Individuals only learn if they want to. You may be lucky enough to teach highly motivated learners who are keen to learn no matter how you design your teaching, but more likely, you will need to get them motivated. Many learners may feel confident about their own information literacy and not see the need for any specialist input, so this can be an extra challenge when teaching.

Fundamentally, there are two different kinds of motivation:

Lublin (2003) summarizes the characteristics of learner motivation. Highly motivated learners may be interested in the subject matter and enjoy learning for learning's sake, taking a ‘deep’ approach to learning, so they try hard to learn thoroughly, internalizing all the information and using practical and reflective opportunities to turn it into personal knowledge. Those learners who focus simply on the requirements of a qualification, rather than the wider subject in general, will usually take a ‘surface’ or perhaps a strategic approach to learning (strategic learners do not just want to pass, they want to obtain high marks and are capable of being very organized to achieve this). In the latter cases, your learners may not engage fully with the learning process and the learning may not last. Be warned though: these distinctions can sometimes be quite glib and the effectiveness of learning is not tested until assessment or sometimes after the assessment process has been completed. Strategic learners can often pick up new content very effectively and move on quickly.

Remember as well that many participants may not come to your session with a positive self-concept of themselves as learners.