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Emerging Perspectives
ep.journalhosting.ucalgary.ca

Let’s CHAT About Online Student Engagement: Cultural-Historical Activity
Theory as a Theoretical Lens

Jacqueline Yu*

University of Calgary

Student engagement has been linked to academic outcomes and school completion.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, online instruction became a learning mode of
necessity, resulting in an explosion of related research. This article will explore
Engeström’s (1987/2019) cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) as a theoretical
lens to understand online learning environments. Using third-generation activity
theory, in-person learning environments will first be described through a model of
two activity systems; one system relates to the teacher’s instruction, and the other
relates to the student’s school participation or studying. This model will be extended
for online settings to incorporate a third activity system, the homeschooling family.
This extension may provide a promising approach to conceptualizing the unique
dynamics of online student engagement.

Keywords: Engagement, Online Learning, E-learning, Cultural-historical activity theory,
5-12 schooling

Yu, J. (2024). Let’s CHAT About online student engagement: Cultural-historical activity
theory as a theoretical lens. Emerging Perspectives Special Edition: Designing for Digital
Futures, 7(1), 1–11.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, student enrollment in K-12 online learning had already

been building momentum in Alberta, Canada (Barbour et al., 2021). However, the ubiquitous

“emergency remote teaching” that became a necessity during the pandemic spotlighted the key

difficulties of delivering effective online instruction, including fostering attentiveness and

meeting students’ academic and socio-emotional needs at a distance (Leech et al., 2022; Martin

et al., 2022; Openo, 2020, p. 6; Vaillancourt et al., 2022). The factors linked to course completion

and student attrition have been an enduring concern for online learning environments, including

*jacqueline.yu@ucalgary.ca



Yu/ Emerging Perspectives (2024) 2

efforts to develop techniques to identify and support at-risk learners (Archambault et al., 2010;

Bienkowski et al., 2012; Friedhoff et al., 2022; Robyler et al., 2008)

Presumed to be supportive of school completion (Appleton et al., 2008), student

engagement has been a prominent research focus for online learning environments (Henrie et al.,

2015; Martin et al., 2021). This emphasis placed on engagement is unsurprising, given the

evidence supporting its relationship with academic perseverance and achievement (Alrashidi et

al., 2016; Fredricks et al., 2004; Lei et al., 2018). Given the instructional challenges posed by

online learning settings, an enhanced understanding of student engagement may help improve

online pedagogies and interventions. In this paper, Engeström’s (1987/2019) cultural-historical

activity theory will provide a theoretical lens for the unique dynamics of online learning

environments and a promising framework for understanding student engagement.

Engeström’s Cultural-Historical Activity Theory

To provide a conceptual outline of Engeström’s (1987/2019) cultural-historical activity

theory (CHAT), it is first necessary to generally define the term, activity system. Building on the

prior theoretical work of Vygotsky and Leontiev, Engeström (1987/2019) first proposed an

approach to studying activity systems in Learning by Expanding. To provide an introductory

definition, “an activity system is a relatively durable collective formation directed at and

motivated by a continuously evolving object” (Engeström, 2022, p. 134). Activity systems are

mainly composed of a singular or collective subject, an object serving as the intended focus and

aim of the subject, and instruments, which the subject employs to alter the object; it supposes

that the activity system is centred on an object, which is actively altered to strive for outcomes to

meet the demands of its members, and those of additional activity systems (Engeström, 2022).

They are complexly wrought with multiple perspectives and traditions, possessing their historical



Yu/ Emerging Perspectives (2024) 3

narrative, which shapes current actions (Engeström, 2001). A classroom environment can be

studied as an activity system with its teacher, the subject focused on the progressing object, and

their pupils’ learning (Engeström, 2022).

Classroom Learning through the Lens of CHAT

Research related to activity systems may focus on a single activity system or the

interactions between multiple activity systems (Engeström, 2001; 2022; Engeström & Sannino,

2021), providing a lens to analyze K-12 online learning environments. Referred to as “the third

generation of activity theory” (p. 135), Engeström (2001) described a model accounting for the

interrelation of at least two activity systems. As shown in Figure 1, the interaction between the

two activity systems can be conceived as a transition from object 1, which is the basic,

uninterpreted object, to object 2, referring to the meaning-imbued object as perceived by the

activity system, to object 3, a “jointly constructed object” (p. 136). Object 3 is the central focus

of inquiry in this generation of activity theory (Engeström & Sannino, 2021).

Figure 1

Engeström’s third generation of activity theory featuring two interrelating activity systems

Using this third generation, Engeström (2022) argued that, within school environments,

learning can be conceived as an interaction between two associated activity systems, with one



Yu/ Emerging Perspectives (2024) 4

system relating to the teacher’s instruction and the other to the student’s “activity of studying, or

school going” (p. 137). As subjects of these two activity systems, teachers and students likely

have dissimilar objects when understanding their goal-directed behaviours and the meaning they

ascribe to learning in the school environment (Engeström, 2016). For example, some students

may be motivated by grades and the practical utility of their learning, whereas some teachers

may focus on students’ content mastery (Engeström, 2016). As a result of this dissonance, these

two systems must “construct common ground for their objects, that is, a partially shared object

that allows them to collaborate effectively” (Engeström, 2022, p. 137).

The Third Activity System of Online Learning

Suppose traditional classroom learning can be understood as two interacting activity

systems (Engeström, 2022). In that case, an analysis of online learning environments should

account for interactions with a third activity system, that of the homeschooling family. Applying

Engeström’s second-generation framework (1987/2019), the family that chooses online

schooling is an activity system bound by its own rules and expected distribution of

responsibilities centred on the object of student learning. The in-person classroom is where the

activity systems of traditional schooling intersect (Engeström, 2022), but the home environment

forms this space for the activity systems involved in online learning. Unless synchronous classes

are mandatory, a significant amount of online learning is asynchronous, providing students with

considerable leniency; this amount of unstructured learning and its physical distance from

teachers renders tracking and engaging students more time-consuming and challenging (Stevens

& Borup, 2015). The crucial role of the parent or guardian in online learning has attracted

researchers’ interest (e.g. Borup et al., 2013; 2019; Chen et al., 2019; Liu et al., 2010; Smith et

al., 2016). Multiple frameworks have identified the unique role of parents in supporting online



Yu/ Emerging Perspectives (2024) 5

learning, including organizational, supervisory, motivational, and academic capacities (Stevens

& Borup, 2015). An at-home adult mentor may be so essential to supporting most K-12 online

learners that this role has even been referred to as a “learning coach” (Smith et al., 2016, p. 102).

Future Directions for Online Student Engagement

Engeström’s (1987/2019) cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) provides a promising

lens to study K-12 online learning environments in terms of three interacting activity systems. As

defined by Fredricks et al. (2004), engagement is a tripartite construct consisting of

interconnected cognitive, affective, and behavioural dimensions, which can shift in duration and

magnitude. Engagement reflects an interaction between a person and their environment

(Fredricks et al., 2004; Renninger & Järvelä, 2022). Relevant to online high schools, Borup et al.

(2014) proposed that parental engagement is of central significance to student engagement in

their Adolescent Community of Engagement (ACE) framework. Extending Engeström’s (2022)

analysis of student learning in traditional school settings, suboptimal learning or disengagement

may be due to a lack of alignment between the school, studying, and homeschooling activity

systems in terms of working together on their partnership with regard to the object of student

learning. As argued by Engeström (2022), it would be naive to study learning only within the

context of teacher instruction: “The common failure to recognize and analyze studying as an

activity system in its own right, not reducible to instruction or schooling, maybe a root cause

behind various forms of student alienation” (p. 137). When striving to engage online learners

effectively, this potential nativity may also include lapses in understanding the importance of the

homeschooling family’s activity system in student learning. Given that some research has shown

the increased responsibilities of the parent in online learning settings (Borup et al., 2013; Liu et



Yu/ Emerging Perspectives (2024) 6

al., 2010; Smith et al., 2016), effective communication and collaboration may be essential to

student engagement.

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Figure 1

Engeström’s third generation of activity theory featuring two interrelating activity systems

https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-368720150000027005
https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-368720150000027005
https://doi.org/10.1177/07342829211053668
https://doi.org/10.1177/07342829211053668


Yu/ Emerging Perspectives (2024) 11

Note: Reprinted from Y. Engeström, 2001, Expansive learning at work: Toward an activity

theoretical reconceptualization. Journal of Education and Work, 14 (1), p. 136. Copyright 2001

by Taylor & Francis Ltd. Reprinted with permission.


