Impacts of Peer Instruction on Engagement in an Elementary Science Classroom

Abstract

Student engagement in the classroom has a direct impact on how much students learn in a class. Additionally, highly engaged students in early education are more likely to remain engaged throughout their academic future. Students who have moderate or low engagement in early education tend to end up minimally engaged by middle school or high school. This leads to reduced learning outcomes in the present and in the future for these students. This study investigated the impact of peer instruction on classroom engagement of fourth-grade science students. Students were organized into pairs or small groups to read related texts and explain to their partner what they had read. Likert scale surveys, observation rubrics, and student interviews were used to determine if this treatment affected engagement. It was found that there was a small but not significant increase in engagement during peer instruction. The vast majority of students had the same level of behavioral and emotional engagement with peer instruction as they had with traditional instruction. This was verified with all three methods of data collection. This likely means that this particular mode of peer instruction was not optimal for this age group of students. More scaffolding around how the peer explanations are carried out, or use of another type of active learning may prove more effective for 4th grade science students.