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Engagement with student-centred learning: The student perspective

Thesis · April 2016

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Engagement with student-centred learning: The student perspective

Baptiste Roucau

A Thesis
in
The Department
of
Psychology

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements

For the Degree of Bachelor of Arts
Honours in Psychology
Concordia University
Montréal, Québec, Canada

April 2016
Abstract
Baptiste Roucau
 Engagement with student-centred learning: The student perspective

Student-centred learning (SCL) is believed to make learning more engaging for students. However,
some research suggests that SCL can also be experienced as excessively distressing and ultimately
disengaging by students. Few studies have examined the roots of this phenomenon. Yet in order to
design effective educational programs, it appears crucial to determine the factors that facilitate or hinder
students’ engagement with SCL. This was the purpose of the present study. A science course using a
combination of SCL instruction methods was examined as a case-study: seven students were interviewed
at the beginning and at the end of the course, and in-class observation was conducted throughout the
semester. Results indicate that students shifted from initial disengagement to high engagement;
instructor guidance, peer influence and perceived usefulness were the main facilitating factors, while
lack of clarity, excessive demands and risk for grades were the chief barriers to engagement with SCL.
These findings are linked to theories of motivation, and implications for practice are discussed.
 3

Table of Contents

Abstract ii
Acknowledgements............................................................................................................................iii

Introduction.........................................................................................................................................1

Method...............................................................................................................................................10

Participants................................................................................................................................10

Procedure...................................................................................................................................10

Data Analysis............................................................................................................................11

Interview Data..................................................................................................................11

Observation Data...............................................................................................................12

Data Trustworthiness.................................................................................................................14

Results...............................................................................................................................................15

Student Trajectory.....................................................................................................................15

Disengaging Factors..................................................................................................................17

Engaging Factors.......................................................................................................................21

Satisfaction of the Basic Psychological Needs..........................................................................24

Autonomy.........................................................................................................................24

Competence......................................................................................................................24

Relatedness........................................................................................................................25

Discussion......................................................................................................................................26

Trajectory and Factors................................................................................................................26

Basic Psychological Needs.........................................................................................................29

References......................................................................................................................................33

Appendix A: Recruitment Letter...................................................................................................47

Appendix B: Consent Form ..........................................................................................................49

Appendix C: Time 1 Interview Guide...........................................................................................52

Appendix D: Time 2 Interview Guide...........................................................................................54

 Engagement with student-centred learning: the student perspective

Active involvement in the learning process is essential to success in university. This student
engagement is important in terms of educational outcomes such as achievement, persistence and
retention (Kuh, Cruce, Shoup, Kinzie, & Gonyea, 2008). The question is: how can we foster
engagement? Traditional teaching formats such as the lecture have been criticized for insufficiently
engaging students (Arum & Roksa, 2011; Bok, 2008). To address this shortcoming, new, student-
centred instruction methods have emerged with the aim of enhancing engagement through participation
in “high-impact” activities such as inquiries, projects and role-plays (Bok, 2008; Evans, Mujis, &
Tomlinson, 2015). Several studies report high student engagement with these methods (e.g., Arciuli,
2010; Aumann, 2011; Severiens, Meeuwisse, & Born, 2015), but the findings are not unanimous.
Researchers have found that students do not always engage with student-centred learning (SCL); in fact
they sometimes experience distress or dislike these new methods and thus resist them (e.g., Albers,
2009; Keeney-Kennicut, Gunersel, & Simpsons, 2008; Pepper, 2010). Few studies have sought to
examine the factors underlying engagement and disengagement with these student-centred instruction
methods, and only some have done so from a student viewpoint (Ellis, 2015; Struyven, Dochy, &
Janssens, 2008). The present study thus aimed to investigate student-perceived barriers and facilitators to
engagement with SCL.
Student engagement is a complex, multidimensional construct that encompasses academic and
social aspects of student experience (Evans et al., 2015; Gonyea & Kuh, 2009; Krause & Coates, 2008).
It has been defined as the affective, behavioural and cognitive involvement of students in the learning
process (Appleton, Christenson, & Furlong, 2008; Fredericks, Blumenfeld, & Paris, 2004; Reeve, 2012;
Reschly & Christenson, 2012). This perspective allows engagement to be measured both quantitatively,
for example with the Student Engagement Instrument (Appleton, Christenson, Kim, & Reschly, 2006;
Fredericks & McColskey, 2012) and qualitatively, for example with structured interviews or teacher
observations (Fredericks & McColskey, 2012; Glynn, Brickman, Armstrong, & Taasoobshirazi, 2011;
Lee & Reeve, 2012). Further, it can be measured in terms of specific learning activities (e.g., Appleton
et al., 2006; Lane & Harris, 2015; Reeve, 2012). Historically, the study of engagement mainly targeted
dropout prevention (e.g., Finn, 1989), and it was only in the 1990’s that the focus shifted to higher
education reform (Reschly & Christenson, 2012). Today, engagement is extensively studied, both in
small-scale psychological research (e.g., Lewis, Huebner, Malone, & Valois, 2011) and in large-scale
international surveys such as the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE, Pascarella, Seifert, &
Blaich, 2010).
 This research points to student engagement being a strong predictor of a number of educational
outcomes. Using data from the NSSE, Kuh and colleagues (2008) found that engagement significantly
predicted academic achievement (GPA) and persistence, operationalized as lower drop-out rate. In
addition, they found that engagement had a compensatory effect for lower ability students: their GPA
increased more from every standard deviation increase in engagement than it did for other students.
Other researchers (e.g., Green, Liem, Martin, Colmar, Marsh, & McInerney, 2012; Hitt, Isakovic,
Fawwaz, Bawa’anch, El-Kork, Makkiyil, & Qattan, 2014; Klegeris & Hurren, 2011; Severiens et al.,
2015) have also found similar effects of engagement on achievement and persistence. For example,
Green and colleagues (2012) found that in a two-year longitudinal study of 1866 high-school students,
engagement positively predicted attitude towards school, which positively predicted class participation
and homework completion, which, in turn, predicted academic performance. In addition, engagement
also negatively predicted absenteeism, which was associated with lower academic performance.
Engagement has also been linked to deeper approaches to learning. Students are more likely to
analyse, evaluate, make connections with, reflect on and synthesize course content when they are
engaged (Bryson & Hand, 2007; Coates, 2008; Hockings, Cook, Yamashita, McGinty, & Bowl, 2008;
Nie & Lau, 2010). Accordingly, higher engagement is associated with better retention (Klegeris &
Hurren, 2011; Watkins & Mazur, 2013) and lower engagement with poorer retention (Soria & Stebleton,
2012). Finally, engagement is also important for psychosocial variables. Engaged students show higher
critical thinking abilities, openness to diversity, higher-order moral reasoning, positive attitude towards
literacy, as well as elevated psychological well-being (Brault-Labbé & Dubé, 2010; Pascarella et al.,
2010). In summary, because it is linked with such important academic outcomes as performance,
persistence and retention, and because it is associated with deeper learning and positive psychosocial
variables, engagement is fundamental to student success.
These benefits of engagement can be understood from a motivational perspective. Indeed,
engagement has been conceptualized as the public manifestation of the private, unobservable construct
of motivation, particularly of autonomous motivation (Reeve, 2012). In Self-Determination Theory,
autonomous motivation stems from the satisfaction of three basic psychological needs: autonomy,
competence and relatedness (Ryan & Deci, 2000). Autonomy refers to the need of perceiving behaviour
as emanating from the self; competence refers to the need of feeling effective in one’s interactions with
the environment; and relatedness refers to the need to establish and maintain emotional bonds with
others (Ryan & Deci, 2000). Satisfaction of these needs has been shown to foster goal persistence
(Koestner, Powers, Milyavskaya, Carbonneau, & Hope, 2015), self-esteem (La Guardia, 2009), well-
being (Ryan, Huta, & Deci, 2013), and, in educational settings, achievement (Black & Deci, 2000)
deeper learning (Vansteenkiste, Simons, Lens, Sheldon, & Deci, 2004) and engagement (Jong, Kim &
Reeve, 2012; Nimiec & Ryan, 2009; Reeve & Lee, 2014). Consequently, a learning environment that
satisfies the basic needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness is likely to lead to higher student
engagement (Furrer, Skinner, & Pitzer, 2014; Reeve, 2012).
So how well do current teaching methods promote student engagement? In today’s universities, the
predominant method of instruction is the lecture (Ebert-May, Derting, Hodder, Momsen, Long, &
Jardeleza, 2011; Lammers & Murphy, 2002; Watts & Becker, 2008). A recent survey of 477 Economics
professors, for instance, found that they spent on average 83% of total class time lecturing (Watts &
Becker, 2008). Similar results have been reported elsewhere in the literature (Ebert-May et al., 2011;
Lammers & Murphy, 2002).
The lecture is grounded in the instructivist paradigm, in which learning consists mainly of the
unidirectional transmission of knowledge from an expert to a novice (King, 1993). As a “sage on the
stage”, the responsibility of the instructor is to carefully select and organize the content students need to
know, and to transmit this information effectively and efficiently (King, 1993; Medsker, Ertmer, &
Newby, 2013). The learner is mainly a receptor of information and information retention is assessed by
tests. The rationale for the use of the lecture is two-pronged. First, lectures are efficient: organized
content can conveniently be reused each time a course is given without much alteration (Peters, 2011),
and a lecture given by one instructor can be attended by a great number of students, making it cost-
effective. Class size has indeed been shown to be positively related to the amount of class time devoted
to lecturing (Lammers & Murphy, 2002). Second, lectures are useful when students are beginning to
learn complex domains of knowledge. They are well-suited to introductory courses that aim to impart
the fundamentals of a discipline to novice students (Kirschner, Sweller, & Clark, 2006; Tracey, 2011).
In some contexts, the lecture can thus be effective.
The lecture has been heavily criticized, however, for failing to foster student engagement
(Anderson et al., 2011; Arum & Roksa, 2011; Bok, 2008). Lectures require little else beyond listening
and note-taking. Consequently, students can become passive and less involved in the knowledge
acquisition process (Samah, Jusoff, & Silong, 2009). For example, one study investigating 23 courses of
science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) at the University of Maine showed that in
lecture-based classes, students spent 96.8% of class time listening and only 3.2% asking questions
(Smith, Jones, Gilbert, & Wieman, 2013). This can lead to disengagement by students. In another
sample of 200 English university students, 59% report that they find their lectures boring at least half of
the time, and 30%, almost or all of the time (Mann & Robinson, 2009). The problem is further
exacerbated by the pervasiveness of laptops and tablets in lecture halls, which are estimated to be used
for social media browsing or related off-task activities during two-thirds of total class time (Ragan,
Jennings, Massey, & Doolittle, 2014). Most importantly, this disengagement has tangible repercussions,
being positively associated with absenteeism (Mann & Robinson, 2009; Moore, Armstrong, & Pearson,
2008), and negatively associated with GPA (Mann & Robinson, 2009). With regards to Self-
Determination Theory, these findings suggest that the lecture may not be best-suited to meeting
students’ psychological needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness (Blanchard, Pelletier, Otis, &
Sharp, 2004); this would explain the lower engagement. Thus, although useful to efficiently and
effectively teach foundational courses, lectures can disengage students, which can, in turn, lead to lower
persistence and performance.
In reaction to these shortcomings of the lecture, a constructivist approach emerged, in which
students were seen as participating in the construction of knowledge (Bok, 2008; Savery & Duffy,
1995). Starting in the 1970’s, new forms of teaching were proposed, beginning with McMaster
University’s initiative of learning medicine through problem-solving, and soon gaining momentum in
other disciplines and institutions (Barrows & Mitchell, 1975; Berkson, 1993). Today, this approach
encompasses a variety of instruction methods united under the umbrella term student-centred learning
(SCL). In SCL, teaching consists primarily in engaging students in high-impact, collaborative activities
that allow them to construct and apply knowledge (Evans et al., 2015; Savery & Duffy, 1995). These
activities can include problem-solving, inquiry, role-play and reflection, depending on the specific
instruction method (Smith, Sheppard, Johnson, & Johnson, 2005). In inquiry-based learning, for
example, the instructor uses an open-ended question as the springboard for learning: students learn by
gathering information, reflecting and debating while searching for an answer (Smith, 2000). In role-
plays, students utilize a scenario by embodying particular characters. In the “reacting to the past” series
of games, for instance, students are assigned characters from the past and re-enact turning points in
history, such as the trial of Galileo or the independence of India (Carnes, 2014; Purnell, Pettersen, &
Carnes, 2008). Finally, in reflections, students engage in metacognition to think about and organize the
knowledge they have acquired. The practice of reflective writing, for example, is carried out by students
while reading material in order to improve understanding and facilitate future class discussion (Kalman,
2011). In all these activities, the instructor is no longer a “sage on the stage” expected to deliver
carefully curated information. Content is instead shaped by how it is used during activities, and the
instructor acts as a “guide on the side”, mainly facilitating learning, while students are expected to
become active in the learning process (King, 1993; Savery & Duffy, 1995).
While still far from dominant, student-centred learning is slowly becoming an accepted part of the
curriculum in more and more universities (Eagan, Stolzenberg, Lozano, Aragon, Suchard, & Hurtado,
2014; Watts & Becker, 2008). For instance, “reacting to the past” games, which were first developed in
the 1990’s, have since been used in over 300 universities in such diverse fields as political science,
music history, and STEM (Burke, 2014; Carnes, 2014; Crider, 2011; Gorton & Havercroft, 2012;
Powers, Burney, & Carnes, 2010). More generally, a survey of 16 000 faculty members at 268
universities carried out by Eagan and colleagues (2014) indicates that, although the lecture remains the
chief instruction method, its use as the sole method of teaching has decreased five percentage points
since 1989, while the use of group projects increased from 18% to 45.5% and the use of cooperative
learning from 22.3% to 60.7%, in the same period. A diversification of instruction methods thus appears
to be underway.
How well do these emerging instruction methods foster engagement? Several empirical studies,
both qualitative and quantitative, suggest that they elicit high engagement from students. The standard
methodology of these studies is to compare a SCL instruction method with a lecture-format control
condition (Evans et al., 2015). In general, the SCL instruction methods have been found to be
significantly more engaging than lectures (e.g., Kelly, Haidet, Schneider, Searle, Seidel, & Richards,
2005; Klegeris & Hurren, 2011; Michel, Cater, & Varela, 2009; Severiens et al., 2015; Smit, de
Brabander, & Martens, 2014; Umbach & Wawrzynski, 2005; Wu & Yang, 2007). For example, Kelly
and colleagues (2005) compared the engagement behaviours of university students in a problem-based
learning class (a SCL instruction method) and a lecture-format class. They found that in the SCL class,
74% of observed behaviours were learners engaging with other learners, while it was only 9% in the
lecture condition. In contrast, 58% of observed behaviours consisted of passive listening of the instructor
in the lecture condition, while that only represented 11% of observed behaviours for SCL (Kelly et al.,
2005).
Similar findings of SCL eliciting engagement have emerged from qualitative work as well (e.g.,
Arciuli, 2010; Aumann, 2011; Cormeaux, 2010; Highbee, 2009; Lazrus & McKay, 2013; Ni
Raghallaigh & Cunniffe, 2013; Olwell & Stevens, 2015). Studies of “reacting to the past” games report
especially high engagement, including, for example, an instance of students spontaneously committing
to start class at 7.30am for the remainder of a semester to be able to finish a role-play (Carnes, 2014;
Powers et al., 2010). In both quantitative and qualitative research, engagement translates into student
success. In a large physiology course, use of SCL was associated with higher attendance and better
retention than in a lecture control condition (Klegeris & Hurren, 2011), while first-year university
students having taken a “reacting to the past” based course were significantly more likely to persist and
come back to university the following year than a control group of students matched for GPA and ACT
scores (Olwell & Stevens, 2015). It is likely that this successful engagement of students in SCL comes
from satisfaction of the basic psychological needs posited by Self-Determination Theory. By design,
SCL is student-driven and collaborative, which directly taps into the needs of autonomy and relatedness
(Baeten, Dochy, & Struyven, 2013; Black & Deci, 2000; Rotgans & Schmidt, 2011), while competence
may be met through frequent feedback and scaffolding from the instructor (Wijnia, Loyens, & Derous,
2011). Empirical studies have confirmed that students report high perceived needs satisfaction when
taught in a student-centred way, suggesting that the satisfaction of these needs underlies engagement
with SCL (Minnaert, Boekaerts, & de Brabander, 2007; Müller & Louw, 2004; Smit et al., 2014).
Although student-centred learning appears to be engaging across educational contexts, the findings
are not unanimous. Research has shown that in some cases students are not engaged by SCL instruction
methods, and actually resist them (e.g., Albers, 2009; Alessio, 2004; Baeten, Struyven, & Dochy, 2013;
Ellis, 2015; Gijbels, Segers, & Struyf, 2008; Hockings, 2009; Keeney-Kennicut et al., 2008; Pepper,
2010; Reimann, 2011; Smith & Cardaciotto, 2011). In these studies, instructors implemented various
student-centred instruction methods, but were surprised to find that students did not engage with them
and disliked them. In some of these studies, disengagement was measured via short questionnaires or
course evaluation forms (e.g., Alessio, 2004; Keeney-Kennicut et al., 2008; Smith & Cardaciotto, 2011),
while in others, disengagement was manifest in students’ behaviour, with indices such as refusal to
participate in activities, absenteeism, overt protests or even course dropout (e.g., Albers, 2009; Ellis,
2015; Pepper, 2010). Taken together, these findings indicate that student-centred learning may
sometimes fail to engage students.
Researchers have speculated that lack of engagement with SCL is likely linked to several
disengaging factors, or barriers. These range from the ambiguity and uncertainty inherent to SCL
instruction methods (Alessio, 2004; Pepper, 2010; Reimann, 2011) to the disruption of expected norms
of teacher/student roles (Albers, 2009; Pepper, 2010). However, it is critical to note that these studies
can only provide speculative explanations, as none of them had disengagement as their research focus.
Therefore, they only superficially investigated the factors underlying students’ negative reactions to
SCL, usually in the same course evaluation forms or basic questionnaires that revealed disengagement in
the first place (e.g., Alessio, 2004; Keeney-Kennicut et al., 2008; Pepper, 2010; Smith & Cardaciotto,
2011). The merit of these studies is thus to make the important phenomenon of student disengagement
from SCL visible, but they fall short of providing clear insights into why it occurs (Ellis, 2015).
Only one published study has systematically investigated the barriers to engagement with student-
centred learning. Ellis (2015) produced a framework of resistance factors, and then tested and refined it
by studying the experience of 172 university students in a SCL learning environment. The framework
comprises eight major barriers to engagement, falling into pre-existing barriers (i.e., characteristics
students have before taking the course) or in-situ barriers (i.e., features inherent to the course) to
engagement with SCL. Pre-existing barriers can include: lack of familiarity with SCL instruction
methods; conflicting beliefs about instructor and student roles; and low risk tolerance. In-situ barriers
can include: negative influence of peers; excessive workload; lack of clarity, structure and guidance;
perceived risk for grade; and environmental constraints such as class size. This classification illuminates
the phenomenon of disengagement with student-centered learning and provides a useful framework
within which to integrate future findings.
However, Ellis’ study (2015) captures only part of what we need to know to design effective
educational programs. Her analysis did not investigate the factors that facilitate student engagement with
SCL. Yet knowledge of both barriers and facilitators to engagement with SCL instruction methods is
necessary to foster student engagement, because merely avoiding factors of resistance will not ensure
that students actually engage with SCL (Ellis, 2015; Evans et al., 2015). We need to know the specific
pedagogical features that can satisfy the psychological needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness
and lead to student engagement.
Another gap in the literature is that few studies investigate the factors of engagement with SCL
from the perspective of students. Indeed, the majority of studies examining SCL teaching methods have
focused either on the instructor’s experience (e.g., Hockings, 2005) or on the concrete features of the
instruction methods being implemented (e.g., Baeten et al., 2013; Kalman, Milner-Bolotin, &
Antimirova, 2010). The experience of students navigating these novel learning environments is seldom
considered, and even when it is, it is mostly through course evaluation forms and basic questionnaires
(Ellis, 2015; Greene, 2015; Struyven et al., 2008). This does not afford a sufficient understanding of
what students themselves find engaging or disengaging in SCL instruction methods. And yet this
perspective is crucial, because how students perceive and experience their learning environment
influences how they learn, and may be even more important than the objective features of the learning
environment (Entwistle, 1991; Könings, Brand-Gruwel, & van Merriënboer, 2005; Lizzio, Wilson, &
Simons, 2002; Struyven et al., 2008). Lizzio and colleagues (2002), for instance, found that in a sample
of 2130 university students, students’ perceptions of their learning environment was a stronger predictor
of learning outcomes than even prior achievement at school. Moreover, students’ perceptions of their
learning environment appear to be especially important in student-centred learning: Severiens and
colleagues (2015) highlight that achievement is more dependent on students’ positive experience in an
SCL environment than in a lecture-based course, as indicated by a larger amount of variance in GPA
accounted for by positive student experience in a SCL course (Severiens et al., 2015). Despite being
essential to understand students’ learning outcomes, the perspective of students has thus seldom been
included in empirical research on student-centred learning.
Another factor potentially contributing to the mixed results of student engagement with SCL is the
use of heterogeneous samples in the literature. For example, over half (55%) of the 273 recent studies
examined by Evans and colleagues (2015) in their review of student engagement used samples of 100 or
more participants. These large samples include high achieving and low achieving students, part-time and
full-time students, mature and regular students, and they do not always distinguish between these very
different learners (Baeten, Kyndt, Struyven, & Dochy, 2010). This is problematic because subgroups of
students have been shown to engage differently with SCL (Baeten et al., 2010; Hockings, Cooke, &
Bowl, 2007; Hockings, 2009; Vermetten, Vermunt, & Lodewijks, 2002). For instance, Hockings (2009)
found that students who failed to engage with SCL were more likely to be non-traditional students, that
is, more likely to be mature, low achieving or students from an ethnic minority. Failing to distinguish
between subgroup of students who differ in significant ways is thus likely to blur some important factors
of student engagement with SCL.
The goal of the present study was thus to address these gaps in the literature by identifying the
factors perceived by students to facilitate or to hinder engagement with SCL instruction methods. In
order to provide an in-depth perspective on student experience, the present study adopted a case-study
approach, focusing on one specific course and using a homogeneous sample of high-achieving
university students. The selected course used a combination of SCL instruction methods, including a
“reacting to the past” role-play, inquiry-based debates and reflective writing. In-depth interviews were
conducted in order to include the student perspective and were complemented by in-class observations.
Investigation focused on the overall experience of students throughout the semester, on students’
perceived needs satisfaction, and, most importantly, on the course factors perceived by students to be
engaging or disengaging. Consistent with previous research, it was expected that both pre-existing
factors, such as familiarity with SCL instruction methods, beliefs about teacher/student roles, as well as
in-situ factors, such as perceived autonomy, competence and support from the instructor, perceived
workload, perceived clarity, and peer influence would be important factors of engagement with SCL
instruction methods.
 Method
Participants
Seven undergraduate students enrolled in a Science College course titled Historical, Philosophical
and Social Aspects of Science at Concordia University, Montréal, participated in this study. The course
was selected because it was entirely based on student-centred instruction methods. Specifically, this
course employed a “reacting to the past” role-play, inquiry-based debates, and reflective writing. All
participants were in their first or second year at university and they were pursuing a degree in a scientific
discipline (e.g., Biology, Neuroscience, Psychology, Exercise Science). There were six female and one
male participants, and they ranged in age from 19 to 22 years old. As members of the Science College,
participants were considered high-achieving students (as the required GPA for admission into the
Science College is B+), which provided a relatively homogenous sample.
In order to recruit participants, the investigator was present during the first class of the semester: he
introduced the study, and circulated a letter of recruitment. This letter highlighted the objectives of the
study as well as what participation entailed (see Appendix A). A consent form was also distributed, as
per the university’s ethics requirements (see Appendix B). Of the students who showed interest, eight
were selected based on their year of study and discipline to ensure they were representative of the entire
class. One participant subsequently withdrew from the study because of scheduling issues.
Procedure
Data were obtained in two ways: in-depth interviews and in-class observations. The seven
participants were interviewed twice, once at the start of the semester and again at the end of the
semester. At time 1, students were interviewed during the first or the second week of class for
approximately 20 minutes, using a semi-structured interview guide. This interview guide comprised a
dozen questions designed to elicit information about demographics (e.g., age, major), about the
expectations participants had about the course, and about their general approach to learning (see
Appendix C).These interviews took place in the course classroom outside of class time and were audio-
recorded. At time 2, which spanned the last two weeks of class, participants were once again interviewed
for approximately 40 minutes, using a different semi-structured interview guide. This interview guide
was longer, comprising 20 questions in total, and was developed from previous research in order to
enquire about various aspects of engagement with SCL (see Appendix D). For example, the question
“Why do you think the professor has given you the activity of reflective writing?” was directly borrowed
from Kalman, Aulls, Rohar and Godley (2008), while the question “Did you spend a lot of time on this
course, compared to regular courses in your department?” was derived from several studies highlighting
the importance of time demands in student engagement (e.g., Baeten et al., 2013; Ellis, 2015). The
objective was to elicit information about how students’ experience had changed throughout the semester,
about the factors they had perceived to facilitate or hinder engagement, and about the satisfaction of
their psychological needs. Time 2 interviews also took place in the course classroom and were audio-
recorded as well.
In terms of in-class observations, these were conducted during each class, for a total of twelve 3-
hour sessions throughout the semester. These observations were recorded by the investigator in a field-
diary (Maxwell, 2013). These detailed notes focused on teacher-student and student-student interactions,
especially during the role-play and the debates. The investigator also paid attention to the
unconventional physical layout of the classroom (e.g., teacher and students’ position during a given
activity), drawing sketches when necessary, as well as to the reactions of students to various learning
activities. The primary purpose of recording these observations was to inform subsequent data analysis
by contextualizing students’ revelations during the interviews. In this study, interviews were thought of
as the “bookends” of data collection, while continuous observation provided insights into the process
experienced by students over the semester. Conducting observations was also important to promote the
trustworthiness of the data, and it served as a source for data triangulation. Using multiple methods to
collect data allows one to circumvent the limitations of relying on one specific method (Maxwell, 2013).
For instance, individuals do not always do what they say they do; complementing interviews with
observations therefore enables comparison of participants’ declarative behaviour with their actual
behaviour (Maxwell, 2013). Sinatra, Heddy and Lombardi (2015) stress that using a combination of
methods is particularly important when studying engagement, because it is a multifaceted construct that
cannot adequately be captured by any unidimensional measure. Further, in-class observations have been
shown to be especially useful in identifying the experiences that “trigger” interest and engagement in the
classroom (Renninger & Bachrach, 2015). In sum, the combination of interviews and observations
constituted a fruitful method with which to investigate student engagement with SCL.
Data Analysis
Interview Data. The process of qualitative data analysis is inherently cyclical and was thus carried
out in several iterations (Maxwell, 2013). First, each interview was transcribed and read; then, each
interview transcript was coded individually. The investigator then returned to some interviews to apply
newly identified codes. Next, all emerging themes and categories were combined into a coding structure,
as detailed below. Each interview was then re-coded in light of that structure, while the coding structure
itself was finally readjusted to fit all the interview data. This multi-step refinement of the structure is
essential to ensure codes faithfully represent the data (Maxwell, 2013).
 The data from the interviews were thematically coded using line-by-line coding, with discrete ideas
being the unit of analysis (Ryan & Bernard, 2003). For instance, the idea “sometimes I found that the
instructions from the teacher were too liberal” was coded as the insufficiently specific instructions
theme. Themes were then combined into larger categories, specifically called substantive categories:
insufficiently specific instructions was thus tied to the broader notion of lack of clarity, which had
previously been highlighted in the literature (e.g., Alessio, 2004). The objectives of the study, which
were to investigate students’ overall experience throughout the semester, perceived barriers and
facilitators to engagement, and satisfaction of the psychological needs, guided the analysis. Specifically,
they provided the organizing structure for the substantive categories: these organizational categories
were established prior to data collection and served as “bins” to order data, while substantive categories
were derived from the data and represent the experience of participants (Maxwell, 2013). The
substantive category of lack of clarity, for example, was integrated into the barrier organizational
category. Taken together, these levels of analysis form a hierarchical coding structure (Figure 1).
All throughout the coding process, interviews were also compared and contrasted against one
another. Specifically, data were analyzed both idiographically and nomothetically (Ponterotto, 2005).
Idiographic analysis refers to the identification of themes that are unique to an individual. For instance,
because only one participant mentioned lack of importance of historical knowledge, it was coded as an
idiographic theme. Conversely, nomothetic analysis refers to the classification of commonalities, that is,
themes that appear to be shared across the sample. For example, because all participants reported initial
confusion with the role-play, it was categorized as a nomothetic theme. This distinction provides a richer
understanding of participants’ experiences (Ponterotto, 2005).
Observation Data. Data from the observations were primarily used to inform coding of the
interviews. Specifically, the investigator used field notes throughout the coding process to ensure that
themes and categories were relevant in the context of the course, and to accurately identify themes as
idiographic or nomothetic. The field diary also helped to better understand interview data. For example,
if a particular student mentioned that the room layout was more conducive to role-play than to debating,
field notes could be consulted to interpret that information. Moreover, an important purpose of this
contextualization was to detect potential inconsistencies between participants’ declarative behaviour
(i.e., interview data) and actual behaviour (i.e., observation data). However, it turned out participants
were very frank and insightful, such that no major inconsistency was noted between the interview and
the observation data.
Data Trustworthiness
In quantitative research, validity and reliability are the two main dimensions used to evaluate the
soundness of data. In qualitative research, this translates into trustworthiness, which refers to the
correctness and credibility of qualitative findings (Maxwell, 2013). In this study, trustworthiness was
established by using field observation and coding supervision. As described above, conducting
observations enabled triangulation of the data by comparing in-class observations of students with
declarations made in the interviews. Another method of establishing trustworthiness was to have
another party with expertise in the content area read through the interview transcripts and examine the
coding structure. This ensured that codes accurately reflected the themes presented in the interviews.
The research supervisor conducted this review, and was in agreement with the investigator on the
majority of the themes. When disagreement occurred, a discussion ensued until a consensus could be
reached.
 Results
The study results are presented in three separate sections, reflecting the study objectives. First,
students’ overall trajectory in the course is presented. Second, the barriers and facilitators to engagement
identified by students are detailed. Third, students’ perceived satisfaction of the needs of autonomy,
competence and relatedness are described.
Student Trajectory
When participants were interviewed for the first time, they had attended either one or two classes,
in which the instructor had explained to them the nature (i.e., the teaching methods that were going to be
used), and the requirements of the course. Their initial reaction was one of aversion. Specifically, the
three categories that emerged during the first interview were students’ confusion, nervousness and
skepticism (Figure 2). All seven participants reported that they did not fully understand how the course
was going to unfold and what would be expected of them. As one particular student expressed: “I’m
really, really lost”. Consequently, students reported feeling anxiety: “I’m going to have a hard time, I
know”; “I’m really nervous”. This worry was perceivable by the observer in the numerous concerns
students voiced to the teacher during the first two class sessions. Finally, participants expressed some
doubt about the teaching methods that would be employed in the course. The role-play, in particular,
was perceived as inappropriate for a university course: “I mean a game! In a science class!” said one
student. Reflecting on her experience at the beginning of the course, one student admitted: “I didn’t
think I was going to learn that much, to be honest”. In sum, students initially expressed concerns about
the course and generally failed to engage with it.
Throughout the semester, however, in-class observations revealed that students became rapidly
more engaged. Whereas the first session of the role-play appeared to be disorienting and nerve-wracking
for students, as indicated by the lack of conversation between team members, the long silences during
the question period and the shaky voices of the presenters, after the second session, students appeared to
have accepted and eased into their roles. Interaction between students markedly increased, teammates
encouraged one another before presenting, and students started taking initiative to embody their
characters. One particular student, assigned the character of a prince, spontaneously set a chair on a table
as his throne for the duration of a session; another student demonstrated principles of inertia and motion
by riding a skateboard across the classroom; yet another student, assigned the role of a cardinal,
punctuated her presentations with ardent biblical verses recited in Latin. This improvement was
mentioned by participants during the second interview: “after the first and second class, we had gotten
 used to doing the presentation”; “I felt more comfortable near the end of the game than at the
beginning, for sure”.
After the role-play had ended, the first session of the debate appeared to once again cause
confusion and nervousness among students. There were other long silences, and few people offered
counter-arguments or questions after each presentation. One student recalled this in her interview: “for
the first debate, there was like a 20 minute period when I didn’t know what we were supposed to do”.
However, by the second debate session, students appeared to have understood their roles and were
gradually engaging with the activity. In one of the last weekly debates, for example, students repeatedly
went beyond their allotted time to discuss issues of gender in science, and exchanged sophisticated
arguments and rebuttals, with almost every student contributing to the debate without any prompt from
the instructor. A similar evolution took place with reflective writing: students were initially unsure how
to write reflective papers, approaching it as a summary writing activity, but eventually understood the
purpose of the activity: “now it’s more like understanding how this work at the time influenced
science...I’m definitely better at it”; “at the beginning I was like ‘OK, I have to write this paper, I really
don’t want to’, now I’m like “OK, I’ll do it!’”.
At the end of the semester, students reported high engagement with the course. In the second
interview, which took place during the last two weeks of class, participants conveyed that they had
enjoyed and benefited from all components of the course: “the game was really fun and educational”; “I
learned a lot about how science works, so I’m really happy I’m in the Science College and I have taken
this course”. Their concerns about the unusual nature of the course had subsided, and some students
were even surprised to realize how stimulating they had found the activities to be. For instance, one
student who was initially reluctant to take part in the role-play and the debates said: “It was a lot more
engaging [than I thought]...when we do debates and things like that, the time flies!” All participants
praised the course, mentioning it had surpassed their expectations, and one particular student reported
that it had been “life-changing” and that “every scientist should take this course”. In-class observations
and interviews thus indicated that, over the semester, students shifted from initially low engagement, or
even disengagement, to ultimately high engagement.
Disengaging Factors
What specific factors underlay this trajectory of student experience? Because participants in this
study experienced the strongest disengagement at the beginning of the course, we first examined the
barriers to engagement with student-centred learning, thus gaining insights into the initial apprehension
and reluctance of students. Following Ellis’ analysis of resistance factors (2015), a distinction was made
between pre-existing factors (i.e., factors students bring with them to a course) and in-situ factors (i.e.,
factors inherent to a course). All major engaging and disengaging factors are outlined below (Figure 3).
There were two main pre-existing barriers to engagement with SCL. Firstly, most participants
reported that they had little to no experience with public speaking, debating and writing non-technical
papers. As these three skills form the core of the instruction methods used in this course, students
expressed concern they would not know how to go about participating in a debate or writing a reflective
paper: “I’m not used to debate and things like that”; “How are we supposed to write a paper if it’s not
like an essay?” For two participants, this issue was exacerbated by linguistic concerns. Because English
was not their native language, they felt even less confident in their ability to express themselves well in a
second language.
All participants mentioned that they had never taken a course using these instruction methods
before. One particular student expressed: “I never got a chance to be in a class like this”. When asked
about the type of course she was used to, she described: “the teacher uses PowerPoints, lecturing, and
we’re just writing what he’s saying on the computer...the usual. It wasn’t anything like this.” Further,
students also mentioned that they had never learned about the history or the philosophy of science
before: “before this course, I knew nothing about this”. This lack of familiarity with both the content and
the methods of the course induced anxiety for students. A general lack of relevant experience thus
initially hindered engagement with this student-centred course.
In relation to these pre-existing factors, four in-situ factors contributed to the initial disengagement
of students from the course. First was perceived lack of clarity: as highlighted earlier, students reported
that being uncertain about how the course would unfold initially thwarted engagement. One student
reported: “For the Galileo game [the role-play], we were kind of thrown into it, we weren’t really
explained...” Likewise, having to meet expectations perceived to be unclear in order to complete tasks
was discouraging to students: “I don’t know what to do for the presentations and papers....when the
game starts, I’m just going to go with the flow and then catch up with everything, because right now,
I’m really, really lost”. In addition, several students mentioned that at the beginning of the course, the
teacher’s instructions were insufficiently specific.
Students also worried that they risked obtaining lower grades in this course. Specifically, all seven
participants believed that, because of the unusual nature of this course, they would obtain poorer
 grades than in the other courses they were taking: “I thought I would have worse [grades], because
when I had seen the course outline, I was like ‘Wow, this course takes a lot of writing’, which isn’t my
strong point”. Consequently, students reported experiencing this as threatening, especially as they
needed to maintain a high GPA in order to remain in good standing in the Science College. An
interesting implication of this was that, for some students, nervousness about an activity appeared to be
proportional to the risk it entailed for their grades. For example, one student justified her lack of
apprehension about reflective writing by saying: “It was only 2% for each paper, and it’s not even
counting this semester”.
Students perceived the requirements of this course as excessively demanding, which led to
disengagement. This encompassed both the intensity of the instruction activities and the complexity of
the material students were exposed to. Specifically, thinking of arguments and counter-arguments during
the role-play and debates, and understanding readings of philosophy of science were perceived to be
significant challenges by students: “it was really long readings, and sometimes it was pretty hard to
understand”. Consequently, participants initially believed they would be unable to meet the demands of
this course, which discouraged them: “that’s an uneasy feeling I have towards this class: I feel like I
should be understanding these concepts more”. One student summed it up by stating: “It really was too
much”. For several students, this barrier was amplified by a lack of time due to outside commitments —
either the demands of other courses or, for one specific student, involvement in an athletic team. This
contributed to disengagement from the course.
Some students reported that the faction they had been assigned to during the role-play was overly
challenging or demotivating. In the “reacting to the past” role-play selected by the instructor, students
were assigned to one of three factions of astronomers: the conservatives, who were proponents of a
geocentric model of the universe; the linceans, who were proponents of a heliocentric system; and the
moderates, who had a middle-ground position. One student noted that being part of the latter faction, the
moderates, was difficult and unsatisfying, as it required a constant back-and-forth between seemingly
irreconcilable views. Another student reported that being assigned to the conservative faction initially
made her feel resentful, because it entailed arguing for a scientifically incorrect position: “in the
beginning, I was a little bit angry to be in the conservative faction, because I don’t believe in that, you
know”. Interestingly, this student later acknowledged that she had become more open-minded and better
able to get involved in her character, as she progressively recognized the value of the arguments
advanced by her faction: “learning about how they were thinking, their arguments, made me realize they
weren’t that dumb, you know. They had some things to back their theories. So I think in that way it
opened my eyes to not be so close-minded”.
 In summary, two pre-existing and four in-situ barriers initially hindered students’ engagement with
the course. Students appeared to come to the course lacking experience with required skills, and
unfamiliar with both its content and its instruction methods. Furthermore, students initially perceived the
course as lacking clarity, being threatening for their grades, excessively demanding, and challenging in
terms of the positions they had to defend in the role-play. The combination of these factors initially
prevented students from engaging with the course.
Engaging Factors
What factors enabled students to overcome these initial hurdles and, ultimately, to engage with the
course? As depicted in Figure 2, there were two pre-existing and three major in-situ facilitators to
engagement with this course.
Two pre-existing factors contributed to students’ engagement with the course: previous experience
with required skills, and a willingness to accept discomfort. First, unlike most participants, two
interviewees reported having extensive experience with public speaking and debating, allowing them to
feel confident in their abilities: “I’ve done a lot of presentations in the past, in Cegep and high-school, so
I think presenting to a class was not something new to me”; “I did many orals during my Cegep, so that
was something I was comfortable with”. Having previous experience with writing was also perceived as
useful, even in the case of a student whose native language was not English: “I really love to write in
French, so that really helped me [writing] in English”. The second pre-existing factor was idiographic
(i.e., unique to one participant): one student reported that being willing to tolerate, and even embrace, a
certain amount of discomfort contributed to engagement. During the role-play, for example, she reported
that, while fright was unavoidable before presenting in front of an audience, its consequences could be
mitigated: “I always feel nervous before an oral... I just don’t let it stop me”. According to this student,
this mindset helped her overcome the initial difficulties of the course, which she described by saying:
“the freestyle component is really important”.
The three in-situ factors that students perceived to facilitate engagement included teacher
guidance, perceived usefulness and peer influence. The instructor played an important role in this
course, according to the participants. By being available and supportive, he helped students to overcome
the initial apprehension they had about the course. One particular student expressed: “he gave us so
many things, so many means and tools...He was always available...I emailed him about 20 times, he
always answered me”. Further, the frequent feedback and clarifications he provided enabled students to
understand what was expected from them: “In the first one [reflective writing assignment], I didn’t
really know what I was doing, but the second one, since I had more of an understanding of what he was
expecting from us...I didn’t have that much of a hard time”. Moreover, the instructor appeared to
regularly consult students when he had to make decisions about the course. In one instance, the
investigator observed that he discussed the date of a particular deadline with students and submitted the
final decision to a vote. Participants mentioned that they appreciated this “democratic” teaching
approach: “he would ask us ‘would you prefer to do this or this?’ And that was good”. Lastly, students
reported that the instructor often took the time to explain the rationale of what he was teaching, which
helped students adhere to the course: “he didn’t just tell us: ‘well you need to know this because it’s part
of the curriculum’”; “he used to take 20 minutes at the end of class to...explain how we could use the
knowledge from that paper in real-life”.
In relation to this, usefulness was the second chief facilitating factor of engagement with this
course. During the first class sessions, students could not yet perceive the utility of the methods
employed in the course: “with the game, I thought: ‘are we just like acting?’ I didn’t realize that by
acting, by getting into these roles, we would understand...our characters’ point of view and the opponent
team’s point of view”. But as the course progressed, students realized that what they were learning was
useful and they became more engaged. In some cases, a specific activity could be perceived as
facilitating another component of the course. For example, students perceived reflective writing to be
useful for subsequent debates: “I get so much more from the readings with the papers... And it’s useful
in debates to get your ideas organized”.
At a broader level, some students noted that the skills they were developing in this course were also
useful in connection to their future selves as researchers and academics: “if people are going to stay in
university, you’re going to have to write papers for the rest of your life, you know? It’s just good
practice”. In contrast, one specific participant did not believe that what she learned would be useful for
her future career as a scientist, and hence questioned the value of some components of the course.
Usefulness thus appeared to be important to engagement. Interestingly, some participants also
spontaneously mentioned how useful they perceived student-centred learning to be. They compared the
teaching methods employed by the instructor with lectures, and stated that the former enabled deeper
learning: “if you have a lecture...people might retain it or people might not, but if you’re giving them the
independence to read it and to actually think about it and then come to class to discuss it, then you’re
involving the students more, you know what I mean?”. Another student added: “it’s not just the teacher
lecturing, we really had to immerse ourselves in the roles, I really liked that” and concluded: “you
learned more when you’re interacting”.
The last facilitator to engagement with SCL in this course was peer influence, which encompassed
several elements. A first aspect of this influence was the emotional support that students provided to one
another. Participants unanimously reported that they felt supported by their teammates when they had to
do challenging tasks: for example, one student mentioned that being told “it’s OK, we’re on the same
boat”, prior to doing her presentations during the role-play, was very reassuring. A second aspect of this
influence was the academic support students obtained from their teammates. Some participants reported
that when they struggled with a specific activity like reflective writing, or with particularly abstruse
philosophical concepts, they were able to turn to their peers for advice and clarification: “if somebody
understood something, then he’d explain it to you”. This helped students overcome the initial
complexity of certain components of the course, as illustrated by what one student said: “everything
made sense after working in groups”. A third aspect of peer influence was to view peers as vicarious
sources of information. That is, students were able to observe how their peers acted during the role-play,
or how they dealt with counter-arguments during the debate, and could benefit from this by adjusting
their own behaviour. Initially, as one student noted, “there is no one you can compare yourself to”,
whereas “after the 2nd class...we knew how others were doing it, which was a great comparison criteria,
and which gave us pointers”. This vicarious learning appeared to help students become more familiar
with the roles they had to adopt in this student-centred course. The last facilitating aspect of peer
influence consisted of the bonding that took place between students. Participants reported that the
collaborative nature of this course fostered close relationships with their teammates. As one particular
student expressed: “it was really interactive: we were in teams and we bonded, forming a small scientific
community at school, which is pretty cool”. This was confirmed by in-class observations, which
revealed a marked increase of friendly student-student interactions as the semester progressed.
Participants generally reported that having developed these close relationships was one of the most
engaging aspects of the course: “I’m really pleased with how the class turned out: you make new
friends, which is great...”.
To summarize, there were two pre-existing and three in-situ factors that appeared to facilitate
student engagement with this course. The two students who had experience with public speaking and
writing, and the one who was willing to accept some degree of discomfort reported that it helped them to
engage with the course. Moreover, the support students received from the teacher, the recognition of the
usefulness of what they were learning, and the beneficial influence from their peers were the chief
engaging factors inherent to the course.
Satisfaction of the Basic Psychological Needs
As the argument on student engagement is predicated on the satisfaction of the basic psychological
needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness, students were asked to comment on this aspect of their
experience during the interviews (e.g., “Do you think you had the required skills to do the role-play?”;
“Did you have freedom in your learning?”).
 Autonomy. Participants generally believed that this course was designed to afford autonomy. They
recognized that its instruction methods had been selected in part because they provided students with the
opportunity to learn independently. One student expressed: “I only understand when...I teach myself,
and that’s kind of what he [the instructor] was trying to do”; “he doesn’t want to shape our thoughts, he
just wants to nurture our ability to think”. Interestingly, participants made a distinction between the role-
play and reflective writing. Because of its relative lack of structure, the role-play was perceived to
require students to be especially autonomous: “we had some freedom in the Galileo Game [role-play], a
lot even, and we could do it our own way”. Reflective writing, however, was found by some students to
be controlling, while for others, it afforded freedom. One student believed that the reason reflective
writing was constraining was because its primary purpose was to ensure students completed their
readings: “it was more verification than anything else...there was no freedom in it”. Conversely, other
students remarked that the reflective writing instructions were sufficiently flexible to allow for
autonomy: “he [the instructor] gave us certain guidelines to follow but you were free to look at it from
your point of view and to write what you thought”. In both cases, this suggests that autonomy was
important to engagement with a given activity. Furthermore, as mentioned above, the teaching style of
the instructor provided students with a sense of autonomy. In addition to asking students for their input
when making decisions about the course, he also shared the control of the class with them. As one
particular student expressed: “he let us go where we wanted to go...He was sitting there, listening to us,
it was completely our class”.
Competence. In this course, competence appeared to be important to engagement. The two
students who reported feeling competent because they had experience with public speaking and writing
prior to this course were better able to engage with the role-play during the first sessions than students
for whom competence was initially low. Most students indeed reported lacking confidence in their
ability to do well and initially struggled to engage: “I just don’t feel completely prepared when I come to
the class when we debate about Galileo”. Interestingly, extensive preparation appeared to mitigate this
by increasing competence: “I did the readings two or three times...when I have that kind of presentation,
I always go up there and I know what I’m talking about”. In addition to preparation, structure was also
an important factor for competence to emerge. Here too participants distinguished reflective writing
from the role-play. Reflective writing was perceived to be clear and structured, which helped students
feel competent and engage with it: “The first paper was really straightforward, I understood really well. I
felt very comfortable writing all the reflective writing papers, really”. Conversely, the role-play was
perceived as lacking structure, which led students to feel confused and disengaged. One particular
student stated: “we were all lost during the game: what we were supposed to do, we didn’t really
understand”. Interestingly, she suggested that one possible solution would be to make the role-play more
structured by adding lecture-like sessions, thus highlighting the importance of structure to competence:
“it would have been better...to have more PowerPoint presentations, explanations before...to make sure
we were saying the right thing”.
Relatedness. Participants generally reported having formed close relationships with other students
in this course. During the first interview, participants mentioned that having to present in front of people
they did not know was initially intimidating: “you don’t know the other people in the class, so it’s a bit
more stressful”. However, as the course progressed, taking part in team-based activities fostered bonding
between students. As one student expressed: “when we were planning orals in our group, it was pretty
cool because it helped us bond and know each other”. This appeared to decrease anxiety and increase
engagement: “when you’re more with your friends, you feel more confident to act stilly and get more in
the role”. Moreover, students also perceived the instructor to be caring, which allowed them to create a
positive relationship with him: “the teacher is excellent, I really like him...he’s always kind and
receptive and approachable”. The need of relatedness thus generally appeared to be met in this course.
 Discussion

The primary goal of the present study was to investigate the experience of students enrolled in a
student-centred course. Specifically, it aimed to identify the factors perceived by students to contribute
to engagement or disengagement from SCL instruction methods. In line with previous research, it was
hypothesized that pre-existing and in-situ factors (Ellis, 2015), as well as satisfaction of the basic
psychological needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness (Furrer et al., 2014; Reeve, 2012) would
be important aspects of student engagement with the course.
Trajectory and Factors
Overall, students in the present study were highly engaged with SCL. The longitudinal nature of
this study allowed us to determine that engagement is a dynamic process, with students initially showing
low engagement with the course, and shifting to an ultimately high level of engagement as the course
progressed. Initial disengagement was indicated by the confusion, nervousness and skepticism reported
by students at the beginning of the course. The pre-existing factors that appeared to underlie students’
concerns and reluctance pertained to their previous experience: most interviewed students mentioned
that they lacked experience with the skills required by the course, and that they were unfamiliar with
SCL instruction methods. Consequently, students perceived that the course expectations were unclear,
and that their grades were potentially in jeopardy, which furthered disengagement. These findings are
consistent with previous studies reporting student resistance to SCL (e.g., Albers, 2009; Keeney-
Kennicut et al., 2008; Pepper, 2010; Reimann, 2011).Throughout the semester, however, students’
involvement in the learning activities increased, and by the end of the course, students showed high
engagement. Similar trajectories have been observed in previous role-play studies, in which students
were initially apprehensive, but became more engaged as the course progressed (e.g., Auman, 2011;
Carnes, 2014; Loui, 2009). In addition, some of the factors contributing to students’ initial reluctance in
these studies were similar to those identified in the present study: for example, unfamiliarity with
teaching methods, stress of public speaking, and skepticism about the value of a role-play in university
(Auman, 2011; Carnes, 2014).
More generally, the disengaging factors identified in the present study were consistent with the
literature. The main barriers experienced by students in the present study were: lack of experience with
required skills; lack of familiarity with SCL; lack of clarity; risk for grades, excessive demands, and
challenging faction assignment (Figure 3). These factors were directly related to Ellis’(2015) barriers of
familiarity and experience with instruction methods, expected negative effect on grades, lack of
relevance, appropriateness of instruction method, lack of clarity, and perceived workload. Being part of
a challenging faction had also been highlighted in previous studies using “reacting to the past” role-plays
(e.g., Carnes, 2014; Olwell & Stevens, 2015). This indicates that the difficulties faced by participants in
the present study were likely not unique to the particular sample used in this study, or to the instruction
methods employed in the course.
However, not all of the present study’s findings were consistent with Ellis’ work (2015). Some
important barriers included in her resistance framework were not mentioned by participants in our study,
most notably negative peer influence, and expectations about teacher and student roles. In the present
study, peer influence was perceived as predominantly positive, whereas in Ellis’ study (2015) a number
of students reported that negative peer response or dysfunctional group-work dynamics hindered
engagement. One possible explanation for this discrepancy is the difference in class size between the
course examined in the present study (22 students) and the larger class investigated by Ellis (141
students), as having a smaller class could contribute to a more positive atmosphere (Zepke, Leach, &
Prebble, 2006). In Ellis’ study (2015) as well, large class size was mentioned as an obstacle to
involvement, because it was perceived to be more difficult for students to contribute something original,
and because being the focus of attention of so many people was intimidating to students. It is also
possible that other elements of the course (e.g., teacher’s behaviour) enabled especially positive
interactions between students in the present study. Unfortunately, the qualitative data obtained in the
present study are not adequate to disentangle the respective effects of each individual factor on a given
variable.
In addition, participants in the present study did not mention that their expectations about the role
of a teacher vis-à-vis his students conflicted with what they encountered in the course, whereas this was
a barrier reported by students in Ellis’ study (2015). A possible explanation for this difference is the year
of study participants in the present study were in. Messineo, Gaither, Bott, and Ritchey (2007) found
that inexperienced university students (i.e., 1st or 2nd year students) tended to have less specific
expectations about teacher and student roles, and were more likely to expect discussion and group-work
in university, than more experienced students (3rd and 4th year students). Because participants in the
present study were either in their first year (n = 4) or second year (n = 3) at university, it is thus possible
that they had not yet formed rigid expectations of how a teacher ought to teach and how a student ought
to learn in a university setting, and that they were more likely to believe that engaging in discussion and
group-work was normal for a university course.
The main facilitating factors identified by participants in this course, teacher guidance, peer
influence and perceived usefulness, were congruent with previous studies. In the present study, it was
specifically the guidance and support provided by the teacher that contributed to engagement. This is in
line with several studies highlighting the importance of teacher involvement and warmth for student
engagement (e.g., Bryson & Hand, 2007; Furrer et al., 2014; Klem & Connell, 2004; Ni Raghallaigh &
Cunniffe, 2013; Reason, Terenzini, & Domingo, 2007; Zepke & Leach, 2010). For example, teachers
who are perceived to be available to discuss academic progress and challenging tasks have been shown
to increase student engagement (Bryson & Hand, 2007; Zepke & Leach, 2010), while students who feel
academically and affectively supported by their teachers also show higher engagement (Furrer et al.,
2014; Klem & Connell, 2004; Ni Raghallaigh & Cunniffe, 2013; Reason et al., 2006; Zepke & Leach,
2010).
Furthermore, in the present study, students’ relationships with other students also constituted a
chief facilitator of engagement. Specifically, positive peer influence was comprised of four distinct
aspects: emotional support, academic support, vicarious learning, and bonding. The aspects of emotional
support and bonding are directly related to previous research underlining the importance of positive peer
interactions (Furrer et al., 2014; Zepke & Leach, 2010) and positive class atmosphere (Ni Raghallaigh &
Cunniffe, 2013; Severiens et al., 2015) to engagement with student-centred learning. In one study, for
instance, the lack of connection between students at the beginning of a SCL course initially hindered
engagement, but was rapidly mitigated by teacher interventions promoting bonding (e.g., asking students
to introduce themselves at the beginning of an activity); as in the present study, these new relationships
in turn increased engagement with the course (Ni Raghallaigh & Cunniffe, 2013). In addition, our
findings show that the “reacting to the past” role-play was especially effective to foster social
interactions and bonding among students, which is consistent with previous “reacting to the past” studies
(e.g., Olwell & Stevens, 2015; Webb & Engar, 2016). Academic support (i.e., the advice and
clarification provided by peers) has also been identified as an essential aspect of engagement and student
success in the literature (Moran & Gonyea, 2003; Pike, Kuh, & McCormick, 2010; Wentzel, 2009). One
study, in particular, found that academically-related peer interaction was the strongest predictor of
positive student outcomes at university (Moran & Gonyea, 2003). Lastly, vicarious learning (i.e.,
learning that occurs through peer observation) is a central component of social cognitive theory
(Bandura, 1997), a major theory of learning, and it has been shown to contribute to deeper learning (Chi,
Roy, & Hausmann, 2008; Muller, Sharma, Eklund, & Reimann, 2007) and to engagement with SCL
(Schunk & Mullen, 2012).
Perceived usefulness was another major facilitating factor identified in the present study. When
students could recognize the usefulness of a given learning activity, they tended to engage with it; when
students doubted the usefulness of an activity, they tended to disengage from it. In the literature,
perceived usefulness appeared to be especially central in online learning environments (Cheung &
Vogel, 2013; Liaw & Huang, 2013; Shen, Laffey, Lin, & Huang, 2006), where its relationship to
engagement was similar to that identified in the present study. For example, Liaw and Huang (2013)
showed that perceived usefulness of various components of an interactive online learning environment
was positively associated with perceived satisfaction and self-regulation, both of which are related to
student engagement in important ways (Pintrich & De Groot, 1990; Rimm-Kaufman, Grim, Nathanson,
& Brock, 2009). In addition, Cheung and Vogel (2013) showed that acceptance of, and engagement
with, a novel, collaborative online instruction tool was also predicted by its perceived usefulness. It
should be noted, however, that in these correlational studies, as well as in the present research, one
variable cannot be said to cause changes in the other; it is also possible that students tend to perceive an
activity as more useful when they are engaging with it, or that a third variable is influencing both
perceived usefulness and engagement. Further research manipulating engagement or usefulness is
necessary to examine the direction of this association. Lastly, one study raised the intriguing possibility
that perceived usefulness could be subject to peer influence: in an online learning environment, students
were more likely to perceive an instruction method as useful when they believed their peers also found it
useful (Shen et al., 2006). This suggests that students in the present study could also have judged various
components of the course to be useful because they were influenced by the beliefs of their peers. This
possibility was not addressed in the present study and deserves further investigation.
Basic Psychological Needs
The findings of the present study are interpretable through the lens of Self-Determination Theory
(Ryan & Deci, 2000). Indeed, by incorporating the basic psychological needs of autonomy, competence
and relatedness, a Self-Determination perspective enables researchers to examine the features of social
contexts that lead to autonomous motivation (Gagné & Deci, 2005; Ryan & Deci, 2000) and, in
educational settings, to engagement (Jong et al., 2012; Nimiec & Ryan, 2009; Smit et al., 2014). When
analyzed from a Self-Determination perspective, the initial disengagement experienced by students in
this course may have resulted from a low level of satisfaction of the needs of competence and
relatedness. Most students reported lacking experience with the central skills required by the course
activities and expressed low confidence in their abilities to do well in the first sessions of the role-play,
indicating that competence was originally low. In addition, the lack of clarity experienced by students
may have further lowered competence, as previous studies have shown that when tasks are ambiguous,
ill-structured or unclear, perceived competence decreases (Lodewyk, Winne, & Jamieson, 2009; Wijnia
et al., 2011). The need for relatedness may also have been initially low, due to students not knowing one
another, as suggested by Furrer and colleagues (2014). As Self-Determination theory would predict, this
combination of low competence and low relatedness was associated with low engagement. It should be
noted that at this early stage of the course, the need for autonomy was likely not relevant, as students had
not had the opportunity to feel either autonomous or controlled yet.
Students became more engaged as the semester progressed. Could this rise in engagement have
resulted from a higher level of satisfaction of the psychological needs? Our findings lend support to this
interpretation. The need for competence may have been increasingly satisfied through progressive
understanding of the requirements of the activities, which was facilitated by teacher guidance, peer
academic support, and vicarious learning from peers. This is consistent with previous studies
highlighting that teacher clarification, feedback and guidance (Jang, Reeve, & Deci, 2010), peer advice
(Wentzel, 2005), and vicarious learning (Schunk & Mullen, 2012) increase perceived competence. The
need for relatedness may have become more highly satisfied as students formed acquaintance and
friendship ties with emotionally supportive peers, as well as by establishing a positive relationship with
an encouraging instructor, both of which have been shown to be essential to the emergence of
relatedness in the classroom (Furrer et al., 2014; Reeve, 2012). Lastly, the need for autonomy may have
been increasingly satisfied through the teaching style of the instructor and through internalization of
activities by the students. This deserves further explanation.
First, the instructor’s teaching approach in the present study appeared to correspond to an
autonomously supportive teaching style (as opposed to a controlling teaching style). Autonomously
supportive teaching styles are characterized by providing choice, by giving meaningful rationales for
activities, by providing students with opportunities to talk and work independently, and by being
responsive to students’ needs (Reeve & Jang, 2006). This teaching approach has been shown to be
fundamental to fostering autonomy and, in turn, student engagement (Jang et al., 2010; Reeve, 2012).
Second, internalization refers to a central process in Self-Determination Theory, whereby
individuals can become autonomously motivated to complete extrinsically motivating tasks (i.e., tasks
that are not inherently rewarding) by connecting them to their self-selected goals and aspirations (Gagné
& Deci, 2005; Ryan & Deci, 2000). For example, a parent may not find cooking dinner to be
intrinsically rewarding, but if he identifies it as connected to his goal of raising healthy children, he
might internalize the behaviour such that he will be autonomously motivated to accomplish it. Likewise,
students in this course may not have experienced all learning activities as intrinsically rewarding, but
they appeared to have been able to internalize some components of the course, thus becoming
autonomously motivated to accomplish them. One way to understand this is to consider increases in
perceived usefulness as a signal that students were able to connect a given learning activity to their
goals, that is, to internalize it. For instance, by identifying that the debates and reflective writing gave
them practice with skills that would be useful to their future career as researchers, some students may
have become more autonomously motivated to take part in these activities, and thus more engaged. In
sum, Self-Determination Theory can illuminate the rise in engagement reported by students in this
course by interpreting it as the result of a gradual, combined satisfaction of the basic psychological
needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness.
There were a number of important limitations to the present study, most of which pertained to
generalizability. First, the course selected for this study had a class size of 22 students, which is smaller
than most university courses (Chapman & Ludlow, 2010), even student-centred courses (Evans et al.,
2015). Second, students enrolled in the selected course were a relatively homogeneous group of high-
achieving students. While this helped avoid some pitfalls encountered by previous studies, such as
overlooking the differential engagement patterns of various subgroups of students amongst
heterogeneous samples (Baeten et al., 2010; Hockings, 2009), it also limits the ability to extend the
present findings to other populations of students. More specifically, it is likely that lower achieving
students, or students enrolled in larger classes may experience student-centred learning differently than
did participants in the present study. For example, it is possible that lower achieving students could be
less concerned about their grades (e.g., McClure & Spector, 2005), or struggle more intensely to
overcome initial difficulties. It is also possible that students from a larger class would not benefit as
much from emotional and academic support from peers as did students in the present study (Ellis, 2015;
Zepke et al., 2006).
One potential direction for future research is thus to assess how generalizable the present findings
are by investigating which factors are perceived to contribute to engagement or disengagement with
SCL when participants are lower achieving students, both in a similarly small class, and in larger
classes. As noted earlier, however, other studies examining courses with larger classes of heterogeneous
samples reported similar barriers and facilitators to those mentioned here (e.g., Ellis, 2015; Ni
Raghallaigh & Cunniffe, 2013), suggesting that some factors of engagement with SCL may be so
fundamental that they recur across contexts and samples.
Furthermore, because the present study was qualitative in nature and focused on the experience of a
small number of participants, its findings cannot be generalized outside the sample of students without
caution. Variables such as engagement, motivation and needs satisfaction were also assessed
qualitatively rather than through validated instruments. While this was a deliberate decision of design
meant to obtain information not traditionally supplied by questionnaires, it would be interesting for
future research to expand upon the findings of the present study by quantitatively measuring engagement
and needs satisfaction in relation to specific features of SCL courses.
 The present study nonetheless successfully investigated student-centred learning from a student
perspective, and its findings have implications for research and practice. First, it appears that most
students do not come prepared to a student-centred course. In line with research indicating that lectures
are the predominant method of instruction in university (Ebert-May et al., 2011; Watts & Becker, 2008),
students’ previous experience appears to consist largely of lectures, in which they have seldom
developed the skills required by SCL. This initial lack of preparation is likely to thwart the basic need
for competence, while generating anxiety and confusion, ultimately resulting in low engagement. It thus
appears critical for instructors to be aware of this in order to help students overcome these initial
difficulties (Ellis, 2015). One powerful way for teachers to do this is by scaffolding students, that is, by
providing appropriate guidance and support to assist students in activities that are beyond their current
abilities (Belland, Kim, & Hannafin, 2013; Clapper, 2015). The findings of our study indicate that the
instructor’ attempts to scaffold students constituted one of the chief facilitating factors to engagement
with the course. Therefore, one recommendation is to train instructors to recognize when students need
assistance with SCL, and to aid them in providing effective and autonomously supportive scaffolding, in
order to help students overcome barriers to engagement. .
Second, participants in the present study appeared to derive significant benefits from having
positive interactions with their peers. Students could bond with them, learn through them and obtain
emotional and academic support from them. A second recommendation for practice would thus be to
promote student interaction and tie formation in classrooms. Several teacher interventions have
effectively accomplished this (e.g., Pike et al., 2010; Webb & Engar, 2016) with very positive outcomes,
including in large classes (e.g., Ni Raghallaigh & Cunniffe, 2013). It would thus be beneficial for
instructor training to include this component.
Third and lastly, Self-Determination Theory appeared to be an especially suitable framework to
interpret the present findings by illuminating the linkages between specific course factors and
engagement. This suggests that, following previous research (e.g., Minnaert et al., 2007; Smit et al.,
2014) future studies on engagement and student-centred learning would benefit from adopting a Self-
Determination perspective.

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 Appendix C
Time 1 Interview Guide
 Are you a 1st year student? What is your major? How old are you?

 What expectations do you have about this course?

o What do you think you should do to succeed in this course?

o What do you expect to get out of taking this course?

 How do you understand science works?

o Probe: How do scientists carry out their research? How do they go about developing

their theories?

 How do you approach learning? How do you usually proceed to learn new

knowledge/concepts?

o Specific examples

 Do you think learning about the history of science would be useful to you?

 Do you think reading materials beforehand would be useful to you?

o Do you usually read materials ahead of time? Do you take any notes?

 Do you think this course will be challenging?

 Do you think this course will be enjoyable?

 Appendix D
Time 2 Interview Guide
 How much did you know about the history and philosophy of science prior to this course?
 Galileo Game
o What did you think about the Galileo Game?
o Did you feel nervous at first?
o Do you think that you had the required skills for the GG? Did that change over the
semester?
o How did you do GG?
o Did you feel competent when doing GG?
o Did the way you reacted to GG change throughout the semester? Why? What
changed?
o Did you find the Galileo game useful to understand how science works? How?
 Do you think it’s still relevant today?
 Reflective Writing (RW)
o Why do you think the professor has given you this activity RW? (Probe: Anything
Else?)
o When you are performing RW, describe what you are thinking about. (probe: Are
you thinking about science ideas? How?)
o What did you think about RW?
o Did you feel nervous at first?
o Do you think that you had the required skills for RW? Did that change over the
semester?
o How did you do RW?
o Did the way you did RW change throughout the semester? Why? What changed?
o Did you find RW useful to understand how science works? How?
 Had you ever taken courses similar to this one in terms of teaching methods before?
o What teaching methods are you used to?
 How well do you think methods like GG and RW could be used in your discipline?
 In your view how does science work: How do theories come about and how do new theories
take the place of older theories?
o Has your view changed over the semester? Why?
 Do you think you had freedom in your learning?
 o Were you able to work on the things that interested you?
 Did the instructor take the students’ perspectives into account and explain why he had you
perform certain activities or made certain decisions?
 Did you find that there was enough guidance?
o Did you always understand what you were expected to do?
o (probe) How did you manage uncertainty?
 Did you enjoy working in groups in the Galileo game and in later debates? Why?
 Did you spend a lot of time on this course, compared to regular courses in your department?
o Do you think this is an appropriate amount of work for a university course?
 How much did you think that you would learn using the Galileo game/RW?
o Did you think you would have similar grades to what you usually have?
o Were you satisfied with the way you were graded in Galileo game? RW?
 Have your expectations about the course been met?
o Did the Galileo game and RW help you meet these expectations?
 Did you find this course challenging? Why?
 Did you find this course enjoyable/motivating? Why
 Do you think it’s good that the Science College has you take a course like this? Why?
 What advice would you have for new students registering in this course?
 What have we not talked about that we should have?

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