Purpose-Driven Teaching: Why It Works and How to Start

I graduated college with a bachelor’s degree and a 2.75 GPA.

That number reflected how I had approached most of my academic life: do just enough to get by. From about middle school on, my primary reason for putting in any effort at school was simple: advancement. Advance to the next assignment so I could move on to the next unit. Advance to the next grade so I could eventually advance my way out of school altogether.

And in the schools I attended, I could advance with minimal effort. I could BS essays, study the night before big tests and still earn a passing grade, and coast through group projects by letting the “A student” do all the work. My goal was to get a C, keep my mom off my back, and make sure school didn’t get in the way of me enjoying life.

In fact, I actually started college as a Recreation and Leisure major (that’s a real thing)! When I went home for Thanksgiving that first semester, my grandfather—who had been saving my whole life to help with tuition—asked me what my major was.

I said: “Recreation and Leisure.”

He paused: “No it’s not. What’s your major?”

I laughed: “No, Pops. Really. That’s what it’s called. It’s a rec and leisure degree.”

Again, he said: “No it’s not. What’s your major?”

So I had to pick a different degree, and chose English instead. I had always been decent at reading and writing, and if that was a respectable enough major to get me through college and keep my family off my back, that’s what I would do.

How Discovering Purpose Altered My Life

For years, I treated school like a system to navigate, not an opportunity to grow. I followed the rules, earned the credits, and moved on. This didn’t just end after high school.

But something changed at the very end of my senior year of college. I took a job tutoring a high school student in English, earning a whopping $7.25 an hour, just to make a little extra money. I didn’t think much of it at the time. I wasn’t trained to tutor, and just figured I’d show her how I write and hope it helped.

What I didn’t expect was how much it would matter. Not just to her, as her confidence grew and her grades improved, but to me. I saw what happened when someone discovered their ability to improve. I was able to share what expertise I had with someone else and, as a result, watched a student transform—not just in skill, but in how she saw and carried herself. It felt like a superpower I didn’t know I had until then.

I realized I had something to offer. I could help people grow.

This job gave me purpose. It gave my learning a direction it had never had before. And so when I graduated from college, I took the next natural step: I got a job at a long-term care pharmacy packing pills from 9 to 5.

Not what you expected?

Well, that pharmacy job paid $12.25 an hour, which was exactly how much I needed to support myself while I went to school at night to earn a teaching certificate. For the first time in my life, I was developing work ethic. Working hard wasn't optional. I had to work 40 hours a week during the day and then another 40 at night if I wanted to accomplish my goal of becoming an educator.

Going From a C Student to a 4.0

I suddenly became the kind of student I had never been. I showed up to every class. Led group projects. Wrote 20-page papers. And graduated with a 4.0.

I didn’t get smarter in those two years. My brain didn’t grow exponentially between my bachelor’s degree and my master’s. Instead, I found a reason to care about my education. For the first time in my life, I discovered a purpose for it.

Purpose Is Fuel

Purpose is fuel. It turns passive students into engaged learners. It makes the work matter. And when the work matters, students dig deeper, think harder, and grow in ways no grade or form of advancement ever demanded.

None of this is to say school has no purpose, or that there wasn’t purpose embedded in the learning when I was growing up. But what often happens in school is that we fail to articulate the purpose of the work to students. It’s almost like it’s assumed. “Of course you go to school. Of course you advance from one grade to the next.”

Student: “Why am I learning grammar?”
Teacher: “Because it’s in the Common Core.”
Student: “When am I ever going to use this?”
Teacher: “I don’t know, but your ability to demonstrate it on a test is how you’ll be evaluated. And it’s how I’ll be evaluated as a teacher.”

Many students don’t thrive in school. That’s not usually an intelligence or capability problem. It’s a motivation problem. And one powerful way to increase motivation is to embed relevance and purpose into learning.

Research backs this up. A large-scale study published in Science found that high school students who were asked to reflect on how their schoolwork connected to their personal goals showed greater engagement, improved academic performance, and more long-term persistence than those who weren’t.¹ Another study from the Brookings Institution emphasized that students who understand the relevance of what they’re learning are more likely to retain knowledge and apply it in real-world settings.²

When students understand the relevance of what they’re learning, they pay closer attention, take more ownership, and retain it longer. Purpose isn't an extra in education; it should be the driver. It’s the difference between going through the motions and engaging deeply in their work.

Making “Regular Units” More Purposeful

For instance, I once had my students create cookbooks with very simple recipes for refugees in our area. We emphasized how important excellent spelling and grammar would be. For people new to the English language, proper punctuation is crucial. And so, as part of that project, my students learned spelling and grammar. I used my tried-and-true grammar unit, which actually looks pretty traditional.

But now my students were more engaged, because the purpose of learning grammar—which can be tedious and even a little boring—was meaningful.

“If we want to serve our audience of refugees, we need to learn proper punctuation.”

There was now a deeper reason to pay attention during the grammar lesson. This led to more engaged students who were learning the material at a deeper level.

Articulating the Purpose of the Content of Your Class

Purpose doesn’t require a big project or a total curriculum overhaul. Sometimes, it starts with simply helping students understand why a lesson matters.

Take the example of the refugee cookbook. The grammar instruction itself didn’t change. I still used direct modeling, repetitive practice, and even pulled out a worksheet or two. But the reason behind the grammar mattered. Students weren’t just memorizing rules for a quiz. They were learning how to communicate clearly for someone who truly needed clarity.

Every teacher can do this. You don’t need a major unit or outside partner to bring purpose into your class. It starts with a simple question:

“How does this content connect to the real world, to our students’ lives, or to the kind of person we want them to become?”

Here are a few ways to start:

• Connect content to authentic audiences: Who would benefit from students learning this well? Can they share their work with someone other than you?
• Frame lessons with a real-world “why”: Instead of “we’re learning punctuation because it’s on the test,” try “we’re learning this so people understand what we mean when we speak or write.”
• Ask students to reflect on the purpose themselves: Try questions like “Where could this be useful outside of school?” or “How might someone use this in a future job or role?”
• Revisit your own “why”: Remind yourself what makes this content valuable beyond school. If you believe it matters, your students are more likely to as well.

When students understand the purpose behind what they’re learning, engagement increases and the learning becomes more durable. Not because the material changed, but because its meaning did.

¹ Source: Yeager, D. S., et al. (2014). Using design thinking to improve psychological interventions: The case of the growth mindset during the transition to high school. Science, 345(6200), 1360-1363.

² Source: Farrington, C. A., et al. (2012). Teaching Adolescents to Become Learners. University of Chicago Consortium on Chicago School Research / Brookings Institution.