How to motivate yourself to study? How to motivate students? How do we turn off all the distractions, Facebook, twitter, tik tok, sports, movies, our families and friends, and figure out how to motivate yourself to do homework? Every student I would assume in every area of study, be it culinary arts, code, law and or medicine, at some point every student has had to figure out how to motivate themselves to study. While teachers, especially at the elementary through High School grade levels has been tasked with how to motivate students since school days began.
What is studying? By definition, the devotion of time and attention to acquiring knowledge on an academic subject, especially by means of books. The devotion of time. The word devotion; means, love, loyalty, or enthusiasm for a person, activity, or cause. You have to have a love for the activity (Whatever it is you are studying), you have to be and remain loyal to the cause (the reason you want to learn what you are studying). You have to see the end result with enthusiasm (when diploma day comes, and all the hard work pays off). You have to take all that devotion and put it into time. You have to put the work into what it is you say you want. Whatever you are trying to accomplish you have to work at it. If you want to get a job, you can most likely expect to work 8 hours a day, 5 to 6 days a week at the minimum. If its entrepreneur ambitions you have, you can expect to work every waking moment of the day in some way or another. The point is, you have to put the time in, and the Attention. Attention by definition is notice taken of someone or something; the regarding of someone or something as interesting or important. So, let’s assume that Tyler wants to be a Chef. And let’s tailor our definition to Tyler in order to simplify this definition to our topic of discussion. Attention, as it relates to Tyler doing his homework is, Tyler takes notice of studying to be become a Chef. So, Tyler holds in high the regard devoting time to studying and doing his homework in high regard. This devotion to becoming a Chef is what makes Tyler’s studying both interesting and important. Tyler has to really have a love for becoming skilled in the area of culinary arts. There has to be a passion and a desire based on something on the inside driving and pushing Tyler without there being a need for Tyler to be driven and pushed to acquiring the knowledge in the area of preparing food! If Tyler is acquiring knowledge, Tyler is on YouTube watching videos about cooking. Tyler is online reading articles on ingredients and cooking techniques. Tyler is watching cooking shows for recipe ideas and how “Tyler’s Place” will look in the future.
Tyler goes on to teach culinary arts now tasked with figuring out how to motivate students? How to get excited about a subject. You have to create interest in the subject. Go beyond the textbook. Use video, video created to spark interest. Something exciting that is viewed with interest. The same interest as if you went to your local theater and took in a good movie with popcorn and soda, that type of video interesting. Find podcast on the subject that has a different take or delivery of the information to keep things fresh. Create real world situations that relates to that subject. If the subject is business. Create a mock business and create a real-world situation that would occur within the day-to-day activity of the mock business. Have the students do a marketing plan based on a mockup product. Make some t-shirts or candles to sale. Where students have to go through the entire marketing cycle, from buyer persona to buyer conversion. Create teams, nothing like a little friendly competition to get the work out. Have a prize, have a different competition monthly or quarterly to build up excitement and expectation. Plan so some of the project assignments have to be done at home. Include activities that require family members and friends to be involved. Assignments that allow students to include their pets, or favorite tv show. This will show students helpful ways of how to motivate yourself to do homework for future classes and studies. Making homework fun and interesting through mock real-world experiences, small groups and competitive class projects can help your students do better overall and have success.
Motivation is all about devotion and love of something. [ Read our { how to motivate yourself } article] There has to be something fueling the motivation. Be sure that you are studying something that brings you joy. Study something that gives you whatever it is you want to get out of what you are studying. If you are looking for something that brings a sense of purpose to our life, make sure that field of study does that for you. If financial gain is what’s important to you, be sure that the field of study you choose pays well, in the range you are looking to make as a salary. Whatever it is you are looking for be sure that field can offer you that, then work hard to acquire all the related knowledge and skills related to that field. Set aside hours out of you day just like you would if you had a job. When you reach you goals, you will not schedule anything on your calendar during working hours. Everything other than work would have to wait until you get off work or close up shop for the day (to my small business owners). Approach your study time the same way. Plan out what you are going to study. See this as practice for the job or business you want. Be a self-starter, plan your day, what needs to get done in order of importance, plan time to search out other information and content related to your field of study. Self your hours of operation and do whatever else you want once you close up “The Study Shop” for the day.
“The road to success and he road to failure are almost exactly the same.” – Colin R. Davis
“Success usually comes to those who are too busy looking for it.” – Henry David Thoreau
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