I’ve been reading some work on models of The Self, which attempts to model the link between our internal motives and values, with our external behaviours (amongst other things). One of the difficulties that I have come across in my readings on engagement is to accurately identify the difference between students that are truly engaged, and those that are simply academically (strategically) compliant with the school system in order to achieve a grade.
Your motives (or motivation) is what allows you to operate in a specific sphere of life, or what pushes you to operate in a particular way in a specific sphere of life. In spheres where you have high self esteem, your motives will allow you to excel, and push your boundaries. Failure in these areas will not hurt your self-esteem too much, as long as there is the expectation of eventual success. This is equally valid in academic and in physical domains. In activities where your self esteem is low, your key motivation will act to protect your self-esteem, and avoid engaging in that activity, in order to not experience more failure (Branson, 2009, p. 13).
At the risk of complicating the framework any further, it seems that Reward and Motivation could be two other dimensions that could be used to identify student engagement level, along with Attention and Commitment already used by Schlechty in his work on engagement. Considering, for the moment students who are truly engaged in their learning, then it is fairly clear that both their Rewards and Motivations are being internally driven. Their reward is the leaning itself, and they need little encouragement from their teachers in order to continue their pursuit of learning.
Students who are working closer to the level of Strategic Compliance very obviously are looking for an external reward – they are looking for a specific grade outcome, or praise from teachers or parents for hard work. I believe here that motivation is still internally driven. As a teacher, we are unable to flick a switch to make a student care about grades or praise. Yet, there are teachers who have the skill to develop this in students – perhaps this is something that can be looked at later, in terms of improving student engagement rather than measuring it.
Students who are Ritually Compliant are working only because the alternative is negative consequences, which say s quite plainly that both the reward and motivation for working are being developed externally, and come from the way the teacher runs the classroom.
Placing these in a table, it looks a bit like this:
| Schlechty Levels of Engagement | Rebellion | Retreatism | Ritual Compliance | Strategic Compliance | Engagement | |
| Dimensions of Engagement | Diverted Attention No Commitment |
No Attention No Commitment |
Low Attention Low Commitment |
High Attention Low Commitment |
High Attention High Commitment |
|
| Reward & Motivation | External External |
External Internal |
Internal Internal |
|||
| Student Goals | Disrupting Learning | Avoiding Learning | Avoiding Punishment | Learning for Grades | Authentic Learning | |
Whether this provides us with a more reliable way of measuring students engagement or not remains to be seen, but in the meantime it should give us pause to reflect on what different strategies we can use to assist our students in producing their bet work, at whatever level of engagement they are currently at.
Branson, C. M. (2009). In search of authentic leadership. Linking Links Program. Brisbane.
Schlechty, P. C. (2011). Engaging Students: The next level of Working the Work. San
Francisco, CA, USA: John Wiley & Sons.