Rethinking Student Engagement

Before any technique or tool, engagement starts with the conditions you set: why students should invest in the work, and whether the classroom feels like a place where everyone's participation is welcome.

Read: Rethinking Student Engagement, Center for Teaching and Learning, UC Berkeley.
This page grounds this whole path in research on autonomy, competence, and relatedness (Niemiec & Ryan, 2009), three conditions that make engagement more or less likely regardless of which technique you use.

Read: The Spark of Learning: Energizing the College Classroom with the Science of Emotion, Sarah Rose Cavanagh (West Virginia University Press, 2016). 
This book makes the case that emotion isn't a distraction from learning but a driver of it. It shapes attention, working memory, and motivation. A useful complement to the self-determination theory piece above: one focuses on the conditions that support engagement, this one focuses on the emotional mechanics underneath them.

Read: Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning, James M. Lang (Jossey-Bass, 2nd ed., 2021). 
Lang's book is a collection of small, low-effort changes that can be folded into an existing course without a redesign. The second edition includes chapters specifically on motivating students and building a sense of belonging, both directly relevant here.

The first few weeks of a course set expectations that carry through the rest of the term; for classroom norms, who gets to participate, and how technology fits in.

Read: Sustaining Engagement Without Laptop Bans, Center for Teaching and Learning, UC Berkeley.
This article examines the complexities of maintaining student engagement in the presence of digital devices. It highlights research indicating that multitasking can hinder learning outcomes and discusses the potential drawbacks of implementing device bans, such as inadvertently stigmatizing students who rely on technology for accessibility. The article advocates for inclusive teaching strategies that integrate technology thoughtfully to foster active participation and sustained attention without resorting to prohibitive measures.

Read: Who actually gets called on? The Question of "Cold Calling", The Chronicle of Higher Education.
 This article shows that structured cold-calling can increase equitable participation, particularly for women, who tend to speak up less under pure hand-raising, but only within a classroom culture that already treats mistakes as a normal part of learning. For a deeper dive, see also Kelly Hogan and Viji Sathy's book Inclusive Teaching: Strategies for Promoting Equity in the College Classroom (West Virginia University Press).

In practice: Community Builder: PowerPoint Party, a real example from Berkeley's CTL Teaching Innovation Showcase. 
In this Public Health course, students built a short self-introduction slide, presented for two minutes each, then took a Kahoot quiz on what their classmates shared. A simple, low-tech way to build relatedness in the first weeks of a course.

Active learning approaches have been shown to increase student performance and lower failure rates compared to lecture alone, with the largest gains for students from underrepresented and historically excluded groups (Freeman et al., 2014; Eddy & Hogan, 2014).

Explore: Active Learning, Center for Teaching and Learning, UC Berkeley.
Active learning involves instructional methods that engage students actively in learning, encouraging skill development and critical thinking through activities like reading, writing, and discussion. This resource highlights the benefits of active learning for building student engagement, and it also offers practical strategies to help instructors implement active learning in their courses.

Read: Choosing the Right Active Learning Strategies, Center for Teaching and Learning, UC Berkeley.
Engage with this guide on Types of Active Learning Strategies and explore various active learning strategies to help you select the right mix for your specific classroom contexts and teaching styles. 

Explore: UC Berkeley Active Learning Classrooms
Berkeley’s Active Learning classrooms (ALC) are teaching and learning spaces that allow the instructor to customize the physical learning environment to meet pedagogical needs. In an ALC, the room design, flexible furniture, writing surfaces, and technology allow for multiple pedagogical activities. ALCs have been intentionally designed to encourage and foster the use of active learning strategies - except, they don’t come with a manual about how to make that happen! 

Read "Space Matters! Maximizing Active Learning Classrooms for Student Collaboration and Engagement" to learn how to get the most out of your classes in ALCs.

For any questions about ALC or strategies, feel free to reach out to us via teaching@berkeley.edu or schedule a consultation.

1. Polling tools are excellent resources for increasing student interaction during classes. They can quickly gather student opinions and knowledge, enabling real-time adjustments to teaching and increasing student involvement in the learning process.

• Watch: View these short video tutorials on using Berkeley sponsored polling tools—iClicker Cloudand PollEverywhere. These videos will guide you through setting up an account, starting a poll, etc. You can also receive customized assistance by emailing studentresponse@berkeley.edu or by scheduling a 1:1 consultation.

2. Peerceptiv is a peer collaboration tool designed to enhance student engagement by facilitating peer review and team member evaluation assignments, and is now available for all UC Berkeley classes as part of a pilot.
    
3. Course Capture provides students with recorded lectures that they can revisit at their own pace. More than just a make-up tool, it can be used strategically to reinforce key concepts and support flexible learning needs.
    
4. Kalturaprovides a flexible platform for recording, sharing, and enhancing video content within bCourses. In addition, recordings from Course Capture automatically get put into Kaltura. You can use Kaltura alongside discussion boards, embed videos in assignments, or build reflection activities structured around video clips.

Read: Encouraging Attendance, Center for Teaching and Learning, UC Berkeley.
This resource offers strategies to boost student attendance by enhancing the value of class sessions through active learning, clear communication of attendance importance, and fostering intrinsic motivation. It suggests engaging students with activities like discussions, collaborative projects, and problem-solving exercises that are unique to the classroom environment.

Introductory and large-enrollment courses are often where engagement is hardest to sustain. 

Read: Engaging Students in Large Courses, Center for Teaching Innovation, Cornell University.
This resource is a practical guide covering course structure, regular checks for understanding, and small relational moves (learning names, soliciting quick feedback) that matter even more once a class is too big for the instructor to know everyone by default.

In practice: QQCR: Question, Quote, Comment, Reply, a real Berkeley example Berkeley's CTL Teaching Innovation Showcase. 
This is an example of sustaining engagement in a large, asynchronous course (80+ students) which can be adapted to synchronous courses as well. Students post a question, quote, comment, or reply to a peer about the week's reading, graded via an autograder script. The instructor's own reflection: it worked well enough that the class had to introduce Community Guidelines to manage the volume and range of discussion it generated.