Sparking Student Engagement

In a culture for learning, students are actively engaged in acquiring new knowledge and skills. Their prior knowledge and experiences are used as a foundation to do so. It is important that students are “hooked” into learning topics and concepts that reflect their interests, abilities, and skills. Knowing our students is essential so we can best engage them in their learning. In this course, you will explore instructional methods which provide students with opportunities to actively engage in learning as their interests and background knowledge are utilized.

Topic A: Engage the Learner: Introduction

Topic B: Active Engagement Introduction

Topic C: Project-Based Learning Introduction

Course Outcomes:

At the completion of this course, you will be able to:

• Analyze how the Domains of Student Engagement impact instruction.
• Identify active engagement instructional strategies.
• Create a lesson plan that reflects instructional strategies to promote student engagement.

Pre-Assessment: Click this link and scroll to page 10. Read the "Importance of Content" element on page 10. In a five to seven sentence paragraph, compare your areas of strength and challenge to the criteria for a distinguished teacher. (You will submit this paragraph as part of the assessment at the end of this course.)

"The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught, as that every child should be given the wish to learn." John Lubbock.