I agree that engagement is the key for students to remain focused. The they need to know the answers to the 3 questions:
Am I interested?, Can I do this?, Does it matter?
If we design our lessons with these questions in mind then student engagement will increase, once this happens then using productive talk and modeling metacognition will increase retention of the information.
I have learn that prodcutive talk leads to learning. Engagement is the key to remain focused on the student perspective. I also learn that the teachermusy encourage metacognition through molding it, explaining their thoought process when introducung content information, and teach the students to label their knowledge and that of their classmates during discussion.
