Practitioner Enquiry
       1)      What I wanted to change in my group;
 
Considering this question I felt the main change I was keen to implement was the students self-awareness and self-regulation. The group were all male students if my research had an impact on their self-awareness and self-regulation then hopefully it could have an overall effect on their motivation levels.
2) How did I go about this?
 
     There were three main methods that I used to do this;
·        Considering students intrinsic motivation
·        Brain Gym®
·        Mood Dudes
 
Intrinsic Motivation – Wish List & WIFFM’s two tasks that require the students to re-evaluate the reasons for their choice of subjects and college itself. The Wish list enables students to consider the ‘what if’ scenario where if they could do anything what would they do? This exercise gets a message across that it is really only the students themselves that are preventing them reaching their goals….
 
Brain Gym® - Purely physical activities that are very different from everyday activity that are designed to stimulate the left and right sides of the brain, laying down neural pathways that link the two sides.
 
Mood Dudes – These dudes gave myself and the students the opportunity to speak openly about their feelings when considering coursework, student reviews etc. I used them at the start of the lesson to show the students how I was feeling and why. (They really appreciated it!!!)
 
3)      What were the results for the group?
 
The students were hugely responsive to all the concepts that were used and I felt the most profound effects were on certain individuals rather than the group as a whole. The course forum results would suggest that the motivation level of the group had dropped, however the questionnaires I used would suggest a contradiction in some of the results.
 
4)      What I learned as a practitioner from doing this project?
 
It was encouraging to see the change in individuals with some of the methods that I used and to that end I have continued to use these methods in my teaching. In particular I continue to use brain gym in class and occasionally the WIFFM’s. The mood dudes have yet to surface this term!
 
For further details contact:
josborne@farnboroughsfc.ac.uk