Online learning environments are diverse and dramatically different from face-to-face classrooms. How students engaged is very different in online learning (Chiu & Hew, 2018). Student engagement that comprises of three dimensions - behavioural engagement, emotional engagement, and cognitive engagement, is considered an important aspect of online education, which can be explained by the self-determination theory of motivation (Deci & Ryan, 1985). The theory posits that all individuals possess three fundamental psychological needs that move them to act or not to act – the needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence (Deci & Ryan, 1985). Online learning environments support the three needs are more likely to behaviourally, cognitively and emotionally engage students in learning

This presentation aims to share some instructional strategies that support the three needs, resulting in better student engagement. For example, how to use collaborative group multimedia eportfolios to enrich various classroom interactions: students within group, between groups, teachers and students; how to facilitate conversations in discussion forum; how to redesign course to increase sense of belongings. The presenter used pre-, mid- and- post survey to collect students’ feedback and views on their engagement to investigate how the strategies work.

The results indicated (i) the eportfolios encouraged collaborative leaning, peer assessment and self-assessments; (ii) multimedia and/or multiple representations made them feel autonomy and competent and motivated them to learn and share, (iii) the students behaviorally, cognitively and emotional engaged in the discussions; (iv) the overall instructional design increased level of relatedness.

Keywords:student engagement, online learning, assessment