The Impact of Motivation on Students Academic Achievement - Research Paper Example

The Impact of Motivation on Academic Achievement Contents 2 Introduction 3 Problem ment 3 Literature review 4 Motivation theory 4 Importance of motivation theory for instructional designers 6 Impact of motivation on the student achievement 7 How instructional designers can use motivation theory 9 Conclusion 9 References 12 Abstract This study aims at finding out the impact of motivation on the students’ academic achievement covering the motivation theory, the importance of motivation theory for instructional designers as well as the application of this theory. In order to accomplish the above objective, extensive research and data collection was done by exploring different scholarly articles including peer-reviewed articles. The review is structured this way; it starts with motivation theory and what it entails, importance of motivation theory for instructional designers, the impact of motivation on students’ academic performance, and lastly how instructional designers can use motivation theory. These review assisted in gathering adequate information concerning the topic and effectively exploring the theory of motivation and its impacts on the learning process and academic achievement. Introduction The term motivation focuses on energizing, directing and sustaining individuals’ behavior towards the achievement if a particular goal. Motivation is a very important aspect in learning settings as it positively impacts on the students’ academic performance. The two types of motivation, intrinsic and extrinsic, affect students’ behavior and academic performance in one way or another. intrinsic motivation are the forces inherent to the students and related to the task they are performing while extrinsic motivation are the external reinforcers unrelated to the tasks being performed. Findings indicated that motivation play a leading role in improving the academic performance and achievement of students. More so, scholars report that there is a strong correlation between students’ motivation to learn and their academic achievement (Hancock, 2004). Problem statement Agreeably, every student is interested in achieving their goals and succeeding academically and this is determined by many factors including teachers support and motivation. Although many students are interested in learning and acquiring adequate knowledge, they need to be encouraged and motivated to remain focused on achieving these. Motivation is the key for achieving a specific goal or target (Tengku and Sepideh, 2012). Lack of motivation may result in lack of interest in academic achievement and this will in turn lead to increased school dropout. More so, students perform poorly due to lack of encouragement and motivation and this will result in loss of interest in learning and achieving their goals. This is because some students especially those who will not choose academics as their first priority, need to be motivate to effectively perform tasks assigned to them and engage in class activities. Literature review Motivation theory From an educational point of view, the concept motivation comprises of various meaningful connotations concerning learning and educational development, and academic achievement refers to the accomplishment of an important development task. Motivating students is an important aspect of effective learning and some people are convinced that motivation is a necessary factor for learning. More so, satisfactory school learning cannot occur when there is lack of motivation to learn. Undeniably, motivating students to learn is very crucial practice in the field of education and its impact on student’ academic performance significantly contributes to effective learning process. Motivation plays a significant role in improving the academic performance of students, which in turn enable them to attain their academic achievement. Motivation can be manifested in students’ choices of learning activities, their persistence and dedication in the learning process as well as how the students cope with different obstacles in the course of their learning process. The various views of motivation for learning include interest theory, which states that students are motivated to learn if they interested in the material. Secondly, self-efficacy theory posits that students are motivated to learn based on their competency, and capability to handle a particular task. The attribution theory argues that students do learn better if they attribute academic achievement and failures to effort in the process of learning. Lastly, goals oriented theory states that students are motivated to learn when they want to understand something (Mayer, 2008). Arguably, the most common types of motivation that are appropriate in the learning process and academic achievement are intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation occurs when students perform tasks and engage in activities that they enjoy doing while extrinsic motivation is the kind of motivation results from the reinforcers or external factors. Forces within themselves motivate learners exhibiting intrinsic motivation and inherent to the task they are performing i.e. they engage in a particular activity because it gives them pleasure and assist them to gain an important skill. These students learn and engage in certain activities without any external reward (Tennyson and Dijkstra, 1997); thus, they are more focused on a particular activity. They engage in learning process and various activities amongst which they feel are enjoyable (Tengku and Sepideh, 2012). On the contrary, students exhibiting extrinsic motivation are motivated by factors external to themselves, and unrelated to the task that they are undertaking (Cheng and Yeh, 2009). In most cases, such students are interested in getting good grades since they are motivated to learn as a means to an end. In most cases, a lot of emphasis is placed on intrinsic motivation in explaining the academic achievement of students because learners who are intrinsically motivated do engage in class activities and perform assigned tasks willingly and they are eager to learn and process the information effectively. However, both intrinsic simultaneously motivate students and extrinsic factors so as succeed in their academic work, for instance, they can enjoy learning and at the same time focus on getting good grades. Studies show a positive relationship between intrinsic motivation and increased urge to learn and improved academic performance (Dahl and Smimou, 2011). Motivation also arises from environmental conditions at school, that is, the environment can enhance students’ motivation to learn certain things or behave in a particular manner, and this is called situated motivation. The ARCS model is used to improve the motivational appeal of instructional materials, instructor’s behavior and the way in which modules or courses are designed. It incorporates a motivational design model, which can be successfully integrated with other instructional design models (Cheng and Yeh, 2009). The four conditions identified by this model, attention, relevance, confidence and satisfaction, should be met for an individual to become and remain motivated according to Keller (Driscoll, 2005). To begin with, attention is the main prerequisite for learning and the major concern of motivation is to gain and sustain attention. Stimulating and sustaining the students’ attention requires the instructor to introduce unexpected issues that will arouse the students’ interest. Secondly, relevance is a condition that follows attention and it occurs after the students’ attention has been obtained. In most cases, students are motivated when the content of the instruction responds to their needs. Relevance can originate from the manner in which the students are taught and the strategies used in classroom. In addition, confidence helps in influencing the students’ persistence and achievements. Lastly, this model focus on promoting satisfaction, for instance, if students’ efforts are in line with their expectations, they will feel motivated to learn. Importance of motivation theory for instructional designers An instructional designer deals with the creation and delivery of educational training materials such as manuals, handouts, and e-learning courses among others to various educational institutions. Instructional designers are mainly concerned with motivating learners because in most cases, students are not motivated to learn, as they are busy. In particular, they focus on ways to understand, improve, and apply different instruction methods (Reigeluth, 2013). Motivation is very important for instructional designers because these designers mainly aim at increasing student motivation. Students’ motivation and engagement in class activities depends on the instructional strategies. When students are intrinsically motivated to learn, they learn more and have a more positive experience. For instructional designers, good quality instructions are motivating and so there are focused on creating good quality instructions to motivate students. Mostly, motivation is considered as something that occurs prior to instruction like attracting attention and orienting learners rather than focusing on it as key element in the instructional design. The traditional instructional design is concerned with issues such as learning different from those of motivation, which is mainly concerned with emotional issues. Instructional design involves the breakdown of what students in the institutions of learning learn and how best to deliver these materials to enhance effectiveness and efficiency. More specifically, instructional design comprise of developing instructional materials and tasks, implementing the delivery system as well as evaluating the instruction and students activities. Impact of motivation on the student achievement Motivation assists in directing and regulating students’ behavior in such a way that their behavior is purposeful and persistent. That is, when a motivated student is assigned a particular task in school, they put more effort to ensure that these tasks are done correctly and in a more effective manner. In cases where they fail to achieve this, they continue putting more effort and energy towards the achievement of their set goals. The kind of achievement goals established by students influence their task persistence and problem solving efforts (Driscoll, 2005). In addition, the impact of motivation on students can be seen the classroom settings, for instance, it gives the students the energy to be active in the learning process and arouse them for actions. Motivation also sustains their interests and behavior for a longer period of activity. In addition, it helps in increasing their efficiency and ability to face their class work with interest and as a result, they will increase their academic performance and achievement. Moreover, motivation assists students to direct their behaviors towards the achievement of a specific goal, which they have set for themselves. For instance, when determined to attain high scores and good grades, students can decide to behave appropriately like studying wisely to achieve their set goals. Motivation assists in energizing, directing and sustaining individuals’ behaviors and so it helps learners to keep moving in a certain direction, which in this case is academic achievement. Individuals can be motivated depending on the motive behind their activities. More so, motivation is enhanced when students are convinced that they are making significant progress in the learning process (Mayer, 2008). Notably, students’ motivation can be revealed in their cognitive, emotive and behavioral commitment in their school undertakings. Students are motivated differently as one student may be more interested in class work, be active in class discussions and perform better in assigned projects, and another may be more interested in the school social activities such as interacting with other students and attending extracurricular activities among others. In addition, another student may be interested in athletics, playing sports or being active in physical education classes. More so, other students especially those with unrecognized learning disability may feel motivated to avoid academic work, social situations or athletic activities among others. Instructors ensure that they do what they can so as to motivate learners and help them behave in a manner that will enable them improve their performance and succeed academically. Furthermore, gender also affects students’ academic success as studies reveal that females tend to be more external whereas men tend to be internal in their attributions of academic success (Siann, Lightbody, Stocks, and Walsh, 1996). Motivation affects students’ learning and behavior in various ways; firstly, it leads to increased effort and energy. Motivation determines how much effort students need to spend while performing tasks especially those affecting their interests and needs. Secondly, motivation directs students’ behavior towards specific goals, that is, it determines the specific goals towards which students strive and so it influences the choices made by students. More so, motivation affects cognitive processes as it influences what students pay attention to and effectively process the information they have learnt. Most importantly, motivation enhances performance, as students who are motivated to learn tend to perform better academically. On the contrary, students who not motivated to learn are more likely to drop out of school especially if they have little interest in academic achievement. The impact of motivation on students’ academic performance should not be undermined. Therefore, there is need to motivate students in order to arouse them their interest in learning and acquiring knowledge and improving their performance accordingly. How instructional designers can use motivation theory Motivation is very important element needed in the learning process and instructors have variety of instructional materials to present appropriate information to students (Rodgers and Withrow-Thorton, 2005). Intrinsic motivation has been associated with the instructional conditions like feedback and reward structures, and teacher surveillance among others (Tennyson and Dijkstra, 1997). Motivational design can be applied to the instructional design model, for instance, instructional designers can adapt motivational design procedure to any instructional design model. The ARCS model is composed of various factors influencing the motivation to learn including attention, confidence, relevance and satisfaction. This model helps individuals to solve problems and so it assists instructional designers to point out and solve certain motivational problems associated with instruction. This model provides a methodical structure for creating motivational approaches for students, and can be incorporated with lesson schemes and instructional objectives that help in effecting motivational strategies. Therefore, effectively evaluating the instructional material, the learner as well as the tutor can benefit the designer to incorporate active motivation. The instructional material should be designed in such a manner that the information conveyed is important to the students and are linked with their interests (Rodgers and Withrow-Thorton, 2005). Conclusion Motivation is an important aspect in education and the learning process and it positively impacts on the students’ academic achievement. Motivation manly focuses on energizing, directing and sustaining individuals’ behaviors towards the achievement of a specific goal. Notably, students are motivated when they effort that they put in a particular task is successful and when they have control over their performance. motivation plays a leading role in the learning process in that, students who are motivated tend to perform better and continue as compared to students who are not encouraged and motivated as this group give up and drop out of school in most cases. Motivation is a necessary factor in the learning process and it can be seen the students’ choices of learning activities, their persistence and dedication in the learning process and also how these students try to cope up with various challenges in the process. Both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation significantly contribute to the academic achievement of students because students do engage in the learning process and class activities since they enjoy doing that while at the same time, these students may be active in these activities so as to achieve something in form of reward or recognition associated with academic success. The ARCS model has for condition namely, attention, relevance, confidence and satisfactory, which has to be met in order to achieve academic success. Motivation theory is very important to instructional designers as their major concern is motivating learners and increasing student motivation. Motivation helps students to improve their academic performance as it increases the amount of energy and effort the student put in a given task, direct their behaviors towards the achievement of a specific goal and so on. Therefore, motivation is inevitable in the effective learning process and so students should be motivated to help them achieve their academic goals. References Cheng, Yi-Chia, and Yeh Hsin-Te. (2009). From concepts of motivation to its application in instructional design: Reconsidering motivation from an instructional design perspective. British Journal of Educational Technology. Vol. 40 No 4, p. 597–605. Dahl, D. W., & Smimou, K. (2011). Does motivation matter? Managerial Finance, 37(7), 582-609. Driscoll, Marcy. (2005). Chapter 9 Motivation & Self-Regulation in Learning. Boston, MA: Pearson. Hancock, D. (2004). Cooperative learning and peer orientation effects on motivation and achievement. The Journal of Educational Research, 97(3), 159-159. Mayer, Richard. (2008). Learning and instruction. Columbus, Ohio: Pearson. Reigeluth, Charles M. (2013). Instructional Design Theories and Models: An Overview of Their Current Status. London: Routledge. Rodgers, David L., and Withrow-Thorton Beverly J. (2005). The Effect Of Instructional Media On Learner Motivation. International Journal of Instructional Media. 32.4, p.333-342. Siann, G., Lightbody, P., Stocks, R., & Walsh, D. (1996). Motivation and Attribution at Secondary School: the role of ethnic group and gender. Gender & Education, 8(3), 261-274. Tengku Sepora, T. M., & Sepideh, M. J. (2012). Motivation, its types, and its impacts in language learning. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 3(24). Tennyson, Robert D., and Dijkstra S. (1997).Instructional Design: Theory, research, and models. London: Routledge. Read More