Engaging with Engagement: Interrogating Preservice Teachers’ Theories of Engagement in Their Literacy Planning and Reflection

ABSTRACT

The term engagement is widely used in teacher education and professional development. There is, however, a lack of consensus about the meaning of this term: it is defined in numerous ways with various theoretical underpinnings. This article employs a postqualitative approach to explore conceptualizations of engagement and their implications for teaching and learning. Specifically, we examine written teaching reflections from one cohort of preservice teachers, asking: 1) How did preservice teachers use the word “engage(ment)” in their planning for and analysis of one-on-one literacy instructional events? and 2) What conceptualizations of engagement did these usages reflect? Through the analytic approach of thinking with theory, we plug these data into four theoretical perspectives that are relevant to preservice teachers’ talk about engagement: 1) First Generation Activity Theory, 2) Reader Response Theory, 3) Self-Determination Theory, and 4) Inter-Comprehension Theory. We explore how each perspective illuminated our data, as well as questions that emerged. We conclude by (re)imagining engagement through a languaging relations perspective, arguing that this lens shifts toward a more humanizing conceptualization of engagement by centering the ongoing (re)making of relationships as people teach and learn.

KEYWORDS:

• Engagement
• postqualitative
• preservice teacher education

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the preservice teachers and their course instructors.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Statement of IRB Approval

This research project was approved by The Ohio State University Institutional Review Board.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lindsey W. Rowe

Lindsey Rowe is an Assistant Professor of Literacy at Clemson University. Her research explores the language and literacy practices of multilingual elementary school students.

Jackie Ridley

Jackie Ridley is an Assistant Professor of literacy and early childhood education at Kent State University. Her work focuses on the English language and literacy learning practices of young refugee and immigrant background children.

Marie E. Borkowski

Marie Borkowski is a Senior Lecturer of Languages, Literacy and English Education at The Ohio State University. Her research focuses on preservice teacher education and literacy in primary and early childhood education.

Sarah E. Jackson

Sarah Jackson is an Assistant Professor of Early, Middle, and Exceptional Education at Millersville University. She researches how the youngest readers and writers can engage in humanizing and critical work, particularly through literature and creative pedagogies.

Michiko Hikida

Michiko Hikida is an Associate Professor of Elementary Language Arts at The Ohio State university. Her research focuses on how to make literacy learning more humanizing, just, and loving for students often marginalized in educational spaces.