Teaching Students to Drive Their Learning: A Playbook on Engagement and Self-Regulation, K-12 (The Corwin Visible Learning Official Collection)

High levels of engagement―it’s not an impossible dream. But to attain it we need to focus on what galvanizes learning, and ensure we are offering the tools and mindsets with which students can lean in. In this playbook, an ace team of educators give us the goods to guide self-starting learners.

Nine modules show us how to:

• Coherent standards, success criteria, tasks, and goals so students can travel clear pathways
• Offer tools that allow learners to recognize the gap between their current performance and the expected performance, and select strategies to close that gap
• Talk with students about engagement as a continuum, and that there are actions they can take to heighten their buy-in to any endeavor
• Stress-test our lesson plans to ensure students can discuss, debate, create and problem-solve around highly relevant content
• Use lots of low-stakes assessment and feedback routines to develop effective collaboration that doesn’t depend on us.

Our job as teachers is to guide learning experiences that build knowledge and self-efficacy. But from there, we need to stay on the sidelines and let students play. Only then will they develop the muscle to persevere, the strategic actions to excel, and the confidence to make our curriculum the springboard of their own dreams and goals.

Douglas Fisher is a professor and chair of educational leadership at San Diego State University and a teacher leader at Health Sciences High and Middle College. Previously, Fisher was an early intervention teacher and elementary school educator. In 2022, he was inducted into the Reading Hall of Fame by the Literacy Research Association. He has published numerous articles on reading and literacy, leadership, and curriculum design, as well as books such as Your Introduction to PLC+, Welcome to Teaching, How Feedback Works, Teaching Reading, and RIGOR Unveiled. Fisher loves being an educator and hopes to share that passion with others.

Nancy Frey is a professor of educational leadership at San Diego State University and a teacher leader at Health Sciences High and Middle College. Her published titles include The Courage to Learn, The Art and Science of Coaching, How Scaffolding Works, and The Illustrated Guide to Visible Learning. Frey is a credentialed special educator, reading specialist, and administrator in California and learns from teachers and students every day.

Sarah Ortega, EdD, is a credentialed bilingual teacher and administrator in California.  She served as a classroom educator for 19 years before moving into various leadership positions at the site and district level.  In 2023, Sarah was recognized as the Chula Vista Elementary School District Teacher of the Year.  Her teaching videos have been featured in professional development training and educator magazines. She is a professional learning consultant and works with schools and districts to design and implement learning solutions that support the emotional, behavioral, and instructional needs of students.  She is a co-author of Teaching Foundational Skills to Adolescents and Instructional Strategies to Move Learning Forward.

John Hattie, PhD, is an award-winning education researcher and best-selling author with nearly thirty years of experience examining what works best in student learning and achievement. His research, better known as Visible Learning, is a culmination of nearly thirty years synthesizing more than 2,100 meta-analyses comprising more than one hundred thousand studies involving over 300 million students around the world. He has presented and keynoted in over three hundred international conferences and has received numerous recognitions for his contributions to education. His notable publications include Visible Learning, Visible Learning for Teachers, Visible Learning and the Science of How We Learn, Visible Learning for Mathematics, Grades K-12, and 10 Mindframes for Visible Learning.