ASU Goal Orientation Worksheet

ALL THE DETAILS BELOW:

Overview

Game shows, sporting games, and competitions of all sorts are designed to drive our motivations. However, the environmental conditions or the ways the rules are set up push participants toward different goals. For example, the Kahoot! game that was part of the self-check for this lesson had a leader board at the end. Students with a mastery approach to this assignment would take the self-check quiz as intended and go back to the readings if they performed poorly. On the other hand, one minor change could shift the entire perspective. What if the Kahoot! was used to award extra points for the top winners, or penalize the lowest performers? This would certainly change students’ motivation to take the Kahoot! But, it would also impact many other things as well. 

Details

Consider the questions below as you reflect on the implications of goal theory in our everyday lives. 

1) Consider the following questions about goal orientation and use reasoning to answer the following questions? 

–Would a person with a purely mastery orientation likely to cheat? Why/Why not? — USE EVIDENCE FROM THE LEARNING MATERIALS TO JUSTIFY YOUR RESPONSE.

–When given a choice between an easy competition or a hard competition, what would a person with mastery orientation choose and what would a person with a performance orientation choose? Why? — USE EVIDENCE FROM THE LEARNING MATERIALS TO JUSTIFY YOUR RESPONSE.

2) Select two well known individuals engaged in a game show or competition and identify specifically what type of goal orientation you think they align with (e.g., mastery, performance approach, or performance avoidance). Be sure to select individuals that align with two of the three approaches and provide enough of an explanation with context as evidence so that your instructor can understand why you selected that orientation and evaluate your understanding of the content based on your explanation.

Note: They can be either fictional (e.g., Beth Harmon from Queens Gambit) or real-life (e.g., Lance Armstrong the cyclist, Ken Jennings who had a very long Jeopardy! streak). 

3) The game show “The Weakest Link” was set up with rules that specifically emphasized individuals performance avoidance goals. Nobody wanted to be the weakest link and get voted off! Select a different game show or competition and identify what type of goal orientation it emphasizes (e.g., mastery, performance approach, or performance avoidance) and provide enough of an explanation and context as evidence so that your instructor can understand why you selected that orientation and evaluate your understanding of the content based on your explanation.