Situated Interest

I definitely feel that situated interest is going to be a teacher's best bet for getting a class interested and involved in what is being taught. Now I realize that intrinsic is where the student is more self-motivated than anything, but I firmly believe that if you get the class involved in the correct way, then there is a good chance for each student to become more self-interested in what is being taught.

Maybe I am completely off base, but what matters is that I think I am capable of encouraging students to become self motivated through the means of situated interest. I feel that if I make my class enjoyable enough, my kids will eventually want to pursue music on their own time. Now, I don't literally mean that I am going to tell them, "You need to get interested in what I am teaching."

No.

I mean more that I plan on getting my kids very actively engaged in what I am teaching them. If it's middle school kids, I am going make class as good of a time as I can, recommend some awesome bands and symphony orchestras to listen to, offer private lessons programs, and recommend some light reading material. I can then hopefully depend on some kids who were maybe motivated to begin with, to take a look at these resources I'm providing and say, "Hey guys, look at this!"

Do you know what gets kids the most motivated? Go on, think about it. Give up?

Their friends! Let's take a minute to think about this. If I can somehow encourage just a few kids initially to take a good interest in music, then I know for a fact that they are going to share that interest with their friends, and hopefully those kids will take a look at what I'm giving them and then become more interested themselves. But I can't rely entirely on the kids. I have to get them started myself. I have to get the situated interest ball rolling.

And that's why it's important for me to be really excited about my classes. My PLE is basically all about how you as the teacher has to be extremely excited, enthusiastic, interested, and whatever else about what you are teaching these kids. And motivation plays right in to that. To get your kids motivated, you yourself must be motivated first.