Despite the fact that unicorns are not real, you undoubtedly know what a unicorn is. Despite the fact that narwhals ARE real, you may not know what a narwhal is. In schools, we think that engagement at the highest level like it’s a unicorn—something we’ve heard of, but know isn’t real. We should be thinking of engagement in schools as a narwhal—something that we may not know much about, but is absolutely real and can be found right in your own school!
In this book, Heather Lyon creates a common understanding of what engagement looks and sounds like so that anyone can design and gauge instruction using this understanding. More importantly, with this knowledge educators can make changes to instruction to truly increase student engagement.