Meeting Minutes November 11, 2009
“Moving the Mountain – How to Motivate Your Child”
President Lori Stevens called the meeting to order at 7:30 pm. Ms. Stevens discussed the delegates’
responsibilities to keep their schools informed of LEAP presentations by getting minutes or
information onto school websites and into school newsletters. She noted that delegates should send
out flyers and report about past and upcoming presentations at their respective PTA/PTO meetings as
well as inform parents of LEAPS’ benefits to them and their students. She also indicated that each
school can have up to two delegates.
Ms. Stevens then requested officer reports.
VP Communications Karen Cholakis could not be present at the meeting and therefore did not have
a report.
VPs Programs Susan Boyd and Aundrea Foster thanked the delegates for coming to the meeting
and thanked the panelists for their willingness to speak to LEAP on the important subject of how to
motivate your child.
Secretary Kristen Thatcher thanked Past-President Maura Walsh-Copeland for stepping in as
Secretary for the September and October meetings. Ms. Thatcher also stated last month’s minutes and
handouts are posted on the LEAP website.
Treasurer Ed Myers reported the LEAP account balance is $429.21 and 17 schools or roughly 33%
of schools have remitted annual dues. Additionally, about 50% of the delegates have attended at least
one of the meetings.
Ms. Stevens introduced the speakers for the program:
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Allyson Pate, Educator, LCPS Resource Center
Laura Rheinhauer, Associate Director, Educational Connections, Inc.
Janice Koslowski, Principal, Potomac Falls High School
Allyson Pate, Educator, LCPS Resource Center
Ms. Pate opened her remarks with some research she did on student motivation. She stated over
several thousand sites focus on motivation. Some sites boast of providing simple steps to help with
motivation ranging from 21 to 70 steps. Ms. Pate, who attributed the information she relayed to
Richard Lavoie, said there are four different comments educators often hear regarding motivation:
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If only he would apply himself…
If only she would put her mind to it…
He just doesn’t care…
She is just not trying…
As each child has his/her own learning styles, each child also has his/her own motivation styles and
once you determine the motivation style, there are techniques and strategies to help start and maintain
your child’s motivation.
Through his research, Mr. Lavoie, concluded that there are 8 forces of motivation: Power, Prestige,
Praise, Gregariousness, Autonomy, Inquisitiveness, Aggression, and Affiliation. Once you determine
which force of motivation best represents your child, he then provides, “The 6 P’s of Motivation” –
Projects, People, Praise, Prizes, Prestige and Power – the style that best is used for the type of
motivation that your child best represents. Ms. Pate then showed a lecture Mr. Lavoie gave to further
emphasize his research. (Video excerpt courtesy “Motivation Breakthrough,” by Rick Lavoie. For
more information, visit ricklavoie.com.) Mr. Lavoie opens his remarks by stating that all human
behavior is motivated. When he hears someone say a student is lazy because he puts his head down
during a class, Mr. Lavoie contends the child is not lazy. Rather, he suffers from a “learned
helplessness” which can look just like laziness. He explains that the child is motivated to keep his
head down and when a parent or educator can determine his motivation force, a strategy can be
developed to motivate that child to participate in the class.
During the lecture, Mr. Lavoie discusses reward and punishment strategies and suggests that rewards
provide the assumption that every behavior is measurable and that if the child chooses to act in a
certain way, the educator or parent will give him something. For punishment, he suggests that it does
not eliminate the behavior. Instead, punishment just represses the behavior and he gave the example
that if a child bullies another child in front of his office, he will get in trouble. What does the child
do? He then bullies that child somewhere away from the office so not to get in trouble. No change in
behavior, just a change in location.
Mr. Lavoie also discusses understanding the primary and secondary needs of the child. If a primary
need, like hunger, is not met, the child will not be motivated until the primary need is fulfilled. Ms.
Pate continued with this idea and explained that once the primary needs are met, educators and parents
need to see what the secondary needs may be for the child. She explained these needs can be: status,
inquisitiveness, affiliation, and power as examples and once the secondary need is uncovered,
strategies and techniques can be used to help the child become and stay motivated. Ms. Pate provided
a handout which is attached to the LEAP section of the Loudoun County Public School’s website.
Laura Rheinauer, Associate Director, Educational Connections, Inc
Ms. Rheinauer works with children and parents on time management, organization and study skills.
One of the children she works with would do his work when he was with a tutor, however, when left
alone, he would not complete any work. The team that worked with the child had a “motivational
breakthrough” when they realized that he was not doing any work because he did not know where to
start. She explained that children need tools to help them initiate a task, sustain a task (keep at it),
shift tasks and inhibit things that take away from the tasks. They helped break tasks down for him so
starting the work was not an overwhelming big task, but a series of smaller tasks that led to the same
result – work being completed.
Showing children how to study and providing them with tools for managing their time and keeping
their work organized is critical to their success in school. These tools, along with providing praise to
the student, as Ms. Rheinauer stated the PNP effect – Positive-Negative-Positive, will help foster an
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environment that can help that child succeed. Instead of saying you missed four commas, a parent can
start about by saying the paragraph the child wrote was very inventive and creative (POSTIVE) and
that he may want to try and add some commas to help the reader with the flow of the paragraph
(NEGATIVE), but that the parent thoroughly enjoyed reading the paragraph (POSITIVE).
Ms. Rheinauer brought some ideas that she has used with children to help keep them organized and
understand time management. She highly recommended children use binder systems and that in the
binder system, one folder be designated a “Homework Folder”, so that the student has one place he
knows to find all of his homework. She also recommended that the folder have written on the left
side, “To be Completed” on the left side and on the right side, “Completed”, so the student knows
what need to be done and what needs to be handed in.
She also recommended to parents to have a weekly or biweekly “Binder Maintenance Night” so that
both parent and child can go through the back pack and binders together to help maintain organization.
Ms. Rheinauer also suggested that a family calendar will help families keep track of events as well as
show what time is available to study. She recommended that each member of the family have a color
code on the calendar so clearly identify which event is for whom.
To help students who receive papers home that are to be kept for cumulative tests (or to show a
student his/her improvement from the beginning of school until the end of school – more for the
primary grades), Ms. Rheinauer recommended an archive system using an accordion file. On the front
of the file, the parent and child can write the dates of when papers will be filed so that there is a set
time to make sure it is done.
For children who do not always study in the same location, Ms. Rheinauer recommended a portable
system, like a shower caddy, to hold loose leaf paper, pens, markers, erasers, so that all the materials
needed for homework can be moved easily where the child is studying.
From a time management perspective, she showed several different timers from kitchen timers to
bookmark timers to help children know how long they have to work on items or read. Many of the
items can be found at timetimer.com. For longer term projects, she talked about how children can
break down long-term project like research papers into smaller, incremental tasks; week one – pick a
topic; week two – research topic; week three - outline topic; week four – start writing on topic to help
make a large project seem more manageable to the student.
For study skills techniques, Ms. Rheinauer recommended teaching students to become active readers
either by highlighting main ideas or if highlighting is not allowed, use post it notes, or highlighting
tape. She also recommended that instead of the two column study guide (Main Idea and Brief
Description) have three columns (Main Idea, Brief Description and Draw Picture). She also
recommended finding what works to help your child study and encourage it. It could be squeezing a
stress ball, jumping rope, singing out the spelling words. She stated that when students use their
bodies to study, they tend to remember more.
Finally, she reemphasized that all of these techniques cannot work if the parent is not providing praise
for the efforts. Instead of nagging about getting homework done, try the PNP method (mentioned
above). Ms. Rheinhauer provided a handout which is attached to the LEAP section of the Loudoun
County Public School’s website
Janice Koslowski, Principal, Potomac Falls High School
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Prior to being the Principal at Potomac Falls High School, Ms. Koslowski was the Principal at Eagle
Ridge Middle School. The transition from fifth grade to sixth grade is a very challenging one for
many students, therefore Eagle Ridge instituted it’s INSPIRE program to help rising fifth graders and
their parents prepare for and be successful in middle school.
The INSPIRE Program stands for:
Involved in my school
New discoveries await me
Success in my education
Persistence in my achievement
Insight in to my future
Resolve to do my best
Engaged in my learning
The program allows for all rising fifth graders to spend one week for 2 ½ hours a day at Eagle Ridge
to prepare for school by following a curriculum based on three primary components:
Organization/Time Management; Study Skills; and Social/Emotional Adjustment. The curriculum
takes the components and breaks them down to areas to help the students adjust to middle school and
is as follows:
ORGANIZATION/TIME
MANAGEMENT
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•
•
•
•
Block Scheduling
Building Navigation
Organization of
materials
Time Management
How to handle
homework
•
STUDY SKILLS
•
•
•
•
Learning Assessment
Note taking
Studying for
Tests/Quizzes
How to read a
textbook
•
•
•
•
•
SOCIAL/EMOTIONAL
ADJUSTMENT
Review of Student
Rights/Responsibilities and
expectations of students as
community members
Cliques and looking beyond
our “box”
Bullying/cyber bullying
Conflict management/ Peer
Mediation
Addressing the individual
concerns of our rising 6th
graders
At the end of the week, students feel that they are in control of their new environment which gives
them a motivation to be involved students.
The other key element to this program is parental involvement. As Ms. Koslowski noted, when
parents understand, students understand. A parent must attend the program orientation and can also
attend a parent forum to better acquaint them to their rising middle schooler’s day. At the end of the
program, a written summary of the student’s progress for the week is provided. Ms. Koslowski
provided a handout which is attached to the LEAP section of the Loudoun County Public School’s
website
Question and Answer Session:
Q: To Mr. Koslowski: Is this program implemented throughout the County?
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A: Ms. Koslowski: Each Middle School has a similar program/model that fits the community of
which the school resides.
Q: To Ms. Rheinhauer: What was the website you referenced?
A: Ms. Koslowski: www.timetimer.com
Q: To the Panel: How do you motivate parents?
A: Ms. Rheinhauer: Hopefully, parents want to see their children be successful and that is their
motivation.
A: Ms. Koslowski: Partnership. It is important for the school and the parents to work together to find
out what to do for the child on all fronts.
Q: To Ms. Rheinhauer: We have a binder with multiple folders and it is not keeping my child
organized. I like the idea of the homework file what do you suggest I do?
A: Ms. Rheinhauer: It does help but I would first communicate with the teacher/teachers to see if
they are okay with your child using a slightly different system.
Q: To the Panel: Many of the kids in Loudoun County are exceptional and highly motivated. How
do you tell the difference between not motivated or bored?
A: Ms. Koslowski: Again, partnership. Teachers can let parents know the level of engagement in the
classroom to help determine their level of motivation. All children have access to Search
instructors who are assessing from kindergarten for student abilities to see if they can or should
enter a gifted program as they progress through school.
Q: To the Panel: Another question on the learned helplessness versus laziness. How can we tell the
difference?
A: Some students will stretch themselves to take healthy risks. Sometimes we provide too many
cushions that do not allow these students to take responsibility. We need to help them get to take
on that responsibility by demonstrating, doing the activity with them, watching them do the
activity and then praising them as they independently do the activity. Then establish this routine
and help the student understand that this is an intentional and not incidental routine.
Q: Not really a question, more of a tip. We have prepared a credit card for our son that provides him
with a reminder of what he needs to bring home, to check it to make sure he has everything before
he leaves. Another person said they made up an acronym to help her child bring home what is
needed.
Q. To Ms. Pate: Are there any workshops to help parents with these tools?
A. Ms. Pate: Yes, we hold about 48 workshops a year. Also the Richard Lavoie video is about an
hour and then I have a 45 minute dialogue with parents to go through these tools and techniques. I
can arrange a showing at the LCPS building or a showing at your school.
Q: To Ms. Rheinhauer: I can help at home with my son’s backpack, but how can I help my son with
his desk at school?
A: Ms. Rheinhauer: I suggest you use a box top and then the student can pull out the desk and see
what is there. I would clean it up with him so he knows why things are where they are and I would
keep his desk at home the same way as his desk at school. Or you can take a picture of it, so he can
see and be reminded what it is supposed to look like.
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Q. When should a parent help (bring in lunch, forgotten flute or homework) and when should she
show tough love and allow the student to learn a lesson?
A. Ms. Koslowski: Balance. From a parent’s perspective, at the beginning of the year my daughters
know they have so many chances for us to bring their forgotten item to school, then they are
responsible for the outcome. There is nothing wrong with reminding them; remember you forgot
your homework last week, are you sure you have everything? Or let them email their teacher with
forgotten homework – have them solve the problem.
Q. We have an affluent community, yet we are growing more diverse. What do we do as a schools
system to make sure no child falls through the cracks?
A. Ms. Koslowski: The teaching staff knows which students have ample parental support and those
that do not have that kind of support. Teachers will find out about a student’s background to help
determine what additional support he/she may need.
LCPS Superintendent Dr. Hatrick:
Dr. Hatrick thanked the panel for a very informative set of presentations and stated that as much
progress as we make on what motivates kids, everyone is different. We do know that organizational
skills will serve them for a lifetime and those that are organized have a much better life. On a
different subject, we are entering the season of “B’s” –Boundaries and Budgets. Dr. Hatrick also
noted that the week of November 16-20th is American Education Week.
Boundaries Update:
Stone Bridge Boundary proposal is from Stone Bridge to Tuscarora and is on the LCPS website. One
proposal would move students the traditional way – 9th and 10th grades go in a phase-in proposal.
Another proposal would have the current students stay at Stone Bridge with all the 8th graders going to
Tuscarora.
The meeting to discuss these proposals will be held on Thursday December 3rd at 6:30 pm at the LCSB
Administration Building and the School Board plans to vote on December 8th.
Budget Update:
On November 10th, The CIP (Capital Improvement Plan) budget for the next six years was presented
and can be found on the LCSP website. If you want a printed copy, you can call the Planning Office
(571-252-1050) and they will print it out and send it through the Pony mail (at the schools). Dr.
Hatrick stated that a key feature is that the recommended budget for all of the projects needed for the
next six years is $963,400,000 and that the Board of Supervisors has stated that the amount funded
will be $472,580,000. That means that the top priority projects will be funding which are the (1) twostory elementary school in Leesburg, (2) Moorefield Station Elementary School; (3) design work for
the HS 6 in the Ashburn area; and (4) renovating the Parkview Science Labs.
Dr. Hatrick noted that an important item to understand about our building model is that LCPS is the
gold standard for building in VA. Our buildings cost less per square foot and have less per square foot
per student than anywhere in the State.
There will be two public input sessions to the Board of Supervisors:
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December 8th at 6:30 pm at the BOS Administration building in Leesburg; and
December 10th at 6:30 pm at the LCPS Administration Building.
Lori Stevens informed the audience that the next LEAP meeting will be Wednesday, December 9th at
7:30 pm and the topic will be “Innovation Nation – STEM Education”. The meeting adjourned at 9:10
pm.
Submitted by Kristen Thatcher
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