Achievement Motivation Training for Low-Achieving Eighth and Tenth Grade Boys

Abstract

An achievement motivation training course was given to 24 teachers in San Mateo County, California. They then trained 136 eighth and tenth grade students (four weekends during the fall school semester). Student training was conducted in two settings. About one-half of the students were trained in a local YMCA camp. The remaining students were trained in their local school setting. Evaluation of the trained students’ grades in mathematics, English, and social studies over the school year showed that trained students performed significantly better in mathematics than a randomly selected control group of students. Evaluation of pre- and post-training standardized test scores in science and social studies showed that the trained students performed significantly higher on the science tests than did control students.