Assessing Student Engagement in a U.S. History and Civics Curriculum

There is consensus among social studies educators that student engagement matters, but there is a lack of consensus about how to assess student engagement in social studies classrooms generally and minimal evidence of how to do so in civics specifically. This exploratory study addresses the gap using student surveys and classroom observations from more than 800 students in six school districts across the country to examine multiple dimensions of students’ engagement with a middle school U.S. history and civics curriculum. Specifically, we consider the extent to which student surveys document variation within and between social studies classrooms using the same curriculum.