AboutGreg Norton, MA Expertise As the Director for an accredited private school, I am confident answering questions related to learning issues, learning disabilities, ADD/ADHD, and behavior modifications for students. I am also well versed in procedures related to IEPs and 504 plans.
Experience I was a certified teacher with 18 years experience teaching Special Education and 12 years experience as Director of an accredited private school.
Question Hi, my name is Michelle and i am doing a research activity based on children on *Does a reward motivate children or reinforce children to do better?
So i was thinking to get a group of children gr-1 or gr.2 and give them a spelling list, and when they are done, to reward them at the end. than i will get another set of group and do the same spelling list but this time without a reward.
~Do you think this is a good idea, or what ideas do you think. Thanks
Answer Michelle,
Thank you for the question.
There is much involved in your proposal.
First, your study needs to be double-blind. The person given the spelling list to the students should not know which group will get the reward (knowing which group will get the reward will influence how the teacher behaves, and thus skew the test results).
Second, the reward may not appeal to all of the students. Is it a snack? a pencil? Different students will react differently to different rewards.
Also, a baseline needs to established. How do the students do without the reward? Do the same students do well or consistently fail? You might try your experiment with just two or three students to begin.
I hope that this helps.
Greg
