Education World® : 25 Ways to Motivate Teachers

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25 Ways to Motivate TeachersFrom time to time, Education World updates and reposts apreviously published article that we think might be of interestto administrators. We hope you find this recently updatedarticle to be of value.

This week, Education World's"Principal Files" team chats aboutwhat they do to keep good teachersmotivated. What special things dothey do to inspire teachers to keeplearning and improving their skills?What do they do to keep up staffmorale and make their schools funplaces to work? Our principal team shares their best ideas forencouraging teachers to keep on plugging... Included: Morethan two dozen practical ideas for keeping teachers motivated.

Given the state of school budgets, it is extremely difficult for most principalsto do substantial things to motivate and inspire teachers. But sometimes littlethings can make an even bigger difference! That's why Education Worldrecently asked our Principal Files principals to share with us some of theirbest ideas for keeping teachers motivated. As usual, our principalsresponded with dozens of practical ideas.

This month's P-Files question reminded principal Les Potter about RobertGreenleaf, author of Servant Leadership. Greenleaf's idea is that"administrators need to serve the worker," explained Potter. "At our schoolwe try to do that. We work hard at making things less difficult andcomplicated. We try to cut down the amount of paperwork our faculty mustdo, limit the number of staff meetings, streamline procedures..."

Administrators at Potter's school try to show teachers every day that theycare in many ways. "We have an open-door policy, they see us picking uptrash and cleaning cafeteria tables, we arrive on campus before they do andwe are here when they leave, and we do not have designated parking orother perks sometimes associated with management," Potter said.

"Administrators always have to put aside their own issues and do what isbest for students and staff in a caring and sensitive way. We try not to say

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FacultyRetreats

Set the Tone

Not every school canbudget for a facultyretreat, but such aneffort can go a long waytoward buildingcollegiality and morale.At The American Schoolin London, lower schoolprincipal Julie Ryan hasfond memories of a two-day retreat held an hournorth of the city twoyears ago. Parts of theconference center where

no to teachers, and we always treat them as adults."

Principal Tony Pallija agrees. He and the rest of his administrative team tryto do lots of special things for the entire staff -- from special little gifts toCookie Day. "We try to pretend we are at IBM -- we treat everyone as aprofessional and we celebrate whenever we can," said Pallija. "The materialthings are nice, but I have a motto that I try to live by each day: My job asprincipal is to make the teacher's job easier, better, so they can teach andstudents can learn."

"Developing a positive school climate is critical to an effective school," addedLes Potter. "Morale is a very tentative issue. You can do 99 things right andmake one mistake that will shoot morale forever."

RECOGNIZING THOSE WHO GO ABOVE ANDBEYOND!

All teachers yearn for reassurance that they are doing a good job. Mostprincipals recognize teachers' efforts by offering positive feedback -- bothpublicly and privately. Weekly memos or e-mails, and regular staff meetings,are the perfect forums for recognizing special contributions that teachers orother staff members make.

Principal Jeff Castle includes such recognitions in staff memos and during aspecial celebration portion of each month's faculty meeting. He also makes aspecial point of spotlighting efforts teachers make to develop projects thatinvolve students across grade levels or with other schools. Castle hopesthose special recognitions encourage others to consider projects that extendlearning outside the walls of individual classrooms.

"With all teachers have to do, motivation is the key to keeping them focusedand feeling worthy," principal Larry Davis told Education World. Davis reportsthat at each month's staff meeting at his school two teachers are awardedthe "Golden Apple" for their above-and-beyond efforts. The neat thing aboutthe Golden Apple is that the teachers select its recipients! Each of thewinners of this month's Golden Apples are responsible for passing on theaward to another worthy teacher at next month's meeting.

Many principals try to leave a little extra money in the budget to recognizeoutstanding efforts with small personal gifts such as prepaid phone cards orstore gift certificates. Recently, one principal gave a phone card to a teacherwho stepped in without being asked (because the principal was out of thebuilding) and took over an after-school program for a teacher who was stuckin a dentist's chair having a tooth pulled.

STICKY NOTES, OLYMPICGAMES, TV STARS, MINIGRANTS, MORE!

Principal Teri Stokes tries to observe everyteacher at least two times a month. Many ofthose visits are unscheduled, "snapshot"stops. Before heading on to the next class,Stokes takes a moment to scribble a positivecomment or two on a sticky note. On theway out of the room, she sticks that note tothe door or the teacher's desk.

In addition, Stokes often drops little feel-goodcards or inexpensive gifts in teachers'mailboxes or on their desks. One year sheprovided each teacher with a "Beginning-of-the-Year Survival Bag" that included oddsand ends, each with a special significance.

Education World® : 25 Ways to Motivate Teachers

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E-Learningthe retreat took placedated back to the time ofElizabeth I (16thcentury). "Retreatactivities included a mixof socialization andteam-building activities;analysis of the strengthsand weaknesses of theschool's culture; andcreating essentialagreements about howwe want to worktogether," Ryan toldEducation World.

That retreat was paid forby a parent donation,Ryan noted, "but in otheryears we have heldsimpler daytime, off-grounds retreats thathave been very effectivein setting a tone for theyear. Teachers feeltreated and they get toknow new colleagues --which is essential in aninternational school witha fairly transient faculty."

Does this sound like an idea youmight want to employ? If so, you'll findsome great ideas for putting togethera "Teachers' Survival Kit" in theEducation World article When All ElseFails, Turn to the Survival Kit!

Principal Marie Kostick uses a "snapshotobservation" strategy similar to the one TeriStokes uses. In addition, she takesadvantage of local television stations thatreach out into the community to offersawards such as "The Class Act Award" orthe "Excellence in Teaching Award." Kosticknominates members of her staff who gobeyond the call of duty. Reporters from thetelevision stations come to school tointerview the teachers and present them withcertificates. Each teacher is then recognizedin a TV spot that is broadcast several timesin one week.

To build a strong team, principal PhilShaman held an "Educational Olympics" atthis school one year. Teachers were dividedinto teams and competed in a variety ofevents. All events required that teammembers support each other to complete atask. Events, planned with the support of hisphysical education staff, were both athletic(for example, relay events and a team tabletennis match in which team members had toalternate hits) and non-athletic (such as going through a maze blindfolded).

Many states and some local school districts offer reward monies for schoolswhose students show improvements on standardized tests. In some schools,those monies are divided among contributing staff. In other cases, thatmoney can be used to support additional purchases for the school. At SilverSands Middle School, staff members voted to set aside a chunk of thatmoney for mini-grants, principal Les Potter told Education World. Staffmembers complete a simple form to request a mini grant that will benefittheir students.

20 MORE GREAT IDEAS FOR MOTIVATINGTEACHERS

Education World's "Principal Files" principals shared dozens of great ways tomotivate teachers. So far, we have mentioned just a handful of those ideas.Following is a list of more than 20 additional ideas presented by principalsalready mentioned above:

Plan noon-hour lunches for all staff members several times a year. (Don'tleave out the paraprofessionals, the school secretaries, or the custodians!)Those lunches can be "roving lunches" in which people eat during theirregularly scheduled lunch period, or they can be whole-staff lunches thatkick off professional development sessions scheduled for the p.m. part ofthe day.

Organize small fundraising activities to raise money for an all-staff holiday orend-of-year banquet. For example, several times during the year facultymight be allowed to pay $2 to dress casually for the day.

Contact local restaurants, sports franchises, movie houses, arts centers, andother businesses to arrange for gifts, gift certificates, tickets, or discountcoupons that can be used as special prizes for teachers or coaches who

Education World® : 25 Ways to Motivate Teachers

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More PracticalIdeas From thePrincipal Files

Have you seen thesearticles from the PrincipalFiles Series?

I Wish I Had Taken aCourse In...Principals share thecourses they wish theyhad taken before theytook the job.

There's No Sub for aGood Sub Plan!Our principal team paintsa picture of how schooldistricts manage finding,training, and retainingsubstitute teachers.

Data Is Making aDifference in TheseSchoolsPrincipals share ways inwhich they are usingdata to lead their schoolsto success.

Great Staff Meetings:Pointers from thePrincipals Who LeadThemStuck for ideas foreffective staff meetings?Looking for ways tomake sure everybody ispresent and interested?

Teachers Urged toConsider PrincipalshipPrincipals share the joysof the job plus words ofencouragement foreducators who might beconsidering the path to

volunteer their time or who go above and beyond.

Encourage teachers to seek out professional development courses orworkshops. Approve all reasonable requests. Then get extra mileage out ofthose sessions: Set aside time during each staff meeting, or arrange aspecial professional development day, so teachers can share with theirpeers the main ideas they learned from each session they attended.

Encourage teachers to ask for the instructional supplies they require tofacilitate teaching and learning. Provide reasonable requests from thebudget, or enlist local politicians or businesspeople to sponsor or help youtrack down other needed supplies.

Organize a trip to the movies.

The December holidays can be such a busytime. Instead of adding one more thing to doand one more expense to the month ofDecember, why not spread around the fun?In October, for example, one school heldSecret Spook Week. Those teachers whowanted to participate filled out a profile formthat asked questions about favorite colors,foods, drinks, hobbies, and so on. Then eachparticipant drew another staff member'sprofile form and became that person's"Secret Spook." Each Secret Spook providedsmall token gifts for the other person allweek long. The total expenditure for eachparticipant was set at $10.

Include on each weekly staff memo a quickactivity idea that might be tried out in theclassroom, a quote related to education, or ashort school-related joke. (Note: Theclickable resources above, available on theEducation World Web site, change daily.There are more than enough resources onthose pages to fill a year of weekly memos.)

Send cards to teachers to welcome themback after an illness, celebrate a birthday oranother important event, or recognize aspecial achievement... Add a copy of those"special achievements" cards to teachers'personnel files.

Once a semester, or once a quarter, provideall staff members with a come-late-to-work-no-questions-asked form. (Or give that formto staff members who logged one or noabsences in the most recent quarter.) Thatform represents two hours of time that canbe taken at the start or end of the school dayfor any reason -- from sleeping in to gettinga head start on the weekend. The only catchis that the form must be "cashed in" inadvance so arrangements can be made tofree an administrator or somebody else tocover the staff member's responsibilities.Little things like this cost no money anddemonstrate that administrators are willing togo the extra mile for the folks who work forthem.

Education World® : 25 Ways to Motivate Teachers

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the principal's office.Provide free coffee in the teacher's loungefrom 7:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. every day.

Select a "Teacher of the Month." Set aside a special parking space close tothe main faculty entrance that is marked with a "Reserved for the Teacher ofthe Month" sign.

To motivate professional development, arrange study groups (perhapsorganized by grade level) to read a book or discuss and research a currenthot topic.

Set up a schedule to ensure that every educator makes at least two visits toother teachers' classrooms or other schools during the year. Arrangecoverage for those teachers. You might set up a special arrangement withother schools to open their classrooms to your teachers, but teachers shouldalso be able to make their own arrangements for visitations toclasses/schools they have learned about through the grapevine.

Feed the teachers! Celebrate the end of a busy week by arranging to havethe cafeteria staff prepare a special continental breakfast -- beverages andmuffins, rolls, or coffee cake -- every Friday morning. (Even once a monthwould be nice!) Don't forget to do something nice for the cafeteria folks acouple times a year.

Appoint a teacher to be "acting principal" when you are out of the building.(This usually convinces them that they love being a teacher!)

Make sure that everyone is on a committee that meets regularly and thatthey have real tasks and opportunities for real input in school-level decisionmaking.

Arrange to have music played (or piped in) during faculty meetings. Musicstimulates the brain.

Be sure to publicly commend staff members who go above and beyondoutside of the school day -- by volunteering to be part of district-wide orstate-level committees, for example.

Approach the parent-school association, local business partners, Jaycees, orother groups to gather materials and labor to accomplish various fix-itprojects that the Board of Education is unable to tackle.

Organize a social committee to plan events just for fun. One such eventmight be a monthly "Treat-Your-Friends Tuesday." Each month a differentgroup of teachers brings themed food items to share during the day in theteacher's lounge.

During Teacher Appreciation Week hold a daily drawing for a "1/2-day off"certificate. The principal will cover the class when you take that time off.

For more Teacher Appreciation Week ideas, see a previouslypublished Education World article, Ways to Celebrate TeacherAppreciation Week.

Make a spot on your weekly memo for a special thank-you orcongratulations to individuals or the entire team. For example: Thank you fororganizing Red Ribbon Week! Thanks for the extra effort on parent teacherconferences! Thank you to the "bulletin board fairy" who decorated the boardin the workroom!...

ADDITIONAL RESOURCE

Back-to-School Survivor Day Offers Lessons About QualityLearningEducator recounts how her school's administrators used the Survivortelevision show as a theme to strengthen teams, build camaraderie, presentchallenges -- and teach a few lessons about how to create a quality

Education World® : 25 Ways to Motivate Teachers

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classroom environment for students. Included: Survivor activity ideas andteacher reactions!

Article by Gary HopkinsEducation World®Copyright © 2008 Education World

Originally published 11/19/2002Links last updated 08/26/2008

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