Encouragement from adults—like teachers, school counselors, and parents—is crucial for motivating students in school, particularly classes that kids perceive as difficult, such as math and science.
But students and teachers in middle and high school STEM classes have very different perspectives on who is influencing students’ pursuit of those subjects, according to new survey data from the EdWeek Research Center.
Teachers are far more likely than teens to say that teachers are the ones encouraging students to take advanced STEM classes. Teachers are also much more likely to believe that peer pressure has a negative impact on students’ motivation to work hard in their STEM-related classes.
That’s not, however, how students see it. And whether right or wrong, students’ perceptions matter, according to Katherine Muenks an associate professor of educational psychology at the University of Texas, Austin. Muenks studies the impact of teachers, parents, and peers on students’ motivation.
She recently spoke with Education Week about student motivation challenges. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Does it really matter who’s encouraging students?
That is a really complicated answer because a lot of it will depend on things like the student’s age. There is some evidence to support that, especially at younger ages, parents are very important, but then maybe become slightly less important as kids move into adolescence. Then maybe that’s when teachers and coaches might become more important. At any age, all of these adults can be important, but there can be these shifts in who the kid is most attuned to or listening to.
I do definitely think that there are different supports that each of these adults can provide. The teacher can probably support in terms of learning, especially when it comes to STEM fields, where maybe the parents don’t feel as confident in teaching those things.
Parents might find it a little bit more challenging to try to build students’ confidence. All of these people can be very important and play different roles at different points in development.
How much does peer pressure affect kids’ motivation in STEM classes?
There can be really positive impacts in that peers can provide support and help. We have seen at the college level that peers, especially if students are coming from an underrepresented group within STEM, like women in electrical engineering programs, their peers are actually quite important and provide a lot of motivation and help and support.
However, we also know that peers can negatively impact motivation as well.
I've talked to so many undergraduate students who say that the reason that they pursued a STEM field is because they had a really good chemistry teacher in high school.
This probably is more common in K-12, but there are of course the kind of peers who can communicate that being good at school is uncool. And so that might lead students to not value those academics, and that could be a negative impact on student motivation or their identification with academics.
It’s not straightforward as to whether peers will be a positive influence or a negative influence—it depends on the situation.
It’s difficult when you ask about peers as a whole because often students have a diverse array of experiences. So maybe they have some friends who do make them want to slack off. They have other friends who make them want to work harder. Or, maybe from their perspective they’re like, “oh, I don’t care what my friends think.” That could reflect reality or that could just be the way that they want to think about themselves.
What can teachers learn from students’ perspectives?
It can be informative to understand how your students are feeling about things like peer pressure or who’s encouraging them.
If teachers feel that they are encouraging students to pursue more advanced STEM classes, but their students are not perceiving it, that disconnect could actually impact student choices and behaviors. Even just asking your students, “what do you think? Do you think that I know you can be successful in that?” Getting that perspective could be really useful instead of just assuming that students are going to pick up on things that you’re doing.
I think this [EdWeek Research Center] data just shows that because there are these disconnects, it’s important to not necessarily assume that you know what your students are thinking and to try to better understand their experiences so that you can help align them with what you’re trying to do as a teacher.
It’s really important because students are very attuned to their teachers and what their teachers think about them. So, when students perceive that their teachers care about them, care about their learning and development, we know that there are huge effects on student motivation and student interest in that field.
I know just anecdotally within STEM, I’ve talked to so many undergraduate students who say that the reason that they pursued a STEM field is because they had a really good chemistry teacher in high school or something like that, right? They had a teacher who really believed in them, really cared about them, cared about their learning. That’s a really key part of student motivation and experience in school.
Data analysis for this article was provided by the EdWeek Research Center. Learn more about the center’s work.
