Does a Data-Informed Online Intervention for Teachers Improve Student Motivation and Engagement During the Transition to High School? A Cluster Randomised Controlled Trial

Teachers can foster or thwart students’ motivation and engagement; hence, interventions often target teacher behaviors to improve student outcomes. These interventions are seldom derived from longitudinal data from the specific participants of interest. In this study, we created an intervention to increase student motivation and engagement using previously derived longitudinal data from our target population. We selected six teacher behaviors that best predicted student engagement in two subjects, physical education (PE) and mathematics, among Grade 7 students. We tested a 12-hour mostly-online teacher professional learning intervention in a prospectively registered, single-blinded, cluster-randomised controlled trial. From 30 participating schools, 1,969 students could be matched to one of the 129 teachers who provided consent (71 PE and 58 mathematics teachers). Employing a multiverse analytical approach, we found the intervention significantly increased psychological need satisfaction in most analyses. We found no robust effects on student engagement or other self-reported variables (attitudes toward PE, student use of approach or avoidance goals, or the perceived value of mathematics). Effects on achievement were mixed. We observed positive effects on PE achievement, with increased self-reported physical activity corresponding to an extra 0.43 days of activity per week. There were no significant effects on mathematics achievement. While we did not significantly increase engagement itself, this light-touch professional learning intervention was able to increase proximal predictors of motivation and engagement.