Teachers & Motivation: Applying Maslow To The Educator
Why do teachers come to work?
What’s important to educators? From the kindergarten teacher to the college professor, what drives the professional? Some cite an altruistic urge to better mankind. Others say they can’t get jobs anywhere else and just care about a paycheck.
Maybe motivation depends on the situation. Turning to an oldie but goodie, analyzing the role of the teacher with Maslow’s hierarchy as a guide demonstrates how different motivations dominate different times.
Maslow’s somewhat understood paradigm
His famous 1943 article, “A Theory of Human Motivation,” has become a touchstone of pop psychology. Every psychology-related class from junior high to grad school lays out the bare bones of the theory. Usually incorrectly.
Maslow’s pyramid diagram that you remember from your organizational behavior class? It’s not in his article. He lays out the five needs in order, physiological, safety, love, esteem, and self-actualization, but never…
