The teacher notices that Sami is very smart but gets poor grades. She realizes he is holding himself back to not appear smarter than his less successful friends. To motivate Sami while preserving his social bonds, the teacher assigns Sami and his friends a group project to perform a Shakespeare play in a modern context. She promises a reward and provides feedback and support. Her goal is to use the students' social motivation to help them achieve cognitive goals and learn self-regulated learning.

1. SRL - Study Case
Ana, Antonella, Fatiu

2. Case SRL/Motivation
Sami is a very smart junior
high school student. The
teacher notices it, but
she cannot understand
why he does not get good
grades. He delivers very
good reports, but always
overdue. He always
leaves blank questions on
the test, generally the
easy ones.

3. Case
SRL/Motivation
One day after class the teacher sees
Sami with a group of classmates
who do not perform well in school.
She then realizes that Sami is
handicapping himself in order not
to look smarter than his friends.
The teacher wants to do
something in order to help
Sami develop his mastery goal
and yet keep his social
affiliation goal

4. Discussion of the case

5. Solution for the case
Concepts to be developed:
• Goals of students: cognitive and social
goals
• External motivation: teacher wants to
motivate the students
• Regulation of motivation
• Tools for regulation
• Reward and feedback

6. Our Solution
In order to motivate the students the
teacher comes up with a different group
task. She assigns Sami and his friends in
the same group.
She thinks the task should rise student's
interest, their feeling of affiliation, and
give reward and usefulness.

7. Our Solution
The teacher gives the group the following
assignment:
They need to read a Shakespeare play
and perform it in a contemporary
context.
The teacher promises a reward at the end
of the task, but she doesn't tell what it
is.

8. Our solution
The teacher chooses a leader for each
group and she appoints Sami for his.
She tells him to help his group to do
well.
During the task the teacher motivates the students by
giving feedback and scaffolding their actions. She
introduces a calendar to use, in order to plan their
meetings and task development.
Before the presentations in the classrooms the teacher
reveals the reward: the best group will perform in front
of the whole school.

9. Our Solution
With this task the teacher aimed to use the
social goals to make the students achieve
cognitive goals. In the process she also
wanted to help the students regulate
their motivation by giving rewards,
feedbacks and scaffolding their actions.