Enhancing student engagement

last updated:October 2007

We chose this study because it illustrated a variety of student responses to a new challenge, including the frustrated and persistent responses that Dweck found so often in her research. It also showed how encouraging persistence and suggesting strategies for improvement helped students to re-engage in the task after frustrating experiences of failure.

The study took place with a group of 40 Year 8 students (aged 13-14) from a large, urban comprehensive school. The chosen students had difficulties solving non-verbal reasoning tasks and many of them disengaged from learning during normal lessons. The aim of the study was to explore ways in which students managed, or were affected by, frustration during a learning task. Two groups of 20 students had five 90-minute lessons in circus skills. They all had to learn tight-rope walking and juggling with three balls and, once these skills were mastered, could try out one other skill, such as spinning plates, diabolo (keeping the diabolo moving along a string or in the air), rolla-bolla (balancing on a small platform with a ball underneath) and flower stick (keeping a small stick spinning in the air by hitting it with another stick).

The pupils found the skills hard to learn. Improvement was slow and pupils failed frequently. When they did so, many became frustrated. Students showed three different responses:

• about 40 per cent disengaged aggressively, becoming agitated, swearing or behaving defiantly – 'When are we going to do something different? This is boring. I never wanted to do it anyway.'
• about 40 per cent gave up and withdrew passively
• about 20 per cent kept trying.

The students who disengaged aggressively unsurprisingly drew a huge amount of attention from adults. Discussions with the students showed that these responses mirrored behaviour in the classroom. The students who became passive described how they would avoid confrontation with staff. These students were often quiet and undemanding. They did not disrupt others’ learning because they did not want to draw attention to the fact that they themselves were not engaging. To re-engage with the activities, these students needed support from peers or adults. The students who disengaged passively were easier to notice in this context of practising a physical skill, as their lack of engagement could be seen. They would have been harder to spot in the classroom.

The teachers helped the students to develop strategies to become more successful. They asked students to think about why they had not succeeded and what they needed to do in order to succeed. The types of strategies the students developed ranged from the general – concentrate more, practise more and focus – to the specific – walk slower on the tightrope, move more smoothly and improve balance. The construction of these personalised, achievable targets helped to promote eventual success.

When they achieved success, the students who had initially persisted or passively withdrawn tended to celebrate in a low-key way, with smiles, or a comment in their diaries. Some of the initially more aggressive students were more flamboyant:

'Take a picture of me! Look, look, I can do it now.  Watch me, I’ve got it sussed!'

During the project, students completed a structured reflective diary and this helped the teachers to collect evidence about what was happening and to highlight any patterns that emerged. The teachers interrupted unhelpful avoidance techniques, whether these were clearly obvious (aggressive frustration) or more subtle (passive withdrawal). They supported the students to persist in the face of a challenge by helping them to identify useful strategies for improvement. The teachers aimed to remove the threat of failure to students and to help them redefine success as a willingness to take risks and engage in activities.

Reference: Farquhar, K., Sawyer, M., Cook, C., & Smith, P., (2006) Enhancing student engagement. National Teacher Research Panel summary. Available at: www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/ntrp/publications/