Understanding school engagement: The role of contextual continuities and discontinuities in adolescents' learner identities

Abstract

Adolescents' school engagement is related to continuities and discontinuities in learning notions between various contexts (e.g., school, home, peer groups). Learning notions are the prevalent ideas in a context about appropriate learning goals, contents and means. It has remained unclear how adolescents' learner identities mediate the role that (dis-)continuities play in adolescents' school engagement. To advance insight into adolescents' school engagement, we examined what relations could be found between various contextual (dis-)continuities in learning notions adolescents with diverse levels of school engagement experience and their learner identities. Our comparative case study suggests that especially (dis-)continuities regarding notions of what it entails to be a good learner and the importance of being one between the school context on the one hand, and the contexts of home and peer groups on the other inform students' school-related learner identities. The present study implies that adolescents' school engagement can be fostered by building continuities between school and home in the appreciation of students' efforts and by making them resilient to unconstructive learning notions in home and peer group contexts.