The Future of Education

Student engagement is the cornerstone or sine qua non of educational practice. This article recognizes engagement as a metaconcept, and one that is often desired in the classroom. Though often an implied goal, and perceived as either expected or existential, frankly engagement is often assumed by instructors. Planning for the multiple dimensions of engagement creates enhanced opportunities for student learning. The dimensions identified in this article include behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and agentic engagement. Methodically planning to address engagement from a vantage point of these multiple dimensions allows an instructor to better anticipate successful instruction.

The purpose of this article is to identify a means for instructors to plan for engagement by utilizing a simple set of guiding questions created for this task. These questions were created based on a dissertation entitled The Art of Educational Engagement (Schimpf) which will be published in 2026. Specifically, the questions align to the Schimpf Engaging Community (SEC) Model included in that forthcoming publication. Utilizing the SEC for planning and implementation of daily instructional practices allows for a simplified means of addressing engagement across all grade levels. The model utilizes aspects of Self-Determination Theory (SDT) created by Deci and Ryan (1985) and pairs that with a pragmatic approach to add verbs to the impetuses of autonomy, relatedness, and competency, which drive aspects of the theory toward action. These actions result in opportunities for multiple engagement dimensions to be realized. Ultimately, the model affirms that finite behaviors exist in an environment, which impacts the fleeting interactions of a group, and as those activities move from the effervescent to occurrences of a sustained practice, a sense of community develops.     

Keywords: Engagement, Community, Agentic, Self-Determination Theory

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