David J. Shernoff

Student Engagement in High School Classrooms from the Perspective of Flow Theory

We present a conceptualization of student engagement based on the culmination of concentration, interest, and enjoyment (i.e., flow). Using a longitudinal sample of 526 high school students across the U.S., we investigated how adolescents spent their time in high school and the conditions under which they reported being engaged. Participants experienced increased engagement when the perceived challenge of the task and their own skills were high and in balance, the instruction was relevant, and the learning environment was under their control. Participants were also more engaged in individual and group work versus listening to lectures, watching videos, or taking exams. Suggestions to increase engagement, such as focusing on learning activities that support students’ autonomy and provide an appropriate level of challenge for students’ skills, conclude the article.

Parental Influences on Achievement Motivation and Student Engagement

Underachievement and school disengagement have serious consequences, both at individual and societal levels. In this chapter, we adopt a strength-based perspective to examine the multiple ways in which parents foster achievement motivation and student engagement. Our theoretical orientation is grounded in Bronfenbrenner’s (1977) ecological systems theory in which the child is situated at the center of increasingly distal and interconnected spheres of influence, from family and school to community and societal institutions. Given the increasingly diverse composition of our nation’s schools, we place a premium on understanding how varied ethnic and cultural models of learning and socialization, particularly among low-income families, differentially influence parents’ educational socialization strategies and how these come to affect children’s developing achievement-related beliefs and behaviors. We examine several theoretical models of engagement, motivation, and parental involvement and highlight some notable research efforts that seek to explain parents’ roles in fostering motivation and engagement. We then share several models of innovative programs that have experienced success in creating authentic partnerships between parents, children, schools, and communities toward the goal of stemming the tide of underachievement and disengagement.

Individual and Situational Factors Related to the Experience of Flow in Adolescence

A fundamental issue pursued by researchers in positive psychology involves defining what constitutes a good life and understanding how individuals can create one. From the perspective of flow theory, “a good life is one that is characterized by complete absorption in what one does” (Nakamura and Csikszentmihalyi in Handbook of positive psychology. Oxford, New York, 2002). Born out of a desire to understand intrinsically motivated activity, flow refers to a state of optimal experience characterized by total absorption in the task at hand: a merging of action and awareness in which the individual loses track of both time and self, The flow state is experientially positive, and out of the flow experience emerges a desire to replicate the experience. Over the past three decades, Csikszentmihalyi and colleagues have developed theoretical constructs and empirical research tools to better understand the nature, origins, and consequences of this state of optimal experience called flow. In this chapter, we describe the flow model and then present data analyses in which we explore the personal traits and contextual conditions associated with the experience of flow among adolescents in the United States. We demonstrate the utility of hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) for exploring flow using a complex data set characterized by repeated measures.

The influence of the high school classroom environment on learning as mediated by student engagement

Classroom learning environments are frequently assumed to exert their influence on learning indirectly, via student engagement. The present study examined the influence of environmental challenge and support on learning in high school classrooms, and the potential for student engagement to act as a mediator in this relationship. Data were collected in seven classrooms in six different subjects in several US high schools. The 104 students in these classes participated in the Experience Sampling Method (ESM) and reported records (N = 254) of engagement, learning, and related experiential variables. Measures of the learning environment were also rated from video footage. Variations in the learning environment observed and rated from video were linked to students’ real-time reactions to instruction synchronously. Results indicated that environmental support, but not environmental challenge, was significantly related with perceived learning. Multi-level path analyses revealed that the association between environmental supports and learning was mediated by student engagement. This mediating relationship held specifically for two components of environmental support: Motivational supports and supportive relationships. Implications are discussed for the benefit of practicing school psychologists, including strategies for facilitating motivational and relational support to enhance student engagement.

Assessing teacher education and professional development needs for the implementation of integrated approaches to STEM education

BackgroundGiven the growing interest in, and relevance of, integrated approaches to STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education, there is an urgent desire to understand the challenges and obstacles to developing and implementing integrated STEM curricula and instruction. In this article, we present phase 1 of a two-phase needs assessment study to identify challenges and needs of promoting integrated approaches in STEM education. Utilizing a key informant approach, 22 K-12 teachers and four administrators selected as potential leaders in STEM education in an unidentified state on the East Coast of the USA were interviewed. Participants were asked to identify challenges and perceived supports to conduct integrated STEM education. Questions were open-ended in order to inform a larger, state-wide questionnaire study in phase 2 to be reported subsequently and were qualitatively coded.ResultsSeveral distinctive themes were identified as described by teacher participants when discussing challenges and obstacles of implementing integrated STEM education, as well as supports that would be most helpful in overcoming them. Participants also provided specific suggestions for teacher education needed to support integrated STEM education.ConclusionsPreliminary findings suggest that many teachers are interested in integrated approaches to STEM, but do not believe they are well prepared to implement them. Teachers and administrators also suggest that adequate preparation in integrated STEM would entail a considerable rethinking and redesigning of pre-service courses and in-service workshops. Findings provide a starting point for better understanding teacher needs in integrated STEM and a springboard for further study.

Measuring Student Engagement in High School Classrooms and What We Have Learned

This chapter explains the methodology undergirding many of the studies on which this book is based. Those studies examine students’ engagement from moment to moment while in educational contexts with the experience sampling method, or ESM. Respondents of these studies carried a paging device (usually a programmable wristwatch), which signals them at random moments throughout the day. Each time they were signaled, they completed a brief questionnaire in which they answered open-ended and scaled questions about the day and time of the signal, their activities and thoughts, as well as the cognitive, affective, and motivational qualities of their experience. To study engagement, my colleagues and I analyzed ESM reports occurring while in schools exclusively, and especially while in classrooms, from the Sloan Study of Youth and Social Development (SSYSD), a nationally representative study conducted at the University of Chicago. On average, high school students report being less engaged while in classrooms than in almost any other setting in which they spend significant time. Students felt significantly more engaged, however, given certain perceptions of both instruction and themselves. Concentration, attentiveness, and overall engagement were significantly enhanced, for example, when instruction was perceived as challenging, relevant, and appropriately challenging and when students perceived themselves to be active, in control, and competent. Students were also significantly more engaged in group and individual work than while listening to a lecture or watching TV or a video. Students in our sample were also significantly more engaged in their nonacademic courses than in their academic ones.

The Nature of Engagement in Schools

In this chapter, several conceptualizations of student engagement were evaluated, and those that stress the interaction between an organism and its environment were favored over those that stress positive or successful adaptation to school environments specifically. The latter are particularly vulnerable to idealizing procedural engagement (i.e., appearing to be engaged in terms of following the procedures of schooling) rather than substantive engagement (characterized by a persistent depth of cognitive processing and emotional involvement). Similarly, student engagement was distinguished from motivation thought to be primarily the property of an individual. Many theories of motivation help to illuminate obstacles to engagement in schools. A conceptualization of engagement was adapted in which concentration, enjoyment, and interest are simultaneously heightened. Each of these experiential traits is fundamental to growing and learning, as detailed in this chapter. When concentration, interest, and enjoyment are simultaneously elevated, individuals have experiences similar to flow that seem to fuse aspects of both leisure and work experiences. Engagement that is both work-like and play-like is herein considered to describe meaningful engagement.

Learning from Research on Youth Engagement During Out-of-School Time

In this chapter, research is reviewed, revealing that out-of-school time, and structured after-school programs in particular, provides an optimal developmental context for fostering engagement and positive youth development. Several studies using the experience sampling method (ESM) are then presented contrasting the experience of middle school students while at a variety of school-based after-school programs with their experience when they were not attending organized programs during after-school hours. While attending the after-school programs, the participants reported higher intrinsic motivation, concentrated effort, and positive mood states at the after-school programs than elsewhere after school. When in the after-school programs, students were the most engaged during sports and arts enrichment activities. Affect was significantly higher while doing academic enrichment activities compared to homework, suggesting that a positive emotional response was enhanced when academic work was approached as an individual or group activity that allowed students to demonstrate their skills and initiative and to gain feedback from adults and peers. Furthermore, the difference in quality of experience when in programs versus elsewhere was a significant predictor of a variety of academic and developmental outcomes including English and math grades. Community service and civic engagement opportunities are also discussed, as such opportunities are frequently found to be highly engaging and rewarding. Research on these and other after-school experiences is beginning to answer the question of what types of programs provide high quality experiences for youth, and to illuminate the nature of youth engagement with learning, whether inside or outside of the classroom.

Teacher Perceptions of Their Curricular and Pedagogical Shifts: Outcomes of a Project-Based Model of Teacher Professional Development in the Next Generation Science Standards

In this study, we conducted a model of teacher professional development (PD) on the alignment of middle and high school curricula and instruction to the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSSs), and evaluated the impact of the PD on teacher participants’ development. The PD model included a 4-day summer academy emphasizing project-based learning (PBL) in the designing of NGSS-aligned curricula and instruction, as well as monthly follow-up Professional Learning Community meetings throughout the year providing numerous opportunities for teachers to develop and implement lesson plans, share results of lesson writing and implementation (successes and challenges), provide mutual feedback, and refine curricula and assessments. Following the summer academy, six female teachers were interviewed about their current conceptualizations of NGSS, the extent of curricular shifts made that are required by NGSS, their self-perceptions regarding their level of accomplishment in curriculum writing, and the benefits of the PD in reaching their goals related to NGSS. Interviews were supplemented with an analysis of lesson plans written while participating in the PD program. The interviewed teachers suggested that they had made important conceptual and pedagogical shifts required by NGSS as they participated in the PD, and also noted a variety of challenges as they made this shift. While all teachers were relative novices at NGSS curriculum writing before the PD, most of the teachers interviewed felt that they had achieved the status of an “accomplished novice” following the summer academy. An analysis of their written lessons suggested a great range in the extent to which teachers effectively applied their understanding of NGSS to write lessons aligned to NGSS. Interviewed teachers believed that the PD model was helpful to their development as science teachers, and all reported that there were no aspects of the PD that were not helpful. Even though most teachers obtained a basic understanding and conceptualization of NGSS and PBL, their application of this understanding in their curriculum writing varied. The present study may help to inform future efforts to support teachers to align curricula and instruction to NGSS through teacher PD.

Introduction: Towards Optimal Learning Environments in Schools

This chapter provides an introduction to the topic of engaging youth in schools, detailing how and why policy makers and educational reformers widely consider engagement to be at the heart of meaningful school reform and innovative programming for youth. An alarming high school dropout rate, as well as national and international surveys, testifies to pervasive disengagement in schools; meanwhile, trends of increasing depression and obesity draw attention to concerns over the well-being of youth. A historical analysis presented in this chapter suggests that schools were not modeled after how individuals learn or develop but were rather modeled after hierarchical centralization at the confluence of the industrial revolution and urbanization in the US Engagement, operationally defined throughout much of this book as heightened, simultaneous concentration, interest, and enjoyment, serves as a lens through which both positive school outcomes and psychosocial well-being are examined. This book focuses on optimal learning environments, or environments empirically demonstrated to engage youth. In Chaps. 2-5 of this book, classroom and individual factors that influence students’ engagement in American public schools are identified. In Chaps 6-9, we consider the “how” (how students become engaged and how teachers engage students), “who” (to whom students are engaged and the importance of relationships), and “what” (to what students are engaged or the contents of students’ engagement) of engagement. In Chaps. 10-14, several optimal contexts for positive engagement, as supported empirically, are described in depth, providing models of innovative school, after-school, and community programming for youth.