7.4 SOCIOCULTURAL VIEWS OF MOTIVATION

Emphasize participation in communities of practice. People engage in activities to maintain their identities and their interpersonal relations within the community. Thus, students are motivated to learn if they are members of a classroom or school community that values learning. Just as we learn to speak and dress and conduct ourselves in restaurants or shopping malls by being socialized-watching and learning from more capable members of the culture-we also learn to be students by watching and learning from the members of our community. In other words, we learn by the company we keep.