Day 30 - Motivated by bigger purpose

I read an article heading about how a bigger purpose can motivate students to learn. Well, I was about to mentally shrug it off as something I already know.............Yes, we do look at the purpose of learning. Yes, we do understand that children need big ideas to get motivated for meaningful and purposeful inquiries.

However, I didn't shrug it off because it was tweeted by Kath Murdoch - the guru of inquiry learning. So off I went to read the blog which I found interesting. How a Bigger Purpose can motivate students Blog

I found the research interesting and it made me think of one of the debates/discussions my husband and I often have on homework and what constitutes meaningful homework for children.

I will not post my learning for the day but my questions for the day.

• How  much homework is enough?
• What should it look like?
• Who is responsible to give, to complete, to monitor homework? Why?
• What makes skill and drill homework bad if there is a place for skills in the curriculum?
• What makes the 'thinking' homework good if the thinking does not get scaffolded, challenged or even monitored?
• The research says homework does not help. What context was the research done in?What is the current status of that society- economically and socially? Can the context be transferred? Should the context be transferred? 
• How should the definition of homework change with the needs of the cohort of the children and the strata they come from?  (My Aunt taught in a rural area school and the 'homework' the children had to do was to cure leather to make shoes as that was their sole source of income. Should that not have been a valued component of practical skills development?)
• What is the measurement of success? 

The article about bigger purpose motivating children to learn resonates with me and yet it poses many questions. I am particularly provoked by this paragraph..quote

"Yet, he added, it isn’t practical or possible to render every lesson or assignment in K-12 “super fun and game-y” for kids — and even if it were, doing so could be a disservice to them later. What would they do when they get to law school and are faced with having to memorize long lists of laws? Or when they land a job that calls for mastering information that no one has “gamefied” to make it exciting to learn." Unquote.

I guess at a Primary school level we are still looking for the right balance for the right context and the right needs..... and when we find our feet the context changes again in the rapidly changing world. Having said that if a purposeful mindset motivates children, service learning should be an essential part of the curriculum. 

The learning continues as Kath Murdoch continues to provoke directly and indirectly!