I have only two years under my belt in this teaching world, so my opinion is warped and narrow (remember that!), but what if our whole system of motivation of wacky?! Check out Daniel Pink's video.



This is certainly not the perfect prescription of what needs to change, but it does point out thoughts for change. The first major change, and it is audacious for many to conceive, is that more money does not create better results. Think about how this works inside the teaching career. We get pay raises based on time and a few bumps for masters and doctors degree (that we have to get anyhow). Does that mean all the old experienced (greatly paid) and highly qualified teachers are not doing their best? Not at all, in fact many of them are doing amazing jobs because they work well in this style of work. The problem I see, and as the video shows, is that we could get even more results from our teachers if we would allow them to make creative decisions and products that benefit the whole. This leads me to the second major change. In our current model, there much space for a teacher to be creative in their class, but little space given to those teachers for making decisions that could effect and benefit the whole staff. We have too long depended on a top down leadership that selects the tools and modalities to be used and there is little input from the little man (like me). Are we getting a mere fraction from our teaching staff because we only motivate with dollars? What can be changed about the current system that would make this new motivation work?