The Art of Increasing Student Engagement

Have you ever wanted to add a little “spice” to the way you teach your class online? Try narrative fiction-based instructional strategies! These include using media such as clips from movies, digital images, and music lyrics to get students engaged in unique ways. Read this article to see how effective these strategies are and how to implement them.

Reference: Perry, B., Edwards, M., & Janzen, K. (2019). Enhancing e-learner engagement by using narrative fiction in online nursing and health disciplines courses. In C. Jarvis & P. Gouthro (Eds.), Professional education with fiction media (71-92). Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.

What is this research about?

Narrative fiction-based instructional strategies are learning activities that facilitate student engagement in online environments through various forms of art to communicate thoughts. Engagement can be hard to come by in an online setting where there may be barriers to meaningful human connection, yet engagement has been proven to be important for student success. Using art to teach can create a connection between the learner and instructor that has personal meaning and creates a mutual understanding. The authors of this book chapter use this arts-based approach to create activities that enhance student engagement in online learning spaces.

What did the researchers do?

The researchers used different forms of art (movie/TV clips, photos, and music) to create three types of learning activities for health professions classes at the graduate and undergraduate level. In this paper, the researchers apply a hermeneutic phenomenology theory and the Community of Inquiry (CoI) Framework to self-reported student and instructor experiences that were collected and reported in previous studies. This framework helped to identify how effective the activities were at enhancing engagement and learning experience.

The commonly used CoI Framework, developed by Dr. Garrison, Dr. Anderson, and Dr. Archer (2000, University of Alberta), demonstrates how online learning experiences are created through the development and intersection of social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presence. Each type of presence is described below:

  • Social presence: Qualities that make a learning community noticeable to its participants. This includes development of interpersonal relationships, being able to express individual personalities, and open communication between participants.
  • Cognitive presence: How well learners can find meaning in content through reflection and discussions.
  • Teaching presence: The way teachers design the course and how they teach the course content to facilitate learners reaching learning outcomes.

What did the researchers find?

The authors found that their narrative fiction activities enhance the experience of those who learn online by allowing them to critically think and use different learning strategies. Students can also achieve higher order cognitive learning outcomes (i.e. analysis, evaluation, application, and critique).

The three activities and their outcomes are described below.

  1. Television Dramas or Movies: “Minute at the Movies”
    1. Description: Students viewed a clip from a movie trailer or TV show. Within a discussion forum, they answered questions and discussed how the scene related to course concepts.
    2. Outcomes: Students were encouraged to think of course content in new ways, helping them to remember and deepen their understanding.
  1. Digital Images: Photovoice, Photo Cascade, Photo Montage, Photostory
    1. Description (of one example: photo cascade): Using sites such as Flickr and SmugMug, students each contributed one image related to an assigned course theme to create a collaborative collage.
    2. Outcomes: Through this activity, students created connections between photos and the course theme. They also expressed their own perspective on the theme. This activity created a sense of community where everyone contributes.
  1. Music Lyrics: “My Music Moments”
    1. Description: Students were asked to find a song that related to a course theme and share a reflection in a discussion forum on what the song says about the theme.
    2. Outcomes: Locating meaningful songs was challenging for some students, but once they shared their views and thoughts with others, they were able to further their perspective and learning overall.

How can you use this research?

This chapter illustrates how using arts-based activities can increase engagement in online spaces where engagement is lacking.

  • The fact that the authors were able to integrate arts within a health professions course, a discipline not usually tied to the arts, demonstrates how versatile the arts can be at creating connections.
  • Fiction/narrative forms of art allow students to imagine and share their own unique stories about course content with each other, which helps facilitate their learning and leads to a sense of community. This results in the incorporation of all three presences of the CoI framework (cognitive, social, teaching). The CoI framework is a helpful tool to use when designing course activities to foster engagement.

So, the next time you are preparing to teach a course, consider which artforms and art-related activities might be meaningfully incorporated into your teaching and learning context to enhance student engagement. Try implementing some of these activities or develop new activities using other forms of art you find relevant. You may be surprised by how engaged students can and want to be. You just have to give them the opportunity!

Authors:

Beth Perry, RN, PhD, is a Professor in the Faculty of Health Disciplines at Athabasca University (Canada).

Margaret Edwards, PhD, is Dean of the Faculty of Health Disciplines at Athabasca University (Canada).

Katherine Janzen, RN, MN, ONC(C) is an Associate Professor in the School of Nursing & Midwifery at Mount Royal University (Canada).

Reference:

Perry, B., Edwards, M., & Janzen, K. (2019). Enhancing e-learner engagement by using narrative fiction in online nursing and health disciplines courses. In C. Jarvis & P. Gouthro (Eds.), Professional education with fiction media (71-92). Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.

For additional examples and research, see:

Garrison, D. R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (2000). Critical inquiry in a text-based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education. Internet and Higher Education, 2(2–3), 87−105. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1096-7516(00)00016-6

Janzen, K. J., Szabo, J., & Jakubec, S. L. (2016). Taking the quantum leap: Arts-based learning as a gateway into exploring transition for senior nursing students. Journal of the Canadian Association for Curriculum Studies, 14(1), 77–91. https://jcacs.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/jcacs/article/view/40304

Perry, B., & Edwards, M. (2012). Creating an “invitational classroom” in the online educational milieu. American Journal of Health Sciences (AJHS), 3(1), 7–16. https://doi.org/10.19030/ajhs.v3i1.6747

Perry, B., & Edwards, M. (2019). Innovative arts-based learning approaches adapted for mobile learning. Open Praxis, 11(3), 303-310. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1234938.pdf

Perry, B., Edwards, M., & Janzen, K. J. (2016). Haiku it!–reflection in 17 syllables. In A. Peterkin & P. Brett-MacLean (Eds.), Keeping reflection fresh: A practical guide for clinical educators (37–39). Kent, OH: Kent State University Press.

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