high in one and low in the other.
Which one of the following teaching practices is most consistent with Maslow's hierarchy of needs?
Let students release pent-up energy before asking them to watch an educational video.
Marcus attributes his failure in physics to internal, stable, and controllable factors. Which of the following statements is most likely true about Marcus?
Marcus thinks that he is lazy when it comes to working hard in school because he would rather spend his time with his friends.
Which of the following situations reflects low motivation because the cost of the task is too high?
Monica has always done well in her math and science classes, and she really enjoys doing experiments. Because she'd like to be a doctor, she is taking advanced placement classes in biology, chemistry, physics, and calculus all at the same time, but she's struggling to find the time to complete all the homework.
Given what motivation theorists tell us about expectancies and values, which one of the following activities are you least likely to value?
One at which you will have to work exceptionally hard to succeed.
The TARGET model identifies six areas in which teachers make decisions that can influence student motivation to learn. In the TARGET model, the E stands for evaluation procedures. Which one of the following evaluation strategies encourages students to focus primarily on performance goals?
Placing high emphasis on grades
Which one of these students clearly has a mastery goal?
Ronaldo would rather play soccer than do anything else, so he practices constantly.
Ms. Simons believes that Jeremy has the ability to do much better on math tests than he has done recently. She feels that he doesn't try hard enough. Based on your knowledge of teacher attributions, how is Ms. Simons most likely to act toward Jeremy?
She'll be annoyed when he doesn't do well.
Mitzi has just started her first year of a demanding college-prep high school program. She has always done well at school without too much effort. This year, however, she is struggling to get her homework done and is finding it hard to maintain even a B average. When asked how school is going, she complains, "It's fine, but everyone else has rich parents who pay for fancy tutors. I just can't keep up with that." Which statement is true about Mitzi?
She's trying to protect her sense of self-worth.
Three of the following tasks are authentic tasks. Which one is NOT an authentic task?
Students use a number line to learn to add numbers in the first grade.
Which one of the following is the best example of a student attributing success to internal factors?
Sue Ellen has just received a good grade on her geography test. She is proud that she did so well and glad that she studied hard.
Which of the following goals is most likely to encourage the students' motivation and persistence at the task?
The students in Ms. Hahn's statistics class are developing a survey to collect data, which they will then analyze using the procedures they've learned in class. Ms. Hahn plans to review the survey and offer suggestions before the students collect the data.
Other things being equal, which one of the following activities is 12-year-old Micah least likely to attach high value to?
The tennis team, for which he knows he'll have to practice several hours each day in order to compete successfully
Which one of the following students shows individual interest rather than situational interest?
Victoria loves ballet and wants to become a ballerina when she grows up.
Mr. Thomas volunteers to mentor at-risk children at his local high school every Friday afternoon. When asked by a local reporter why he is giving up an afternoon of pay each week to work with teenagers, he responds, "I want to make a difference in someone's life. Maybe if they can see that I am successful, and I can show them a way out (of the ghetto), then I will have paid it forward." Which one of the following concepts best characterizes Mr. Thomas's motivation in this situation?
Working towards a social goal.
Maricela is a high-school junior and is beginning to consider her future. She thinks she wants to go to a small col
a need for autonomy.
Within the study of motivation, a mindset is:
an implicit theory to explain success or failure.
Mr. Petras is making a special effort to help Morgan. When he plans lessons he checks the instructions to make sure they are clear and specific. Mr. Petras also avoids time pressure, gives students a chance to correct errors on their work and fosters an accepting, noncompetitive classroom climate. His emphasis on these strategies for helping Morgan suggests that Morgan has been having difficulty with:
anxiety.
Ms. K is starting a new unit in trigonometry class, and she is concerned that the students are not intrinsically motivated. Of the following, the most effective way for Ms. K to motivate her students to master the challenging, abstract material is to:
begin the unit with an activity that is fun for the students and has a reward at the end.
In general, as students move up in grade level, we see a decline in:
both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.
Daniel is enrolled in Honors American History, which is his only honors class. Honors classes carry bonus points toward overall GPA (e.g., an A is worth 4.5 instead of 4.0), but Honors classes have a higher workload than the comparable (non-Honors) classes in the same topic. Daniel complains, "This class makes me miss out on other things I care about." His statement most clearly indicates that he:
thinks the cost of the class is too high.
Of the following, the most effective strategy to pique students' curiosity about a topic is to:
demonstrate something unexpected or unusual and ask students for an explanation.
Mr. Rawlins is faculty advisor for the high school service club. He attends every meeting, and he regularly provides the support students need to carry out their activities. During group discussions, however, he typically sits in the back of the room and offers advice only if club members ask for it or if he thinks the club's planned activities are in some way inappropriate. In taking this approach, Mr. Rawlins is most likely to:
enhance club members' sense of self-determination.
Students who engage in self-handicapping strategies when presented with challenging tasks typically have a:
high fear of failure.
Mr W teaches middle school science and often begins lessons with demonstrations about phenomena that students find unexpected and surprising. His approach is most likely to:
increase student curiosity about the underlying scientific principles.
On Sunday afternoon, Rick spent a couple of hours picking up discarded bottles and cans from a picturesque section of the wildlife refuge, even though he knew he would not get paid anything for his efforts. Rick's motivation is best described as being:
intrinsic
Amy wants to go to a party with her friends on Friday night, but she put off working on her term paper for so long that she is feeling guilty. The paper's due on Monday. If she stays home all weekend and writes the paper, we can best describe her motivation as:
introjected regulation.
Of the following, the most effective way to encourage students to remain engaged and to take pride in their work is to:
lead students to balance mastery and performance goals.
One of the most effective ways to encourage students to set a combination of mastery and performance-approach goals for their schoolwork is to:
let them know they will receive feedback comparing their current work to their earlier work.
Rita plans to visit Ecuador some day because that is where her cousins live. When she gets to junior high school, she finally has a chance to take Spanish, a language she will need when she travels to South America. But, she decides to enroll in French instead so that she can be with her best friend. Based on this information, we can guess that Rita has a high need for:
love and belongingness.
A supportive classroom climate helps to build intrinsic motivation to learn because:
students feel safe taking risks and sometimes being wrong.
Eileen is reluctant to go out for the school soccer team. We want to enhance her self-confidence about becoming a successful soccer player. If we consider attribution theory, the best thing we can say to Eileen is:
"You have some natural athletic ability, and practice will make you even better."
Which one of the following examples illustrates situational interest?
Milo's best friend, Jay, just told him that he read a great book about spies, so when Milo sees that book in the library later, he checks it out.
