Summary on Urban Schools in the US - Essay Example

This theory would be useful in determining the level of perceived autonomy, relatedness, and competence. In order to handle the study successfully, it would be necessary first investigate the situation of urban schools currently. Current situation According to Duncan and Murnane, (2011), urban schools in the United States are faced with the shortage of qualified teachers of all subjects, with the shortage of teachers in science subjects being most affected. Additionally, there is inequality of education.

Although all students are capable of doing well in sciences, it is believed that differences in gender, culture, race and socioeconomic status poses as a challenge to their performance. Rand (2000) noted that racism was one of the major factors that caused poor performance in science education. On the other hand, teachers remain overwhelmed by work as they have to deal with children with several problems and disruptive tendencies. Most of these children are from poor backgrounds, and there have not been supporting social services.

In this regard, teachers have to face high student dropout rates, poor attendance, large class size and, complex working conditions, old salary systems and generally uninterested students. It is also noted that teachers may loose mentoring and evaluation systems, ineffective administrations, lack of enough funding, and endless reforms that never tend to lead to real development. For these and more reasons, teachers lack motivation and this leads to poor performance of the urban schools. Rationale of motivation Motivation has several definitions due to the complexity of the concept.

However, motivation can be defined as a driving force that initiates and directs behavior. Motivation can be argued to be the internal energy that propels a person to do something with a purpose of achieving a certain goal. The energy that instigates motivation can be biological, emotional, social or cognitive in nature. However, different theories are used by researchers to explain this concept. In fact, different psychologists use different theories to elucidate how behavior is influenced by motivation.

However, in order to understand the concept of motivation clearly, it is essential to focus on the two main types of motivation: intrinsic motivation, which involves internal desires to undertake a particular task. Intrinsically motivated people do certain activities because it gives them pleasure. The other type is extrinsic motivation which involves external factors and which are not related to the task they are performing. Examples include money and rewards. Therefore, intrinsic motivation can be termed as the act of doing something because it is inherently enjoyable as opposed to extrinsic motivation, which involves doing something because it leads to separable outcome.

Through the times, many researchers advocated for goal-based theories, which focused on identifying factors that motivate people to work towards their goals and objectives. In order to exonerate the concept of self, the theory of self determination is of relevant. This theory focuses on motivation in the effort to examine how people determine their actions. It instituted that competence, autonomy and relatedness influence the way people pursue their goals. The theory emphasise on what the content should be and the reasons for setting goals.

It sets out a stage to