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      Source: Adapted from Ryan & Deci, 2009.

       Figure 1.2: Venn diagram for autonomy, competence, and relatedness.

      And so, if launching learning is about creating a positive environment (and beginning to build positive relatedness toward the content), consolidating learning is about building a situation for students that allows autonomy and competence all students need before they can engage. There are also relatedness elements to any consolidating lesson, because this should also be a highly collaborative structure.

      Collaborative structures do build relatedness, but they also support both the autonomy of a lesson and give necessary supports for students to gain competence. They are very important. In this book, I try to include these elements to engage you as readers. You’ll see those efforts in the presence of multiple strategy choices—you have the autonomy to choose which appeal to you. You will feel competent when I highlight a strategy that you know is a strength in your classroom or when you recognize a student engagement mindset and have antidotes of your own that work with them. I also share personal anecdotes and direct questions to establish a positive relationship between us.

      The following sections discuss autonomy, competence, and relatedness in turn. In later chapters, as you read about the student engagement mindsets, I’ll describe a specific recipe of autonomy, competence, and relatedness that each mindset needs most.

       Autonomy

      Essentially, we all want control over what we do and where we go. That is autonomy. Our brains are hardwired to achieve this (Deci & Ryan, 2014). Every person experiences this feeling. Parents may easily see this in their child’s stages, from toddlerhood to teenagehood—insisting on dressing oneself despite a long process and resulting eclectic ensemble, to audibly resisting a curfew.

      As young people, students crave this same independence. However, much of the traditional education process is scripted. The teacher has roles. The students have roles. Flipping that approach to allow students to take the teacher role can help increase autonomy. I know a mathematics interventionist who does this. Her students come with identified skill gaps, and usually they have been sitting quietly during that topic. They appear withdrawn and disengaged. When they work with the interventionist who, during small-group lessons, has students lead games with each other, the interventionist reports that the students love it and do not consider it a burden (T. Remington, personal communication, August 16, 2018).

      How do teachers in your school allow autonomy? Do you consult with students to see what topics interest them most and how they want to learn about them? In Better Learning Through Structured Teaching, Fisher and Frey (2008) guide educators to student autonomy: a gradual release of responsibility. See table 1.1.

Table 1.1: Gradual Release of Responsibility

      Source: Fisher & Frey, 2008.

      This is the type of instruction that should occur in every classroom every day. The gradual release of responsibility gives a student the structured autonomy for his or her own learning. Student responsibility for learning increases as teacher responsibility for instruction decreases. A teacher assumes the most responsibility when giving explicit instruction, ensuring student understanding of what they are about to learn and why (Fisher, 2008). Then, students and the teacher work together on the learning during guided instruction. This gives the teacher a chance to both model thinking and gauge student comprehension via prompting, facilitating, questioning, or leading tasks that increase comprehension (Fisher, 2008). The next shift in responsibility moves students to collaborative work with peers, where they use problem solving, discussion, and negotiation (Fisher, 2008). They have a chance to play with ideas, take risks, and teach and learn from each other. Autonomy, competence, and relatedness are strong components of this step. Finally, students receive a chance to independently apply what they learn. A major misconception is that this final layer is the assessment; it is not. Students must have individual practice before a teacher does a final assessment.

      Decreasing the teacher’s responsibility creates more opportunities for him or her to work with individual students and small groups, allowing for daily formative assessment and feedback. The most effective teaching strategies to improve student achievement, as researcher and professor John Hattie (2012) notes—classroom discussions, clarity, reciprocal teaching, positive formative assessment, cognitive task analysis, self-questioning, and self-reporting grades—can only occur in a gradual release of responsibility format.

      It is important to note that this is not a linear shifting of responsibility, but the model’s message is clear: scaffold students toward independence through guided instruction and peer collaboration. The gradual release of responsibility is a way to conceptualize consolidating learning.

      Do you see the gradual release of responsibility in your instruction? Do you intentionally build its elements into your lesson plans? If you could add one step to your class tomorrow, which would it be and how would you accomplish it?

       Competence

      We are creatures of habit for a reason; routines are safe and outcomes are predictable. We feel successful, which adds to the sense that we are capable, or competent. We develop prototypes and schemas for how the world works, and we work to master that system. Cognitive psychologists Jean Piaget (1926) and Eleanor Rosch (1973) conceived of the concepts of prototypes and schemas for how the world works, and Ryan and Deci (2009) claim that we work to master those prototypes and schemas. In Drive, author Daniel H. Pink (2009) labels this phenomenon mastery. Pink (2009) points out the irony—that mastery is entirely elusive. There is always a deeper level to obtain. We push through frustration in hopes of achieving the excitement of mastering a concept or skill, but it is mastery that drives us to do that. Competence enables higherlevel performance and risk taking that beget greater levels of success (Pink, 2009).

      What happens when we don’t feel competent? Often, we’ll disengage. Disengagement is strongly associated with a student’s beliefs about his or her academic ability (Patrick, Skinner, & Connell, 1993, as cited in Legault, Green-Demers, & Pelletier, 2006). Students cannot begin a complex task if they believe they lack competence, even though they may have the skills to begin the work (Deed, 2008b). When the student sees the learning as a mountain, he or she would rather walk around the mountain than face the perceived insurmountable challenges of the climb. Feeling competent means students are more likely to seek further development in an area. Moreover, students’ level of perceived competence is a better predictor of performance than their actual ability (Pajares & Schunk, 2002).

      Do your students feel competent in the subject that you teach? How do you enable that feeling in students, and how can you tell when they feel it?

      We move to self-determination theory’s relatedness element next.

       Relatedness

      The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle said that humans are social animals. We seek connections with others. We want to feel valued. Young people, in particular, come with a strong

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