Motivation of School Work

“Two forces have combined in stimulating the preparation of this volume. One force is personal, the experience of the authors; the other is general, the growth of an educational theory demanding motive and interest in all school work. In the twenty or more years of their experience in rural, grade, and high schools, both as teachers and superintendents, the authors came to see clearly the large gains in the speed, thoroughness, and scope of the work when pupils were trying to do things of personal concern to them. From these experiences, they gradually accumulated a large body of concrete results secured under perfectly normal schoolroom conditions. Through presentation of these data to teachers and superintendents in educational meetings, in college and normal school classes, and through educational magazines, a demand arose for a more complete and organic statement of how to motivate the pupil’s mastery of the various school subjects and of the results which have been secured from such motivated work.

The present volume, therefore, seeks to satisfy personal obligations and a growing professional need. It recognizes that the largest daily task of the teacher is the detailed planning and preparation of the various lessons to be taught. The most difficult phase of teaching is not acquiring the necessary information nor controlling the class, but it is discovering problems and motives for the work that will make it appeal to and interest the pupils. This book is designed to furnish concrete help of a fundamental kind in solving this daily problem of every teacher”. – Excerpts from author’s Introduction