Motivation

We have a student in our grade who needs more motivation. By "we" I mean my two fellow 4th grade teachers. I am the writing teacher, one of them teaches math, and the other teaches reading. Between the reading teacher and I, we work in the science and social studies, too. But, we've got this one boy who, despite his reasonable ability, is not at all motivated to do well in academics.

His life is oriented to football. He's a big and tall fellow, for being only ten years old. He loves to watch football, and he plays on a team. He is pretty good at it, too, I imagine. He has stated to each of us, more than once, that he doesn't really care about school; and, because he is going to be a pro football player some day, he doesn't think school is really that important.

Now, I can't blame him for this attitude. I mean, when I was ten, I really don't think I was overly excited by trying to figure out the author's purpose for writing whatever it was I reading in class. But that is one of the standards that the reading teacher is obligated to teach. In fact, although I loved reading, I don't remember any lessons at all about it from elementary school. Um..I do remember struggling with division, however.

So, my co-worker, the reading teacher, had a great idea. She has connections in the sports world through her husband's work, so she reached out to find some NFL player who might be willing to write a letter to our student with the player's opinion of whether or not school was important for a person who aspires to become a pro footballer. She got the letter on Friday!

A player from Tampa Bay wrote an email to her, addressed our student in the greeting, and went on to explain why this player felt that school was, indeed, important if you aim for the NFL. He wrote about the discipline of doing hard things, and how it is the only way a person can get good enough to be a pro player. He talked about how important it is to learn to follow directions, tough it out when it seems to hard, and that school makes you a better person. I forget the rest, but it was a very nice letter that emphasized how important it was to this player that he had gone to school, and that it got him into college and gave him the opportunity to be a football player now.

So, my friend printed off the letter, (keeping the email private) and gave it to our guy. He was over the moon! Turns out that this player plays in the same position our student plays in his league team. But, was our kid ever impressed! I don't even know if he realizes how cool it was that his teacher cared enough to do this. Then, she asked him to sit down and type out a reply, so she could email it back to the player. He was finally motivated to write!

What a great teacher she is, and what a fine thing to do for this boy. I do like his personality. He is curious and funny, but really, really not excited about school work. So, I hope this little gesture from a kind man, who didn't need to do anything for us, will help our student turn it around in class. Positive motivation is always more effective. It's just about impossible to push a rope...