Student engagement in high school classrooms from the perspective of flow theory.

We present a conceptualization of student engagement based on the culmination of concentration, interest, and enjoyment (i.e., flow). Using a longitudinal sample of 526 high school students across the U.S., we investigated how adolescents spent their time in high school and the conditions under which they reported being engaged. Participants experienced increased engagement when the perceived challenge of the task and their own skills were high and in balance, the instruction was relevant, and the learning environment was under their control. Participants were also more engaged in individual and group work versus listening to lectures, watching videos, or taking exams. Suggestions to increase engagement, such as focusing on learning activities that support students' autonomy and provide an appropriate level of challenge for students' skills, conclude the article. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Continuity and change in early school engagement: Predictive of children's achievement trajectories from first to eighth grade?

Premises about the effects of early engagement on achievement were investigated with 383 children who were followed from ages 5.5 to 13.5. Change and continuity in behavioral (cooperative-resistant classroom participation) and emotional (school liking-avoidance) engagement were assessed during Grades 1-3 and were examined within variable- and person-oriented analyses as antecedents of scholastic progress from Grades 1 to 8. Findings corroborated the premises that change as well as continuity in early school engagement is predictive of children's long-term scholastic growth. Compared to children who participated cooperatively in classrooms, those who became increasingly resistant across the primary grades displayed lesser scholastic growth. Among children who manifested enduring engagement patterns, those who exhibited a combination of higher behavioral and emotional engagement across the primary grades made greater academic progress than those who displayed lower levels of these two forms of engagement. Overall, the results of this investigation were consistent with the school engagement hypothesis and extend what is known about the predictive contributions of early school engagement to children's achievement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Trajectories of school engagement during adolescence: Implications for grades, depression, delinquency, and substance use.

Using longitudinal data from the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development, the authors assessed 1,977 adolescents across Grades 5 to 8 to determine if there were distinctive developmental paths for behavioral and emotional school engagement; if these paths varied in relation to sex, race/ethnicity, and family socioeconomic status (SES); and whether links existed between trajectories of school engagement and grades, depression, substance use, and delinquency. Four trajectories for behavioral school engagement and four trajectories of emotional engagement were identified using a semiparametric mixture model. These trajectories were distinct with regard to initial levels of and changes in engagement, as well as to their shapes. Trajectories varied in regard to sex, SES, and race/ethnicity. Different trajectories of behavioral and emotional engagement were linked to grades, depression, delinquency, and substance use. Directions for future research and application are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Promoting successful school completion: Critical conceptual and methodological guidelines.

Conceptual issues related to dropping out, student engagement, and school completion are raised. Thirteen criteria are described as guidelines for designing, evaluating, and documenting programs to enhance successful school completion for all students. The status of the current intervention research is summarized relative to the specified criteria. Recommendations for future research and practice include implementation of interventions, systematic application of criteria in evaluating interventions, focus on school completion across school years, and capturing students' experiences and using the information to develop contextualized interventions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attachment at school age and academic performance.

The association between attachment and school-related cognitive functioning was longitudinally examined for a French Canadian sample of 108 school-age children. The affective quality of mother-child interaction patterns, child cognitive engagement, and quality of child attachment to mother were evaluated during a laboratory visit that included a separation-reunion procedure occurring when the children were approximately 6 years of age. Children's mastery motivation and academic performance were assessed 2 years later (at age 8). Analyses indicated that secure children had higher scores than their insecure peers on communication, cognitive engagement, and mastery motivation. Controlling children were at greatest risk for school underachievement, with the poorest performance on all measures except mastery motivation. Avoidant and ambivalent children were lowest on mastery motivation. Results of mediational analyses support the salience of mother–child interactional processes and child cognitive engagement at school age in explaining relations between attachment and cognitive functioning in school. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

School readiness and later achievement: A French Canadian replication and extension.

We first replicated the data analytic strategy used in Duncan et al. (2007) with a population-based data set of French-speaking children from Quebec (Canada). Prospective associations were examined between cognitive, attention, and socioemotional characteristics underlying kindergarten school readiness and second grade math, reading, and general achievement. We then extended this school readiness model by including motor skills as an additional element in the prediction equation and expanded the original strategy by including classroom engagement. The Montreal Longitudinal-Experimental Preschool Study, featured in Duncan et al., served as the Canadian reference group. In the replication model, kindergarten cognitive and attention characteristics predicted achievement by the end of 2nd grade. Although inconsistent across outcomes, behavioral problems and skills also emerged as predictors of some aspects of later achievement. Coefficients for kindergarten math skills were largest, followed by attention skills, receptive language skills, attention problems, and behavior. Most coefficients resembled those generated in the initial study. In our extension model, fine motor skills added their significant contribution to the prediction of later achievement above and beyond the original key elements of school readiness. Our extension model confirmed prospectively associations between kindergarten cognitive, attention, fine motor, and physical aggression characteristics and later achievement and classroom engagement by the end of 2nd grade. Although they comparatively showed better long-term benefits from stronger early attention skills, girls with less kindergarten cognitive skills were more vulnerable than boys with similar deficits when predicting 2nd grade math. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognition, anxiety, and prediction of performance in 1st-year law students.

Two models to predict academic performance using ability, affective, and cognitive variables were evaluated using students in their 1st year of law school. Participants were assessed before the beginning of classes and prior to and immediately following 2 anxiety-arousing 1st-year academic milestones: a final exam and an oral argument. In the path analysis for the exam model, only the Law School Aptitude Test was predictive of performance. Trait anxiety predicted self-efficacy for cognitive control, which predicted thoughts, which in turn predicted state anxiety. State anxiety, however, did not predict exam grades. In the oral argument model, a clear path of significant predictors could be traced from communication apprehension to self-efficacy for affective control, to state anxiety, and finally to oral argument score. Thus, different processes appear to operate in each of the 2 academic tasks. The implications of the results for law school education and future research are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Increasing school success through partnership-based family competency training: Experimental study of long-term outcomes.

An expanding body of research suggests an important role for parent or family competency training in children's social-emotional learning and related school success. This article summarizes a test of a longitudinal model examining partnership-based family competency training effects on academic success in a general population. Specifically, it examines indirect effects of the Iowa Strengthening Families Program (ISFP) on school engagement in 8th grade and academic success in the 12th grade, through direct ISFP effects on intervention-targeted outcomes--parenting competencies and student substance-related risk--in 6th grade. Twenty-two rural schools were randomly assigned to either ISFP or a minimal-contact control group; data were collected from 445 families. Following examination of the equivalence of the measurement model across group and time, a structural equation modeling approach was used to test the hypothesized model and corresponding hypothesized structural paths. Significant effects of the ISFP were found on proximal intervention outcomes, intermediate school engagement, and the academic success of high school seniors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Discerning direct and mediated effects of ecological structures and processes on adolescents' educational outcomes.

This short-term longitudinal study examined the relations among family and school characteristics, family-level processes (youth perceptions of parent-adolescent interactions), school-level processes (youth perceptions of school belonging, school climate), adolescents' school engagement, and later academic performance. Participants were an ethnically diverse, urban sample of 1,120 9th-grade students (M age = 14.6 years). The structural characteristics of families and schools influenced the proximal processes that occurred therein, and these proximal processes, in turn, influenced students' proximal (i.e., engagement) and distal educational outcomes (i.e., grades in school). Moreover, the structural characteristics of families and schools influenced proximal and distal outcomes indirectly through their influence on the proximal processes. The multimediated ecological model suggested that intervening at the process level may be a successful means of improving both adolescents' engagement in school and their subsequent school performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Courage in the classroom: Exploring a new framework predicting academic performance and engagement.

In the context of 7,637 high school students, the present study explored an hypothesized formulation of academic courage (defined as perseverance in the face of academic difficulty and fear) and its role in predicting academic performance (literacy and arithmetic) and various academic engagement measures (planning, task management, self-handicapping, disengagement, class participation, enjoyment of school, and positive academic intentions). Cluster analysis of core factors derived a four-group solution comprising courage, confidence, avoidance, and helpless orientations. Results from structural equation modeling demonstrated that courage and confidence are not significantly different on some academic measures (including performance) but that across the bulk of measures, confidence is more adaptive. However, courage was unambiguously more adaptive than avoidance and helpless orientations across all outcome measures. In summary, although confidence yields the most positive educational outcomes, courage can be considered an educationally effective response in the face or presence of fear. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of perceived barriers and relational support in the educational and vocational lives of urban high school students.

Drawing on developmental contextual theory, the authors examined the relationship of perceived barriers and support with school engagement and vocational attitudes among 9th-grade urban high school students in 2 studies. Study 1 (N=174) showed that both perceived barriers and perceived support from family kin were associated with youths' commitment to school and aspirations for success in their future careers. Study 2 (N=181) replicated and extended Study 1, demonstrating that perceived barriers, general perceptions of support, and kinship support were associated with behavioral and attitudinal indexes of school engagement, as well as with aspirations for career success, expectations for attaining career goals, and the importance of work in one's future. The findings contribute to efforts to identify individual and contextual factors relevant to the educational and vocational lives of urban minority youth. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Longitudinal Effects of In-School and Out-of-School Homework on High School Grades.

Research has shown that time spent on homework is an important influence on school learning. Many students complete their "home" work in school, yet it is unclear whether homework's effectiveness varies depending on whether it is completed in school or at home. The purpose of this research was to determine the relative influence on students' high school grades of time spent doing homework in school as compared to time spent doing homework out-of-school. We used longitudinal data from the National Education Longitudinal Study to develop, cross-validate, and test a series of structural equation models of the effects of in-school and out-of-school homework on students' high school grades. Results suggest that out-of-school homework had a substantial effect on grades, whereas in-school homework had no such effect. This finding held across different definitions of homework, and when using achievement test scores as an alternative measure of school learning. The findings suggest that schools should encourage students to complete homework at home, rather than in school. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Setting the stage: Career development and the student engagement process.

A longitudinal model assessing the relationship between indices of career development (career planfulness and career expectations) and school engagement (belonging and valuing) was examined through structural equation modeling for a multiethnic sample of urban 9th-grade students (N = 416). The model was examined within the context of a career planning intervention implemented in 2 ethnically and racially diverse urban high schools. Higher levels of career planfulness and expectations at the beginning of the year were associated with increases in school engagement over the course of the year. The observed relationship between career planfulness and expectations and school engagement is consistent with emerging models of career development (e.g., R. T. Lapan, 2004) that seek to explicate the value of career development programming as a component of educational reform. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comparability of the Social Skills Rating System to the Social Skills Improvement System: Content and psychometric comparisons across elementary and secondary age levels.

This study compared the Social Skills Rating System (SSRS; Gresham & Elliott, 1990) with the revision of the SSRS, now called the Social Skills Improvement System-Rating Scales (SSIS-RS; Gresham & Elliott, 2008), across three raters (teacher, parent, and student) for elementary- and secondary-aged students. A detailed comparison of these two instruments' comparability has not been previously reported and was considered important because of the frequent use of the SSRS in many externally funded research studies and school districts across the country. Comparisons between the two instruments focused on key reliability and validity estimates across the rating scales for three raters (teacher, parent, and student) using forms for elementary- and secondary-aged students. As hypothesized, the two instruments had high internal consistency estimates and moderately high validity indices for total scores for both social skills and problem behavior scales. The reliability comparisons revealed the SSIS-RS was superior to the SSRS with regard to internal consistency estimates. The validity estimates revealed expected convergent relationships with the strongest relationships consistently found among the various common subscales across all forms of the two instruments. The authors concluded that the SSIS-RS offers researchers and practitioners assessing social behavior of children and youth a broader conceptualization of key social behaviors and psychometrically superior assessment results when using the SSIS-RS over the SSRS. Future research on the SSIS-RS is also identified and contextualized within a multitiered intervention system. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Predicting Educational and Vocational Attitudes Among Rural High School Students.

Given the paucity of literature addressing the experiences of rural youth, this study investigated the ability of assessed levels of social support, perceived parental involvement, academic self-efficacy, and perceived educational barriers to predict school engagement and work role attitudes among rural high school students. The authors specifically intended to test the generalizability of M. E. Kenny, D. L. Blustein, A. Chaves, J. M. Grossman, and L. A. Gallagher's '(2003) findings with a rural population and within a social cognitive career theory (R. W. Lent, S. D. Brown, & G. Hackett, 2002) framework. Results supported the hypothesized importance of contextual factors (social support and parent involvement) and self-efficacy in predicting the work and school attitudes of rural students. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Engaging students in learning activities: It is not autonomy support or structure but autonomy support and structure.

We investigated 2 engagement-fostering aspects of teachers' instructional styles—autonomy support and structure—and hypothesized that students' engagement would be highest when teachers provided high levels of both. Trained observers rated teachers' instructional styles and students' behavioral engagement in 133 public high school classrooms in the Midwest, and 1,584 students in Grades 9–11 reported their subjective engagement. Correlational and hierarchical linear modeling analyses showed 3 results: (a) Autonomy support and structure were positively correlated, (b) autonomy support and structure both predicted students' behavioral engagement, and (c) only autonomy support was a unique predictor of students' self-reported engagement. We discuss, first, how these findings help illuminate the relations between autonomy support and structure as 2 complementary, rather than antagonistic or curvilinear, engagement-fostering aspects of teachers' instructional styles and, second, the somewhat different results obtained for the behavioral versus self-report measures of students' classroom engagement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Parent ratings of children's social skills: Longitudinal psychometric analyses of the Social Skills Rating System.

The assessment of children's social skills is an important task for school psychologists in both applied and research settings. The present study examines the psychometric properties of parent ratings of the Social Skills Rating System (SSRS), in kindergarten through third grades, testing for measurement differences between boys and girls, between African American, Caucasian, and Hispanic children, and across time from kindergarten through third grades. The analyses used a longitudinal sample of 4345 children from over 600 schools in 30 states to examine these questions using multigroup confirmatory factor analysis. Results provide qualified support for the use of the SSRS for kindergarten through 3rd-grade students across these different populations. However, if scored according to the manual, these results indicate that the measure may not be assessing the same construct over time or for all ethnic groups. If corrections to the factor structure and scoring system are incorporated, these results provide a basis for using parent ratings of the SSRS to assess social skills and problem behaviors across time, ethnicity, and sex in early elementary school. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A social-cognitive-behavioral model of academic predictors of adolescents' life satisfaction.

The current study provided a comprehensive examination of factors related to school that are implicated in students' life satisfaction. A theoretical model is put forth that hypothesizes that behavior experiences (classroom conduct, school grades) and social experiences (perceived school climate) at school influence students' cognitions relative to their global academic beliefs and attitudes toward their current school. These cognitive contexts of schooling are hypothesized to constitute students' judgments of their satisfaction with school, an important predictor of global life satisfaction. Self-report measures assessing adolescents' perceptions of these constructs were administered to a pilot sample of 321 high school students in a southeastern city. Simultaneous regression and correlational analyses clarified which aspects of school climate and other school-related factors were significantly associated with students' life satisfaction. Results of a revised path model provided preliminary support for the model. Findings support the relevance of considering students' quality of life in addition to the current focus on monitoring academic achievement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A comparison of counseled and noncounseled industrial school students.

A group of 69 industrial school students counseled by Veterans Administration counselors were compared with 468 non-counseled students. The two groups were similar in age, education, test performance, and number of courses taken. The two criterion measures—persistence in school and course grades—failed to indicate any differences between the two groups. These negative results are compared with the results of other studies reporting significant effects that were attributed to counseling. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Behavioral reputation: A cross-age perspective.

This study examined the measurement of peer perceptions of behavioral reputation within the contexts of elementary, middle, and high school environments (Grades 2-12, N=2,812) through the systematic evaluation of the psychometric properties of the Revised Class Play (A. S. Masten, P. Morison, & D. S. Pellegrini, 1985). Confirmatory factor analyses demonstrated that the data did not fit A. S. Masten et al.'s original 3-factor structure. Cross-loading of items and different patterns of association between subscales across age groups (elementary, middle, and high school) contributed to the overall poor fit. Exploratory factor analyses revealed an alternative 4-factor structure as a more reliable and valid means of assessing behavioral reputation regardless of the age of the peer group sampled. Both convergent and divergent patterns of associations emerged across developmental levels. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)