Motivation

From what I have seen in the classroom the teacher I work with does a lot of extrinsic motivation. She offers candy to them if they get right answers or to get them to answer her questions or go to the board at school. I have also seen her use of the Self-Determination Theory. Every time she creates scenarios that involve the students so that they have fun. She also greets them at the door and talks to them before and after class about their lives. That creates the sense of belonging. She challenges students by asking hard homework or assigning questions for them to look over at home to see if they can solve them before they are taught how to do that. This uses competence. She also has allowed them to choose when the homework should be due for that lesson. (Autonomy)

I also noticed that she makes sure the first four bases Maslow's needs hierarchy are met. The deficiency needs. One student has been working late nights at his job to help his family out. He then fell asleep in class. Instead of getting mad and waking him up she had him take pictures of a peer's notes and told him that if he needed help to come after class and talk with her. In her stats class I noticed that some students had some intrinsic motivation. They were given two companies, one had an average income and the other a median income. She then let students create two companies that fulfilled the average and median income and create 20 employees for each with names and titles. Some students really got into it and completed it because they enjoyed it. It was not graded and did not need to be turned in. This helped the cognitive and emotional arousal and got students engaged so that they were aroused at the optimal point. They were able to remember and retain the information taught better.