They are not achieving these goals because they genuinely enjoy learning. Riley goes on to suppose that there is a lack of intrinsic motivation in traditional classrooms because it is more difficult to introduce. With all these external outcomes, like rewards, great test scores, etc., students are more likely to work towards these external outcomes than to learn because they “desire the knowledge.”

Riley than goes on to discuss others’ stand points on the idea of intrinsic motivation. She discusses critics of intrinsic motivation; those who believe the concept doesn’t exist or hasn’t been “defined yet.” Riley then moves on to compare intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation with telling her readers about an experiment conducted by other researches. The experiment gave two groups puzzles and awarded one group with cash prizes to motivate them to do the puzzle. Riley stated that the results were that the group who was awarded the cash spent little to no time with the puzzles and that the group that was awarded nothing found interest in the puzzle. This research reinforces the idea of intrinsic motivation by showing that those who were not working at achieving something for an external outcome, were pushed by intrigue or interest in their task. Riley then continues on to discuss the factors that must be present in order for intrinsic motivation to flourish within a student. She discusses how autonomy and competence must be present for a student to possess intrinsic motivation. If a student feels they have the choice in what they are learning and an “opportunity for self direction” they are more likely to have intrinsic motivation. She contrasts this with a situation where a reward is involved and states that a sense of choice will decrease. Riley moves on to refer to a study conducted on Israeli students that compared educators who gave their pupils a higher sense of choice and self direction as opposed to an educator who had a more controlling approach. This experiment found that educators that allowed their students a higher amount of autonomy had a better outcome than those who were in a more control oriented classroom. We can link this back to the comparison of home schooling and traditional classrooms. Learning from the home allows the student a greater sense of autonomy which, as the study above proves, allows the student a more positive outcome as opposed to the student who learned in a m