Level Up Classroom Engagement with Science! Tackling Apathy with Mastery Gamification
Many teachers say that student apathy is at an all-time high in schools. It is hard to motivate students to complete school tasks or even convey the importance of doing school work. In facing this challenge, understanding how to overcome student apathy in the classroom is crucial, and this includes addressing how to overcome learned helplessness in the classroom. Many students just don’t seem to care. They fail to see the connection between their work ethic now and their future success. The Mastery Gamification Methodology offers a powerful approach to bridge this gap between student apathy and student engagement and success.
The three pillars of the Mastery Gamification Methodology are mastery learning, standards-based learning, and gamification. Let’s start by giving a quick definition of each. Mastery learning and standards-based learning are nearly the same thing. In fact, many educators use the terms interchangeably although there are a few subtle differences.
The Three Pillars
Standards-based learning starts with the standards that students should know in each grade/subject and the assessments are directly based on the standards. The standards used are generally up to the school district with Common Core standards and state standards being the most commonly used. This ensures that instruction and standards are pretty uniform and all students receive an equal education.
Mastery learning is based on the idea that a student must “master” each topic taught before moving on to the next. This method not only facilitates thorough understanding but also plays a key role in how to overcome learned helplessness in the classroom. Students are generally required to meet a “minimum mastery level,” determined ahead of time, before moving on to the next topic. This method generally allows students to work at the pace that is right for them and ensures that students understand the fundamentals of the subject before moving on to more advanced material.
Gamification in education can be harder to define because there is no standard way to implement it in the classroom. However, key elements of gamification in the classroom include immediate feedback, often in the form of badges to recognize student accomplishments, and storytelling to engage students in the educational process. Gamification is known for increasing student engagement in the learning process, which is essential in how to overcome student apathy in the classroom.
Now that we have clarified the essentials of the Mastery Gamification Methodology, let’s take a look at the research behind it and how to use it to help students become more engaged and successful in the classroom.
Learned Helplessness
Let’s start with a classic that helps us understand student apathy in the first place and why students are so prone to it. Dr. Martin E.P. Seligman, psychologist, and Dr. Steven F. Maier did a study in 1967 that changed the way we understand apathy. You can find the citations for these resources at the end of this blog post. In 1967 Dr. Seligman and Dr. Maier did a study involving dogs as their subjects. They put dogs in confined areas and gave them electrical shocks. Some of the dogs had a way to stop the shocks (by moving a lever or jumping away) and some dogs did not have a way to stop the shocks.
At the beginning of the shocks, all the dogs tried to get away from the shocks. The dogs who had a way to escape found it and escaped but the dogs who did not have a way to escape eventually just got quiet and apathetic. After doing this for a while, they took the same dogs and put them all in individually confined spaces but this time they all had a way to escape the shocks (jumping over a low wall). The dogs that had previously had a way to stop the shocks quickly jumped over the wall to escape the shocks. However, the dogs that had previously not had an escape did not even try to escape this time. They simply became apathetic and waited for it to end.
Same Behavior in Humans
This study was later done on humans except the humans were exposed to very loud sounds instead of electrical shocks. The results were the same as with the dogs, those who had a way to stop the pain were able to stop it but those who did not have a way to stop the pain eventually stopped trying, even when there was a way to stop the pain.
This study spawned the idea of “learned helplessness.” The idea that, after prolonged and uncontrollable negative circumstances, a person stops trying to fix the situation or find a way out, even if a way to fix the circumstance is introduced. They learn to give up their self-efficacy and they learn to be helpless.
Fifty Year Follow Up
However, in 2016, about fifty years after the initial study, Dr. Seligman and Dr. Maier did a follow-up to their study and uncovered a subtly different conclusion that added to the initial study. The follow-up study concluded that “learned helplessness” is not actually learned, rather it is the default manner in which living beings cope with prolonged, uncontrollable negative circumstances. This emphasizes that many people need to be taught that they have control over their circumstances to take control of their circumstances and change them for the better. In short, a person has to believe that they have the ability to change their circumstances in order to actually take the action needed to change their circumstances.
What does this study have to do with student apathy in the classroom? Let’s say that a student comes to school and initially has a hard time with schoolwork. The student is told that they are wrong, that they need to work harder, and they keep receiving F after F after F. You can only get an F, which is an abbreviation for “failure” so many times before you start believing that you are a failure. This can easily be seen as prolonged and uncontrollable circumstances. If the student is simply given F’s and never given the chance to actually learn what he missed, he will likely exhibit student apathy and learned helplessness.
Self-Efficacy: How to Overcome Learned Helplessness in the Classroom
So what can teachers do about this educational horror? Dr. Albert Bandura, psychologist, has a theory of self-efficacy that may offer some insight. Dr. Bandura’s theory of self-efficacy simply refers to the level of belief that a person has in himself to accomplish a specific task. So, if a student has self-efficacy, they are more likely to be successful in a particular task. Dr. Bandura’s theory cites some ways in which a person can build their self-efficacy. Some of these ways are mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, verbal persuasion, and positive emotional states.
The Mastery Gamification Methodology helps students build this sense of self-efficacy by requiring them to have mastery experiences through mastery learning, allowing for vicarious experiences of success by seeing their peers succeed through mastery learning, by verbal persuasion when their accomplishments are celebrated through the badges and immediate feedback of gamification, and by helping students to have a positive emotional state in school because they are actually having fun while learning.
Growth Mindset vs. Fixed Mindset
This research is reinforced by Dr. Carol Dweck and her work with “fixed mindset” vs. “growth mindset.” Dr. Dweck’s work emphasizes that students who have a “growth mindset” believe that they can develop their skills through effort, support, and persistence. This correlates to Dr. Bandura’s theory of self-efficacy. These students believe in their ability to grow and learn, so they do!
The other mindset that Dr. Dweck researches is the “fixed mindset” which is the belief of students that their intelligence and abilities are unchangeable. These students defeat themselves right from the start because they do not even believe that they can improve. One of the big takeaways from Dr. Dweck is how to give students feedback that promotes a growth mindset.
One such study on how to give feedback to students was uncovered in her study “Praise for intelligence can undermine children’s motivation and performance.” This study emphasized the importance of recognizing student work and effort to encourage a growth mindset. Instead of telling a student, “You’re so smart.” a better form of feedback would be, “You worked hard on this.”
The Mastery Gamification Methodology applies this research in the classroom because it puts a natural system in place that provides positive feedback for student effort and growth. Students receive their badge once they have reached the “minimum mastery level” and their hard work is celebrated once they have put in the work required to reach that level.
Grit
This growth mindset lends itself to a natural transition to Dr. Angela Duckworth, psychologist, and her research on grit. Dr. Duckworth defines grit as passion and perseverance toward long-term goals. In her book, she talks about her studies with both military academies and spelling bee contestants. She found those individuals with higher levels of grit were more likely to succeed. Dr. Duckworth thinks that grit is an even more important factor in success than intelligence or inherent talent.
The Mastery Gamification Methodology teaches students how to develop grit by requiring them to keep at a task until they have reached the minimum mastery level. Students are not permitted to simply “take the F” and move on. They are required to put in the effort until they achieve their success. Can you imagine if students entering school were required to demonstrate grit through mastery learning from a young age? If students simply assumed that school was about working at fun learning tasks until they actually “got it”? How would that change the mindset of our students? How would that change the mindset of an entire generation?
Mastery Learning Itself
With all this research so far, it’s no surprise that we have a final study that documents the success of mastery learning itself. In 1995 Dr. Brian Whiting repeated a study that he had done previously in the 1970’s about mastery learning and he found the same results as before. He followed students through their entire school experience in mastery learning. He found that both student attitudes towards learning and their academic scores were higher than their counterparts who were not in a mastery learning system. It’s a system that is documented to work.
Wrap-Up
The Mastery Gamification Methodology promotes students’ academic success and the soft skills of grit and perseverance through the pillars of mastery learning and standards-based learning. In addition, students’ positive attitudes toward school and immediate feedback to promote a growth mindset are addressed by the pillar of gamification.
If you are ready to learn more about the benefits of mastery gamification and what it would look like in your classroom, sign up for the free quiz below to see if mastery gamification would fit your teaching style. Or, join our community of innovative educators at my Facebook page. Until next time remember, Empowered teachers empower students and empowered students learn!
Citations
Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy: The exercise of control. W. H. Freeman and Company.
Duckworth, A. (2016). Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. Scribner.
Dweck, C. S. (2006). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Random House.
Maier, S. F., & Seligman, M. E. P. (2016). Learned Helplessness at Fifty: Insights from Neuroscience. Psychological Review, 123(4), 349–367. https://doi.org/10.1037/rev0000033
Mueller, C. M., & Dweck, C. S. (1998). Praise for intelligence can undermine children’s motivation and performance. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 75(1), 33–52.
Seligman, M. E. P., & Maier, S. F. (1967). Failure to escape traumatic shock. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 74(1), 1–9.
Whiting, B., & Others. (1995, April). Mastery Learning in the Classroom. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco, CA.
