The Best Motivational Videos For Students

by TeachThought Staff

What are you going to teach tomorrow?

While you have your ducks mostly in a row, you might be looking for that one resource–a video, an image, a prompt–to finish your masterpiece. Or you’re behind and need something–anything–as a bell-ringer to get them working while you wrap your head around the day and week.

These videos focus on motivation–specifically motivating students by helping them see the big picture. These videos are all charged with hyperbole, rhetoric, and emotion. While the tones, themes, sounds, and visuals make powerful cases for motivation, what you’re motivating them for and towards is on you.

Yes, ideally motivation comes from curiosity and self-awareness, not rah-rah speeches you show them from YouTube–so let’s use both. Prime your inquiry-based learning unit with a video, offer them a basic model, then unleash them and watch them fly.

As always, review all content before sharing with your class, obviously. We try to check all content for language and other ‘stuff’ that could get you an angry phone call from a parent, but sometimes things slip through the cracks: links change, content is replaced, or we just plain miss stuff.

The Best Motivational Videos for Students In And Out Of The Classroom

1. How Bad Do You Want It? by Eric Thomas

2. Why Do We Fall?

When you want to succeed as bad as you want your next breath, then you’ll begin to have an idea of what success–at the highest level–requires.

3. The Greatest Speech Ever Made by Charlie Chaplin

Charlie Chaplin wasn’t just a tramp with a cane. He was also capable of fierce emotion and sweeping insights into human culture, as this video below demonstrates.