Psychological Strategies for Improving Motivation and Learning — Strategy 1: Shaping

Gradual reinforcement toward the goal

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Various researchers (Cruz & Cullinan, 2001; Maslow, 1987; Pintrich & Schrunk, 2002) have demonstrated a strong positive correlation between motivation and achievement. Motivated learners approach tasks eagerly, exert high levels of effort, and persist in the face of difficulty. When students lack adequate motivation, they often become restless and disruptive in the classroom as well. Borrowing from the behaviorist and social learning theory perspectives, teachers can employ various strategies to encourage positive classroom behavior, increase motivation and facilitate student achievement.

Shaping

Shaping refers to “a process that involves reinforcing learners for making gradual progress toward a terminal behavioral goal” (Fetsco & McClure, 2005, p. 43). The process involves setting goals for students and reinforcing successively closer and closer approximations to that behavior. As a new level of performance is achieved, the target goal is successively adjusted to a higher level. The process typically involves five steps, including: (1) Identifying the desired target or terminal goal; (2) Identifying sub-goals, referred to as successive approximations, that progressively move the student…