Struck by his students' often hostile and apathetic responses to assignments and instruction and hoping to contribute to the knowledge of motivation, Dan LaSalle began to take an inquiry stance on his own practice. He studied his practice on three fronts with the help of an off-site teacher research group: (1) how his inquiry question changes as a developing urban educator who attempts to incorporate findings and suggestions from motivational psychology without being a student in the academy; (2) the effectiveness of classroom strategies to increase student motivation as a second-year teacher; and (3) the student outcomes he observed. Each of these fronts influenced the others and his practice as the school year continued. LaSalle reports on these influences throughout the academic year and concludes this article by discussing the implications of his narrative for practitioner research, the assessment of student motivation, the role of academic research on student motivation for educators, and the potential contributions of novice educators' voices in education. This article represents a teacher's efforts to synthesize academic research and pedagogical strategies with a developing competence as an educator for impoverished, under-motivated, and academically behind students.