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choice motivation and performance running head choice motivation and performance page |1 the effects of choice on student motivation and performance action research andreas christodoulou jill duncan gail nelmes buffalo state state university of new york dr susan baum may 2012

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choice motivation and performance page |2 abstract three classes of students from qatar academy 21 grade one students early years 22 grade five students primary years and 22 grade nine and ten information technology students upper middle years participated in an action research study investigating the question what is the effect of choice on students motivation and performance a three group post-control and post-treatment test design was used where the sample groups yielded both post control and post treatment data for motivation and performance motivation was measured using a likert scale survey performance was measured using a common rubric post-control all classes were assessed on a task where they had no choice of content or in how they presented their knowledge the treatment was the introduction of content and presentation choice along with opportunities to develop understanding of personal learning styles students then chose the way they wanted to present their knowledge for another project and were again assessed at its completion post treatment paired t data analysis indicated that despite no statistical significance of the primary years students motivation there was extremely statistically significance across the group sample in motivation and performance.

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choice motivation and performance page |3 introduction we are three experienced teachers who teach at an international baccalaureate ib school in doha qatar with a high population of national students our school has actively embraced and encouraged the 21st century approach to teaching and learning with emphasis towards differentiation literacy and technology integration which strives to promote motivation and success in our students the students in this study range from early primary and upper middle years and we have noticed that some of them have a low level of motivation in the classroom situation we suspect that this may be linked to poor performance and we wonder if the level of motivation and consequent performance of our students could be improved were they to be given more individual choice with their projects we feel that this is an area that needs addressing because as ib students our children are expected to be self motivated learners our school mission states that our students are expected to be independent critical thinkers lifelong learners responsible citizens who gain entrance to elite universities and colleges bearing this in mind we were interested in nurturing our students in an environment that would encourage them to enjoy doing the kind of work for which they were best suited napoleon hill 1883 our hope was to foster a richer learning environment that supported independent student project choice we hoped that reflecting student preferences would result in heightened motivation which would in turn enhance performance.

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choice motivation and performance page |4 while reviewing literature we found that there were conflicting arguments related to providing students with choices in certain cases motivation and performance improved but deteriorated under other circumstances this led us to question what impact providing choice would have on our students in this research choice would encompass project content and presentation options review of literature researcher on success napoleon hill 1883 stated that everyone enjoys doing the kind of work for which he is best suited this sentiment is echoed 119 years later by powell and powell 2011 who suggest that allowing students choice that relates to their personal learning styles allows for products that are rich in conceptual understanding they state we know the anxiety and stress of being compelled to work in one s least preferred production-style can actually serve as an obstacle to cognition the medium does affect the message this line of thought is also explored by baum and nichols 2009 when they suggest that providing choice is possibly a more powerful cognitive experience when students have an understanding of their personal learning styles and are sometimes allowed the option of aligning tasks to their learningstyle strengths whether choice is matched to learning styles or in some other area there is much research that suggests that providing students with choice is a key to improving not only motivation but also performance when reviewing research in this field helen moran n.d states that the results

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choice motivation and performance clearly show that more choice equates to greater enjoyment and presumably more page |5 engagement and that a number of previous researchers found that student enjoyment is closely linked to engagement which in turn is linked to levels of performance kohn 1993 also links choice and motivation when he asserts that students who are deprived of choice are also likely deprived of motivation after citing a number of research projects which link student success and high level of motivation he states there is no question about it even if our only criterion is academic performance choice works looking beyond academic performance and towards motivation stone and madigan 2008 cite becker who suggested that a greater amount of choices available for the student promotes a greater sense of ownership and consequently higher levels of motivation and commitment however despite the assertions above there is also a body of research that proposes that offering choice may not always enhance performance and motivation patall et al 2010 suggest that choice may not always be effective or that there are more effective strategies to support motivation furthermore kohn 1993 supported by starnes and paris 2000 cautions that although choice is generally a desirable option it also needs to be guided when he states nearly every essay on education by john dewey the father of progressive schooling stresses the importance of adult guidance and derides the idea of `leaving a child to his own unguided fancies in fact barry schwartz 2009 referring to iyenger and lepper 2000 and iyenger et al 2004 points out that too many options seemed to produce paralysis rather than liberation

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choice motivation and performance page |6 he expands upon this idea by stating if one overcomes paralysis and choose evidence suggests that the quality of performance deteriorates with increases in the number of options and summarises the findings it now seems clear that whereas choice is good more choice is not necessarily better when helen moran asked students to reflect on their experience of choice in the classroom most students indicated that they enjoyed the opportunities but a small group said they preferred to be told what to do and when as they had found it hard to manage themselves she highlighted the fact that some students might prefer more extrinsic motivation in the form of teacher direction in contrast powell and powell 2011 state that whenever you can link the classroom curriculum to student interest you tap into internalized achievement motivation where goals are personal motivation comes from within and achievement is deeply meaningful our goal was to enhance student motivation and performance bearing in mind that the evidence on choice effects has not been ubiquitously positive patall et al 2010 we were keen to explore the effects of choice in our own classroom environments by conducting our own research by asking what is the effect of choice on students motivation and performance

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choice motivation and performance method research design page |7 in order to answer our research question we designed and implemented an action research treatment with a three group post-control and post-treatment test design for motivation and performance a likert scale survey was used at the end of the control group phase and at the end of the treatment group phase to assess changes in motivation see example in appendix 1 a common rubric to assess performance was used to grade a project after the control phase where students had very limited choice regarding project content and presentation options the common rubric assessed student performance according to elements of the ib learner profile the same rubric format was used to assess the students projects post-treatment see example in appendix 3.1 a learning my way assessment see appendix 2 was administered prior to students making project choices and they revisited these after they made their choices this assessment was not used to gather data but rather as a tool to act as a catalyst to get the students thinking about their personal learning styles and options of how to present the intention was that students would make considered choices with an understanding either to follow perceived strengths or explore methods they might not normally choose the 30 questions grouped answers into 6 areas of strength and interest performance multi-media oral artistic written and manipulative we hypothesized that post-treatment student motivation towards the process of

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choice motivation and performance page |8 investigation presenting knowledge and the quality of product performance would increase this hypothesis suggests a relationship between our two dependent variables performance and motivation and our independent variable project choices intervention across the sample students reviewed prior levels of motivation and performance when they had very limited choice of content and presentation options in the early years the students were introduced to 6 types of presentation choices voice thread poster power point information report with scribble press models and performance the students had some knowledge of some of the choices but had not independently used any of them before to present their own knowledge in the primary and upper middle years the students had already been exposed to a variety of project choices and a short time was spent reviewing these particular project choices in the upper middle years students conducted a discussion on an online forum see appendix 5 identifying the possible choices available for their projects evaluating the merits of one option against another the whole sample was then given the choice of content within the boundaries of their current curriculum focus as well as how they were going to present their knowledge and understanding they reflected on their personal learning styles and interests referring to their learning my way assessment and discussions were had about different types of presentation options and how they might match or differ from stated preferences in the learning my way assessment.

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choice motivation and performance page |9 presentation choices were discussed with relation to the skills they required and students were encouraged to think about the motivation behind their choice e.g choosing because they knew they could do something well trying something new etc at this point the early and primary years students had the option of changing their presentation choice some did and could give sound reasons for the change related to the concepts that had been discussed others confirmed their choice also giving pertinent reasons for why they felt their choice was right for them however a few students did not exercise this level of considered choice preferring instead to follow the choices of others this contrasts to the upper middle years where it is a necessary requirement that students following the design cycle process are expected to reconsider their choices after evaluating limitations in time resources and skill level sample and setting the 65 subjects for this study were taken from three classes across the school grade one early years grade five primary years and grade nine and ten upper middle years the type of sample is convenience as this sample is a representation of the students that we teach each day or in the case of the upper middle years two periods a week they range in age from 6-8 years in the early years 10-11 in the primary and 14-16 years in the upper middle years there are ten boys and twelve girls in the early years group while the primary years group has twelve boys and ten girls there was an even distribution of boys and girls in the upper middle years the ethnic breakdown of the sample consisted of qatari students in the primary years group while in the other two classes there is also a small portion of students from a variety of nationalities from around the world the action research study was conducted at qatar academy

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choice motivation and performance which is located in doha qatar page 10 instrumentation and data collection data were collected using three group post-control and post-treatment tests to measure change in motivation and performance at the end of the control phase all three groups completed a likert scale survey see appendix 1 to measure their motivation with regard to a recently completed project where the students had very limited choice over content and how they would present their knowledge the same format was used at the end of the treatment phase to measure their motivation where they had choice over content and presentation options this 12 item three point survey included statements such as i am motivated to do my work i keep working when i really enjoy what i am doing and i persist even when a project is challenging for me students were asked to rate their level of agreement to these statements by choosing a happy neutral or sad face to correspond with each statement the total score was calculated with a weighting of x3 happy x2 neutral x1 sad student performance was graded using a common rubric see appendix 3.1 at the end of the control phase this rubric was used to grade a project that was recently completed where the students had very limited choice over content and presentation options the same format was used post-treatment to grade the project where the students were given choice areas of assessment were assigned grades of 1 not at all 2 somewhat 3 proficient they were broken into two parts process and product and each entry was listed under an ib learner profile heading areas being assessed in the process category had six statements such as level of

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choice motivation and performance page 11 independence shown with project effectively communicates information knowledge of subject and takes responsibility for own learning the product category contained three statements such as content presented in a way that shows an understanding of how the presentation choice works and quality of product the totals of the responses were weighted x1 not at all x2 somewhat x3 proficient the post-control and post-treatment scores for motivation and performance were calculated using paired t-test via graphpad.com anecdotal observational records were also kept in order to provide triangulation for our quantitative measures of motivation and performance heightened motivation was observed in a number of ways firstly there was evidence of `hard fun where students worked during break times and demonstrated that they had dedicated extra time to their projects in their own time students also enlisted family members and friends in their learning experiences by teaching them the skills they had learned and by including them as participants or clients in their projects secondly feedback from colleagues interacting with students commented on their apparent raised levels of motivation students also more keenly observed what their peers were attempting and were emulating the creation of their products because they were interested in them students were actively engaged in showing off and discussing their projects within their private social network a domain distinctly separate from the school learning management systems a number of students independently stated that they felt empowered and enjoyed the opportunity to make their own choices equally a number of students expressed how they felt

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choice motivation and performance page 12 successful and were very keen to present their final product there were some requests from students to repeat this form of project in the same way as they had enjoyed the experience so much and would like the opportunity to make different choices next time in most instances we all felt that the students performance by default also increased specifically to the upper middle years many of the students were independently driven to submit work ahead of deadlines request feedback and post improvements threats to validity motivation one of the greatest threats to validity across the sample was the conducting of the likert scale survey in the primary and the upper middle years the students were curious as to the reason why the survey was being conducted and they may have been influenced by the researcher stressing the importance of the survey instrumentation they could possibly have suspected that they were part of a research project hawthorn effect and researcher bias while in the early years the students being young and enthusiastic are eager to please their teacher and are already generally motivated subject characteristics age when the post-treatment likert scale survey was conducted the students in the primary and the upper middle years could have been influenced by what they had already answered in the post-control likert scale survey testing for example when the students first encountered the

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choice motivation and performance page 13 likert scale survey not a lot of emphasis was placed on the importance care required to complete it after seeing the results of this first survey it was felt that more context was required for a truer reflection thus more emphasis was placed on the care and thought that should be given to answering the post-treatment likert scale survey the question to consider would be was it over emphasised specifically in the primary years an additional teacher was present when they were completing the post-treatment survey this teacher encouraged the students to think carefully about their honesty when completing the survey and should make sure not just to circle `happy faces this led to some students noticeably rating themselves more harshly than in the first survey implementation performance a threat to validity where performance was concerned in the primary and the upper middle years was the `snowball effect in the excitement of having choices the students shared ideas and in this way they influenced each other s choices in the early years it was noted that while the groups were completing their projects two of the groups had different teachers and were confronted with not only a new environment but also with new and novel presentation options intervention location and technology facilitator resources it was additionally observed that in the primary and the upper middle years the performance of most competent students increased proportionally more than the less competent students which contributed to a wider range of performance scores.

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choice motivation and performance minimising of threats page 14 the learning my way assessment was originally considered a threat to validity because the students would be able to spot the cyclically structured questions and manipulate their answers to minimise this threat students were strongly encouraged to respond to the questions sequentially it was felt that students excited by the new and exciting learning experiences would make impulsive choices providing the students in the early years with three different opportunities to review their choices allowed them to make considered decisions.

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choice motivation and performance page 15 results what is the effect of choice on students performance and motivation independent variable student choices post control phase grade 1 5 9+10 mean 1 early years 32.71 post treatment phase grade 1 5 9+10 mean 2 34.38 21 students motivation sd 1 3.21 sd 2 2.09 change in mean 1.67 change in sd 1.12 t 2.6947 df 20 p 0.0139 statistically significant mean 1 19.95 mean 2 24.76 dependent variables performance sd 1 5.56 sd 2 3.39 change in mean 4.81 change in sd 2.17 t 4.2604 df 20 p 0.0004 extremely statistically significant mean 1 30.27 mean 2 30.68 primary years 22 students motivation sd 1 3.1 sd 2 2.83 change in mean 0.41 change in sd 0.27 t 0.7245 df 21 p 0.4768 not statistically significant mean 1 18.09 mean 2 20.45 performance sd 1 3.58 sd 2 3.74 change in mean 2.36 change in sd 0.16 t 4.1890 df 21 p 0.0004 extremely statistically significant

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