Kearsley & Shneiderman (1999)
Engagement Theory: A Framework for technology-based teaching and learning
http://home.sprynet.com/~gkearsley/engage.htm
Engagement theory
p1 ‘ students must be meaningullly engaged in learning activities through interaction with others and worthwhile tasks’
intrinsically motivating due to meaningful nature
it is aligned with other theoretical frameworks
constructivist
situated learning
androgogy
Engagement theory Framework
Relate – occurs in a group context i.e. collaborative teams
Create – project based
Donate- has an outside ( authentic) focus
Authors argue that e-learning technologies facilitate all of these i.e. technology has a positive role to play.
Lit support ( Hilz (1994), Harasim et al, 1995) Hilz study spanned many years, courses and instructors. E-learning contexts led to better mastery of course materials, greater student satisfaction, higher level of students reported learning than for traditional classroom experiences
Research questions ( suggested by the authrors)
1. What curricula, disciplines or age groups is engagement theory most/least effective with?
2. What skills do students need in order to effectively participate in collaborative activities? How should they acquire these skills?
3. How should individual differences be addressed in collaborative work?
4. What kind of student evaluation methods are most appropriate to the application of engagement theory?
5. Which component of engagement theory (i.e., relate, create, donate) is the most important in terms of different aspects of learning?
6. How do we best prepare (retrain) instructors to apply engagement theory?
7. What kind of groupware (collaborative software tools) would best support engagement theory?
- How does engagement theory "scale up" for large classes and many simultaneous courses at the same or different institutions?
