| There continues to be an increasing awareness regarding the importance of improving students' motivation to learn. However, few studies have examined the effectiveness of motivation interventions at an early age level. Investigations examining effective motivation interventions with young, Hispanic children are virtually non-existent. This study explored the impact of a motivation-training program on first, second, third, and fourth grade students' achievement related thoughts and behaviors, academic related beliefs, goal setting practices, intrinsic motivation levels, and academic performance.;A total of 64 elementary school students participated in this investigation. All students were administered pre- and post-test measures. Assessments were designed to measure students' level of motivation (Young Children's Academic Intrinsic Motivation Inventory), academic achievement ( Wechsler Individual Achievement Test-Second Edition-Abbreviated), goal orientation (Patterns of Adaptive Learning Survey), academic efficacy (Patterns of Adaptive Learning Survey), locus of control (Nowicki-Strickland Locus of Control Scale), and achievement motivation (Test of Imagination). Students were matched according to grade level, gender, and ethnicity. Students were randomly assigned to the treatment or control group.;The intervention phase of this research involved participation in a twelve-week motivation-training program designed to promote the development of intrinsic motivation, goal-orientation, academic related beliefs, risk taking, achievement motivation, and academic performance. The motivation-training program infused cognitive-behavioral strategies to introduce and encourage achievement thinking. Action strategies were designed to increase students' achievement and intrinsic motivation.;To explore the possibility of differences between the treatment and control group, multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA) was utilized. The MANCOVA revealed that group factor (treatment or control) did not significantly influence the combined dependent variables, Wilks' Λ = .941, F(6,51) = .538, p = .777. The multivariate eta2 = .059, indicated a "medium" effect size (Green, Salkind, & Akey, 2000, p.151).;Analysis of correlational coefficients did indicate significant correlations between the dependent variable intrinsic motivation and academic efficacy, r(62) = .37, p = .003 and goal orientation r(62) = .65, p ≤ .001. In addition to intrinsic motivation, the dependent variable academic efficacy was also significantly correlated with goal orientation r(62) = .37, p = .003.;These results indicate that additional studies are needed to determine best methods of measuring the impact of achievement motivation training with young, Hispanic students. Conclusions and recommendations for future studies are presented. |
