Sustaining Learning Interest Among Disengaged Students: Impacts of Constructive Feedback

Abstract

This research explores the role of external feedback (provided by a foreign business community or FBC) in students’ learning. The aim is to determine whether indirect constructive feedback can sustain learning interest among disengaged students of upper secondary schools located in a large urban environment. The survey is constructed based on the Theory of Planned Behavior, while the feedback design stems from the Double-Loop Learning concept. Data were collected from 176 former and current students. The findings show that indirect constructive feedback has a significant influence on both attitude and paradigm (relating to learning). The findings show that indirect constructive feedback has a significant positive influence on both attitude and paradigm (relating to learning). Consistency, trust, teacher collaboration, and understanding students’ needs represent important factors when designing indirect constructive feedback from an external source.

1. Introduction

Overcoming school disengagement has been a challenge in students’ learning and development in a large urban area [1,2,3]. Traditionally, schools rely on developing an effective teacher–student relationship with more interactive academic activities and more active engagement [4]. This development depends on a teacher’s capability and experience, which are developed through a series of in-service training sessions [5,6]. It is often presumed that more effective engagement should be sufficient to entice learning interest and provide a positive learning experience to overcome school disengagement.

For younger students, due to extensive interactions and time, a teacher–student relationship can be easily established [7]. This relationship has a positive influence on learning interest and motivation due to trust and respect (by knowing students better, providing choices and opportunities, and encouraging more self-confidence and reflection daily). Despite some successes (especially for students at the primary and the lower secondary levels), the disengagement gap can still exist for those at the upper secondary (or senior high school) level [8,9]. This gap is due to personal outlook after graduation for secondary students (e.g., employment, vocational education, and higher education) after school completion. Thus, sustaining learning interest and motivation to learn among students has been a challenge for upper secondary students.

In Thailand, school disengagement remains one of the country’s most serious issues, which affects long-term national competitiveness and social development [4,10]. This disengagement is mainly attributed to poverty, broken families, and negative learning experiences and environments. Specifically, the quality divide between the two categories of schools has widened over the past decades [10,11]. The first school category belongs to the Ministry of Education and higher education institutes. These schools are a part of the country’s central government. The second school category belongs to local municipalities, which are a part of the Ministry of Interior, including the country’s largest urban area (i.e., the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration or BMA). See

Table 1. Quality divide based on the 2011 scores from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study.

School Category	Science	Mathematics
University teacher training (demonstration or laboratory) schools	552	554
Ministry of Education schools (only public schools)	472	460
BMA schools (the special administration under the Ministry of Interior)	447	425
Other municipality schools under the Ministry of Interior	440	424

Note: About 800,000 students or 15% of the entire population attend Ministry of Interior schools. Source: Department of Education, BMA.

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Initially, the need for BMA schools stemmed from the country’s rapid economic expansion in the 1980s. There was a large migration of the population from poor rural areas to major cities or urban areas (e.g., Bangkok) for better employment opportunities, especially in the construction, textile, and retail industries. Thus, BMA schools were swiftly established to accommodate children from this influx. Like most urban schools, BMA schools are characterized by a lack of school readiness, low academic achievement, and a feeling of disengagement among students. As a result, student dropouts among BMA schools have generally been higher than those among Ministry of Education schools [11,12].

Despite this challenge, there has been strong interest in enticing learning interest and improving the learning experience of BMA students. The reason is that most upper secondary level (from Grade 10 to 12) students tend to look for work immediately after completing their diploma. Soft and learning skills (e.g., learning from social interactions, feedback, mistakes, observations, etc.) are some of the main barriers to employment [11,13,14]. Due to the many manufacturing and service firms nearby, working with business communities, such as FBCs, potentially provides an opportunity to deal with employability and school disengagement [15]. It is important to point out that public–private collaboration in Thailand has been encouraged, such as dual vocational education and work-integrated learning [16]. However, school partnerships have been less interactive due to concerns regarding students’ age and maturity as well as the ability to work with teachers [9,10,12].

Thus, the research question is as follows: can constructive feedback from an external source become a learning stimulus to help sustain learning interest and motivation to learn among disengaged students? Simply put, the research aims to determine whether indirect constructive feedback from an external entity can be an effective stimulus to sustain students’ learning interests. For the research, this external feedback is for the upper secondary schools in a large urban area.

2. Literature Review

School disengagement is viewed as a multi-dimensional construct [2,8]. It deals with personal, social, and economic issues. Personal issues include loneliness, isolation, and even learning ability (as a student who is classified as a slow learner likely feels disengaged from school). Social issues primarily deal with poor school reputation, a broken family, and low self-confidence and self-esteem. Economic issues relate to the family’s financial background (i.e., poverty) and lack of perceived career opportunities for students.

Providing constructive feedback has been encouraged for many decades as part of student engagement [17]. Feedback should be both constructive and positive since it can sustain positive changes in behaviors and attitudes, as well as a shift in paradigm [18]. Thus, constructive feedback is an important mechanism for creating a more positive learning experience, including self-reflection on past mistakes [19,20,21]. When integrating feedback from outside (e.g., FBC) into a classroom, it is important to recognize and understand students’ prevailing assumptions at school. Thus, the use of the Double-loop Learning concept becomes essential [22]. Feedback should be based on the following two relationships: (1) first loop on actions and results, and (2) second loop on assumption/mindset and actions. For the first loop, feedback should focus on improving how students’ actions can contribute to the expected results. For the second loop, the relationship is more complex since there is a need to understand the prevailing assumption of a student that contributes to his or her actions and behavior [23,24].

Moreover, the Theory of Planned Behavior helps describe a student’s learning experience, which impacts his or her intention about learning [25,26]. A student’s intention represents a level of willingness to behave (e.g., decision or action). The behavior represents an outcome of this intention. For instance, asking a question during a lesson indicates a perceived safe learning environment and strong learning interests. Undertaking a new task shows a willingness to learn. Sharing knowledge with a colleague implies self-confidence in his or her knowledge and skills. An individual’s intention is also closely associated with his or her paradigm [27].

A paradigm relates to a person’s prevailing assumptions or internal beliefs. As a result, the paradigm is often viewed as a good indication of an individual’s intention [1,28]. Many BMA students, who view their future success as based on family wealth, are less likely to work hard. If a good employment opportunity only depends on a school’s reputation, he or she likely refuses to pay attention to the lessons at school.

Based on the Theory of Planned Behavior, there are three important attributes that influence the intention to learn for a student [25,26,27]. The first attribute is a student’s attitude. It reflects what a student views to be favorable or unfavorable as an outcome of a specific behavior or action. For instance, since most BMA students do not plan to apply for university placement and opt to work directly, they may show a poor attitude when an experiment does not involve hands-on experience. They may demonstrate a negative attitude in learning when academic achievement is determined only by a grade.

The second attribute is the subjective norms. This term reflects the impacts that social expectations (e.g., peers and teachers) have had on a student’s behavior. For instance, a student chooses to participate in group discussion because of peers’ expectations, implying the right thing to do. The third attribute is perceived behavioral control. This term is about whether a student feels they have considerable control over completing an assignment. Since BMA schools emphasize compliance with the centralized curriculum and assessment, the perceived behavior control is removed from consideration.

3. Materials and Methods

3.1. Description of the FBC Activities

Based on the openness policy by BMA to engage with business communities, the pilot project between FBC and two BMA schools was agreed upon and has been continuing since 2016. FBC began working initially with two senior teachers with a focus on science education. Instead of submitting an experimental report, FBC and teachers agreed that product development (e.g., fertilizer, soap, detergent, etc.) would be a primary output from science experiments. This decision allowed FBC to share business experiences and engage with students’ activities, such as product development.

In accordance with the two senior teachers, many prevailing assumptions shared by students were brought up. For instance, “poverty prevented me from achieving my potential and a school’s learning condition prevented me from skill development for my future”, “Due to poverty, my future was always bleak no matter how hard I tried to work at school”. These assumptions had resulted in a low level of learning interests. Moreover, the two teachers mentioned the importance of emotional support and better living. For emotional support, BMA students often felt hopeless because of their poor school reputation and family background (e.g., less affluent). For better livelihood, due to a lack of affordability for further education, they felt that they were not employable in the workplace (as a centralized curriculum for the secondary level was intended for higher education).

For FBC’s participation, products from science experiments represented a significant change in students’ learning experience. These products, to be sold for extra income, strengthened learning, listening, teamwork, communication, and planning skills. Due to limited business experience, teachers were willing to collaborate with FBC. Note that constructive feedback provided by FBC is referred to as indirect because it highlights the supporting role of FBC without direct involvement in classroom management.

The Double-loop Learning concept was applied for feedback design [29]. See Appendix A for details. The purpose of constructive feedback for the first loop was to reinforce and sustain positive behavior by BMA students in learning. Indirect constructive feedback included sharing business experiences through continuous school visits and workshops (to help students improve their products). For the second loop, the purpose of indirect constructive feedback was to challenge persistent assumptions that had previously hindered learning interests [30]. It is important to point out that FBC has been providing constructive feedback continuously since 2016. This duration would be sufficient to gain a better understanding of its impacts on learning interests and motivation to learn [31,32]. These impacts should be reasonable for further investigation if students are asked to recall broad implications from their experiences [33,34].

3.2. Experiment

FBC, as the provider of indirect constructive feedback, can be described as follows. The engagement has focused on students who are in year 10 or 11 so that they will experience this feedback for at least two years. FBC works closely with teachers so that the five activities of indirect constructive feedback can be arranged and organized. Not only company members of FBC but also FBC partners, such as embassies and international foundations, have worked together to ensure the success and effectiveness of these activities. It is important to highlight the importance of teacher collaboration and understanding of students’ prevailing mindset. Again, see Appendix A for details.

3.3. Research Method

The research method consisted of several steps. The first one was survey development. This development was based directly on three components (i.e., FBC’s activities on feedback, subjective norm, and attitude) as the contributors to the students’ paradigm. See Appendix A for FBC’s activities. Indirect feedback from an external entity is denoted by IF. Attitude is symbolized by A. The term N represents subjective norms. Paradigm/mindset is expressed by P. See Appendix B for the illustration of the survey. The 5-point Likert scale was used, where 1 indicated the least agreement, and 5 indicated the strongest agreement. Then, the research model was developed. Data were statistically analyzed using a structural equation model with path analysis to investigate the effects of indirect constructive feedback from an external source, subjective norm, and attitude on the students’ paradigm. Factor analysis was also employed to test the coherence of the questions to each factor. See Figure 1 for the research’s conceptual framework.

4. Results and Analysis

A total of 176 former and current students participated in the survey. All of them needed to have at least 2 years of interactions with FBC and be familiar with its activities. They were initially asked whether they could recall their interactions and experiences with FBC before completing the survey. The 2-year experience was chosen since FBC had primarily engaged with students in years 10 and 11. Regarding the research framework, a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted to verify how the measurement model was consistent with observable variables. The overall result of CFA shows the model did not fit within the criteria level. See

Table 2. Initial results after harmonizing the model’s key indexes.

Index	Criteria Value	Model Value	Result
p-value	>0.05	0.000	Fail
ꭕ2/df	<2.00	3.340	Fail
RMSEA	<0.05	0.116	Fail

. Thus, the measurement model was inconsistent with some observable variables.

Then, the analysis of the structural equation model was conducted. The result illustrated that indirect constructive feedback and attitude had positive influences on the paradigm, as their loading factor values were greater than 0.03 (i.e., 0.42 for indirect constructive feedback and 0.34 for attitude, respectively) [33]. On the contrary, the subjective norms component did not affect the paradigm (i.e., its loading factor value is 0.02); see Figure 2.

According to the structural equation modeling, subjective norm did not influence the paradigm (or mindset) of the disengaged students. Thus, it was removed. For the second iteration, the overall result of CFA showed a good model that fitted within the criteria level. In other words, the measurement model was consistent with observable variables. See

Table 3. Results from harmonizing the revised model’s key indexes.

Index	Criteria Value	Model Value	Result
p-value	>0.05	0.07382	Pass
ꭕ2/df	<2.00	1.32341	Pass
RMSEA	<0.05	0.043	Pass

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Also, see Figure 3 for the result of the structural equation model. It indicated that the effects from indirect constructive feedback and attitude became higher than the value of 0.03 (0.51 for indirect constructive feedback and 0.42 for attitude). Thereby, students’ paradigm was influenced by indirect constructive feedback and attitude.

Based on the path analysis, indirect constructive feedback and attitude had positive impacts on individual items within the paradigm. Again, the term indirect feedback from an external entity is denoted by IF. The term attitude is symbolized by A. The term paradigm/mindset is expressed by P. See

Table 4. Path analysis from the revised model.

Independent Variables		P1	P2	P3	P4
IF	Total Effect	0.42 **	0.29 **	0.32 **	0.39 **
		(0.12)	(0.10)	(0.10)	(0.12)
	Indirect Effect	-	-	-	-
		-	-	-	-
	Direct Effect	0.42 **	0.29 **	0.32 **	0.39 **
		(0.12)	(0.10)	(0.10)	(0.12)
A	Total Effect	0.35 **	0.24 **	0.26 **	0.32 **
		(0.12)	(0.09)	(0.10)	(0.11)
	Indirect Effect	-	-	-	-
		-	-	-	-
	Direct Effect	0.35 **	0.24 **	0.26 **	0.32 **
		(0.12)	(0.09)	(0.10)	(0.11)

Note: ** indicating p-value < 0.01 (implying significant and positive effect); See Appendix B for the description of P1, P2, P3, and P4.

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A factor analysis was conducted to understand the level of importance among the individual items within indirect constructive feedback, attitude, and paradigm [33]. Based on the factor loading analysis, all items within the components had a significant influence due to the correlation value of more than 0.70 [33]. Therefore, the next step involved the level of importance among the individual items within indirect constructive feedback, attitude, and paradigm [35]. The results from the following items contributed the most: IF3 (Opportunity to learn from outside school shows me that someone cares about my well-being and future.) and IF2 (Opportunity to share my ideas and work with people outside school shows me that I can potentially succeed in the future.), respectively.

For attitude, A3 (My hard work and commitment will have meaningful impacts in the future.) and both A2 (I feel good about myself when I fully engage in lessons and experiments.) and A5 (I feel that making mistakes during work is part of learning.) were the most impactful items. For paradigm, P4 (I believe that my efforts and hard work will contribute to my success.) and P3 (Because of my hard work, the school’s image contributes very little to my future success.) were the most influential items. In this analysis, the P1 item was used as a starting point for a comparison; see

Table 5. Factor loading value of each observed variable within the revised model.

Variable		Factor Loading	Standard Error	T (t-test)
IF	IF1	0.79	0.06	13.60 **
	IF2	0.89	0.06	14.03 **
	IF3	0.91	0.07	12.92 **
	IF4	0.76	0.08	10.14 **
A	A1	0.82	0.06	12.77 **
	A2	0.83	0.07	11.44 **
	A3	0.88	0.07	13.43 **
	A4	0.75	0.07	10.88 **
	A5	0.83	0.07	11.78 **
P	P1	0.82
	P2	0.57	0.1	5.78 **
	P3	0.62	0.1	6.02 **
	P4	0.76	0.09	8.26 **

Note: ** indicating p-value < 0.01 (implying significant and positive effect); IF and A are considered as dependent variables. P1 represents the starting point when comparing the dependent variable value.

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The revised model revealed the importance of indirect constructive feedback and attitude on the paradigm of students. The nature of indirect constructive feedback (e.g., explicit—conversations and donations; and implicit—care and support) helped entice learning interests and sustain positive behavioral changes despite the challenges in schools located in a large urban area like BMA. See Figure 4.

To gain better insights into FBC’s impacts, the next analysis focused on whether attitude could also be influenced by indirect constructive feedback. This was because feedback, if provided in a constructive manner on a continuous basis, not only influenced the paradigm but also would likely affect the attitude of a person [18,36]. The findings showed that, in fact, indirect constructive feedback positively impacted students’ attitudes.

Given this additional analysis, there are two essential implications from FBC’s indirect constructive feedback for upper secondary students at two BMA schools. Feedback had positive impacts on the paradigm of learning among disengaged students. Secondly, feedback influenced students’ overall attitude, which also had a direct impact on the paradigm. See

Table 6. Results from the chi-square showing the level of attitude based on the level of indirect constructive feedback received (statistically significant at the 0.05 level).

Factor		A1	A2	A3	A4	A5
IF1	Value	291.543	256.955	241.178	294.771	257.732
	p-value	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000
IF2	Value	214.438	195.249	256.350	211.161	205.096
	p-value	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000
IF3	Value	154.919	208.012	211.599	149.821	137.443
	p-value	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000
IF4	Value	122.673	150.230	163.440	107.799	105.437
	p-value	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000	0.000

and Figure 5.

5. Discussion

Indirect constructive feedback from an external source influences students’ paradigm on learning for upper secondary students. In other words, this indirect constructive feedback contributes positively to learning interests among disengaged students. The FBC experiences with indirect constructive feedback provide a practical example of how schools can explore an opportunity to engage with outside communities, such as business communities, for their upper secondary students. Furthermore, feedback itself does not need to be complex if students’ prevailing assumptions about learning interests and behavior are recognized.

The continuity of providing feedback, based on 2-year consistent interactions with FBC, is important for trust and engagement with both teachers and students [8,29,36]. For FBC, strong collaboration with teachers is also essential because of their understanding of students’ needs. Teacher collaboration helps design FBC’s indirect constructive feedback to address many prevailing assumptions within students about learning and school. These assumptions are often based on personal, social, and economic factors that negatively affect students’ learning interests [7,37].

Thus, constructive feedback can be in various shapes and forms [38]. Within the first loop (in the Double-loop Learning concept), feedback is more explicit with donations and direct interactions with FBC during school visits and workshops. For the second loop, feedback is more implicit with supportive gestures (to show the level of confidence and belief in the students), such as FBC’s support of peer-to-peer learning and invitations to display and sell products from science experiments. These support and invitations reflect the recognition of students’ efforts, behavior, and hard work, which have resulted in innovation and creativity [29,39]. Interestingly, subjective norms do not affect the paradigm of disengaged students. It is likely that, for elder students at the upper secondary level, the influence of social expectations is limited. Given the short duration left at school, the focus of these students is not likely to please friends or to meet their expectations [1,15].

FBC’s engagement presents an encouraging step to sustain a positive change in attitude and paradigm on learning among disengaged students in a large urban area. For this approach to be effective, there are at least four issues to be considered. The first issue is the repetition and consistency of the delivery of feedback as part of student engagement [28]. The importance of teacher collaboration is the second issue since constructive feedback is indirect and should support classroom activities [4]. The third issue is the relatedness of constructive feedback to the needs of disengaged students [20]. Thus, a teacher–student relationship still plays a significant role in ensuring accurate insights into students’ needs [7,29]. The last issue is the openness and willingness to engage with an external entity as a constructive feedback provider. The clarity of FBC’s intention and roles is important for this last issue to avoid any misunderstanding with teachers.

The design of indirect constructive feedback is essential when attempting to entice learning interests from upper secondary students [40]. Understanding the needs of and prevailing assumptions within students is essential for this feedback design. Since feedback is not part of formal assessment and evaluation, having an external entity such as FBC can stimulate the learning interests of upper secondary students. Stirring learning interests can possibly transform disengaged students into life-long learners who have become important in the workplace today [41].

Finally, indirect constructive feedback from an external entity provides an opportunity for teachers to address students’ prevailing assumptions that have hindered their learning interests. FBC’s collaboration with teachers in feedback design and communication represents a potential step to deal with school disengagement since social expectations (or subjective norms) appear to have an insignificant effect on students’ intention to learn. In addition, the impacts of a student–teacher relationship on upper secondary students can be limited [8,9].

6. Future Research

There are several extensions from FBC’s experiences and engagement with BMA schools. For instance, the interrelationship among constructive feedback from an external source, learning interests, learning behavior, and motivation to learn should be examined. Moreover, how an integration of FBC has affected perceived learning environments by students in urban schools (which tend to have poor reputations) should be further explored. This should help how the learning environment is designed and developed. Feedback design and communication are also another research extension that should be investigated, especially with respect to the second loop in the Double-loop Learning concept.

7. Conclusions

The research aims to address school disengagement, which affects students’ learning interests. It is based on FBC’s collaboration with two BMA schools, which began in 2016, to entice learning interests among disengaged students at the upper secondary level (Grade 10–12). Poverty and school reputation have contributed to this disengagement, which cannot be addressed by a student–teacher relationship alone. Various forms of FBC’s indirect constructive feedback have been consistently provided to these students. Feedback design applied the Double-loop Learning concept.

To evaluate the impacts of FBC’s feedback (as an external source), the survey was developed in reference to the Theory of Planned Behavior. A total of 176 former and current upper secondary students with 2 years of experience with FBC’s feedback completed the survey in early 2024. The findings show that indirect constructive feedback has a positive effect on attitude (i.e., feeling and reaction of a student to a situation) and paradigm/mindset (i.e., relating to students’ intention to learn) significantly. The attitude of students also directly affects the paradigm.

Finally, indirect constructive feedback from an external entity can be used to entice learning interests without direct classroom interference from teachers. Feedback from an external entity provides an opportunity for teachers to address students’ prevailing assumptions, which have hindered their learning interests. FBC’s collaboration with teachers in feedback design and communication represents a promising step in dealing with school disengagement. This is due to the insignificant effect of social expectations (or subjective norms) on students’ intentions to learn and the limited impacts on more senior students at the upper secondary level by a student–teacher relationship.