Quality in feedback processes rests on students' engagement with them. A crucial question is therefore why students do not always engage. Scholars have defined engagement as a social practice pointing to the influence of context but without explaining the nature thereof. The article's purpose is to argue that existing approaches without a theory of the social cannot fully explain non-engagement and that a practice-theoretical approach can fill this gap. It introduces Steven Kemmis' practice ontology and demonstrates the analysis of a non-engagement practice. The article's contribution to research in engagement with feedback is a new ontology of practice and its methodological apparatus.