Which teaching strategies are perceived as effective in inspiring in-person STEM class engagement? Comparison of instructors, U.S. and international college students
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Abstract
Education researchers found that engagement can enhance students’ motivation and achievement
(Reeve & Lee, 2014), so it is essential to understand what pedagogical strategies improve
engagement. Engagement has four components: behavioral (attention, effort, and persistence),
emotional (positive emotions during tasks), cognitive (elaboration and sophisticated learning),
and agentic (contributions to the instruction) (Reeve & Lee, 2014). While researchers have
identified these components, how instructors and students understand engagement is unclear. In
this paper, I compare instructors' and U.S.-born and international students’ understanding of
engagement and ask what teaching strategies are perceived as effective in inspiring engagement
in in-person STEM classrooms. It is crucial because disengagement can undermine student
success and teachers’ efficacy.
Previous researchers used surveys, interviews, or quasi-experimental designs to investigate if
particular teaching strategies can encourage students to engage. However, they primarily focus
on behavioral engagement. Further, much of the work focuses on K-12 rather than higher
education. To fill this gap, I first conducted interviews with 22 instructors and 21 college students (13 U.S.-born and eight international students) to explore how they would interpret
engagement and the teaching strategies they perceived most effective in encouraging
engagement. Then, I followed up with a closed-ended survey to compare U.S. and international
students among a broader student population.
Interviews show that students and instructors commonly understand engagement as behavioral,
but students are more inclined to mention cognitive than instructors. This holds in the survey,
although international students view agentic engagement as more crucial than U.S. students. The
teaching strategies that are perceived as the most and second most effective by students are
“adjust the instruction based on class members’ learning” and “be available outside of the
classroom.” International and U.S. students are only statistically different in the teaching strategy
of required participation, where international students rate it higher on average than U.S.
students.
The results suggest several practices to improve engagement. First, instructors could distribute
surveys throughout the semester to understand how students follow and adjust accordingly.
Second, instructors who want to grade engagement could consider students' cognitive efforts,
such as taking notes.