The overlooked link between behavioural and cognitive engagement

Behavioural engagement is important for student learning.  Examples of behavioural engagement include listening to the teacher, obeying co-constructed school rules and not getting in trouble (Fredricks, Blumenfeld & Paris, 2004).  Still, behavioural engagement seemed mostly ignored from strength-based literature on student learning as most of the research is focused on students' emotional engagement. In this post, I would like to address, the intersectionalities between cognitive and behavioural engagement.

In my research on students' English Language Arts development and learning, I have seen where changes in the students’ behavioural engagement led to them being more purposefully invested in their learning or cognitively engaged. The reverse was true. Students who displayed high levels of behavioural disengagement, tend to be unfocused and unable to complete assigned tasks.

The findings of my research study show that behavioural engagement has a more significant connection with students’ learning than emotional engagement. While emotional engagement,  that is, students'positive and negative affective reactions in the classroom (Fredricks, Blumenfeld, Friedel & Paris’s, 2003, p. 7), was important for students’ sense of belonging and investment in whole group and small group based activities; my research participants’ emotional engagement did not substantially impact their completion of tasks and learning.

The findings of my study indicate that there needs to be further research done to explore the impact that behavioural engagement has on students’ cognitive engagement and learning.


References:

Fredricks, J. A., Blumfield, P., & Paris, A. H. (2004). School Engagement: Potential of the concept, State of the Evidence. Review of Educational Research, 74(1), 59-
109.

Fredricks, J.A., Blemfield, P., Friedel, J., & Paris. (2003).  School engagement. Retrieved from https://www.childtrends.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Child_Trends-2003_03_12_PD_PDConfFBFP.pdf