Educators believe that student engagement in the classroom is crucial to learning and that it can increase achievement and enrollment in challenging courses while decreasing dropout rates. Until recently, teachers and administrators lacked tools to measure the engagement levels of their students in the classroom. Now, aUniversity of Missouri researcher has developed a scale that quantifies student engagement and could help educators identify barriers to student participation and increase levels of student involvement and learning.
“Many educators believe engagement leads to better school performance and is necessary for developing student motivation and interest,” said Ze Wang, associate professor of educational, school and counseling psychology in the at MU. “After developing our scale, data from follow-up testing confirmed that students’ engagement scores were positively correlated with indicators of performance, such as good grades and independent learning outside of school motivated by interest. If teachers and administrators can understand how students differ in engagement levels through use of our scale, then they can take steps to increase academic engagement and positive learning outcomes among students in their classrooms.”
Based on data collected in a Missouri school district by her MU colleagues Christi Bergin, associate research professor, and David Bergin, associate professor of educational psychology, Wang and her colleagues developed a scale that improves understanding of classroom engagement and can be readily used in fourth through 12th-grade classrooms. The survey is relatively short and inexpensive to administer, Wang said.
Reviewed 2015-03-20