Creating a Culture of Effort in the Middle School Classroom

Have you ever had a student thank you for giving him grades? The first time I heard this from one of my students, I was stunned. The idea of receiving grades without effort was completely foreign to me. Growing up I intrinsically knew that the grades I received in school were because of my effort. This is not the case for many middle students in poverty in our urban school districts.

I remember telling the first student that approached me in this way that I didn't give him grades. He earned them. Two years later, I am still having this same conversation. Clearly something different must be done to help my middle school students.

This article shares strategies that can be used to address this problem. With consistency I believe that middle schools students in poverty will eventually understand that the amount of effort or hard work put forth directly impacts achievement.

Creating a Culture of Effort in the Middle School Classroom: Praise
Make a point to praise effort in middle school students. When you get them to buy into the importance of effort, some students still won't make As and Bs. Yet they are working hard. Their effort should be praised just as much as actually making higher grades. Based on your knowledge of your students, you have to decide the best way to praise effort, whether done publicly or privately.

Praise and tangible rewards for effort are not the same. Throughout elementary school, many students have been coaxed into doing expected behaviors. They have been conditioned to expect teachers to always engage in this routine of rewards and punishments. By middle school the expectation of effort simply for achievement is lost on them.

Unfortunately, this practice often continues in middle school. It can even progress to students given "rewards" without doing anything at all to justify it. It helps the teacher cope with their middle school students in poverty. Yet, it makes it more difficult for students in the long run. It also hinders other teachers' efforts to create self-motivation in their middle school students. When this happens, teachers have inadvertently set up a mindset of entitlement in their students. This experiment illustrates this point.

Middle school students benefit for a lifetime when they learn the inherent satisfaction that comes from trying their best for the sake of excellence and achievement. What will students do in their everyday life when no one is around to "give" them something for doing what they are already expected to do? What will be their motivation to reach to higher heights of achievement?

Creating a Culture of Effort in the Middle School Classroom: Goals
Short and long-range goals help middle school students make the connection between effort and achievement. They can be coached to recognize specific behaviors and attitudes that contribute to attaining their goals. Students can evaluate themselves on their efforts toward reaching their goals.

Creating a Culture of Effort in the Middle School Classroom: Exposure
Biographies can be used to create a culture of effort in the middle school classroom. Using this genre for this purpose exposes students to others who have achieve against difficult odds. With continued exposure, the seeds of effort are planted and can be cultivated.

Various literacy activities can be used before, during and after reading. A few are open ended and higher level questions, Socratic seminars, journaling, and other writing activities. They will help students internalize the theme of effort and achievement revealed in the characters' lives.

Invite speakers to the classroom who have worked hard to overcome adversity. Rather than a speech or lecture, students could be allowed to have a dialogue with the speaker about life and how he or she overcame overwhelming odds through effort and hard work.

Creating a Culture of Effort in the Middle School Classroom: Rubrics
Use more rubrics to illustrate exactly what effort looks like. A rubric graphically shows the specific effort needed to produce an acceptable assignment. It allows middle school students to self-monitor their effort. Sights such as Rubistar make creating rubrics easy. Another sight, such as roobrix converts rubric points to a conventional grade.

Creating a Culture of Effort in the Middle School Classroom: Differentiation
Middle school students often feel that certain students achieve because of some innate ability that they do not possess. Past teachers may have unwarily created this attitude by not challenging advanced and gifted students.

Low achieving students have observed their classmates breeze through school work and have concluded that some students are just smart. They further think that because they have to put forth more effort than their classmates, they are not smart. Therefore they feel it's useless to work hard. To them, making a passing grade is a matter of fate, favor from the teacher or of sheer luck.

Differentiation levels the effort playing field. Every student will have to extend effort in order to achieve to the best of their ability. The product produced to show mastery is different according to the prerequisite skills that each middle school student possesses.

Advanced students will no longer fly through unchallenging assignments. They will have to work as hard as other middle school students to achieve. Low performing students will not get frustrated and stop putting forth effort because the assignment is too difficult. All your middle school students will see that everyone has to extend effort. They will see that success is not because some students are just more special.

Many other techniques are available to create a culture of effort in the middle school classroom. Whatever method or methods you choose, it is important to be persistent. This is not a mindset that is changed overnight.

Realistically, in one school year, you may not completely change this way of thinking in your middle school students. It is worth the effort to at least begin the process of change. Imagine the positive results and open doors of opportunity for students who overcome this fallacy in thinking.

Feel free to share any other ideas that would be helpful in creating a culture of effort in your middle school classroom.