Appendix D. Classroom Engagement Strategies

This section is designed to provide faculty with strategies to increase student engagement in all course delivery methods.

Strategies for Creating a Welcoming Environment

Creating a welcoming environment for students helps to set the stage for learning - both on-ground and online. In an online course, we need to pay special attention to creating a welcoming environment conducive for learning.

There are many facets to creating a welcoming environment in an online course - personalization, interactive content, building relationships, and creating an inclusive environment.

Inclusive classrooms necessitate an understanding of accessibility of content and materials to facilitate learning for all students as well as having knowledge of and ways to avoid implicit bias in the classroom.

Specific Ideas:

• Update the profile card on the D2L Homepage.
• Send a welcome message to students prior to class starting and post it as a news item.
• Add a “Meet Your Instructor Page” to your course
• Post an introductory discussion in your course
• Post a short welcome video.
• Use an Icebreaker activity on the first day of class.

Creating an Inclusive Learning Environment

Inclusive teaching describes the range of approaches to teaching that consider the diverse needs and backgrounds of all students, to create a learning environment where all students feel valued, and where all students have equal access to learn.

Creating a course centered on an environment which celebrates diversity, ensures equity, and centered on inclusion requires a significant time investment. However, we have shared a few key things you can do right now to work towards creating an inclusive learning environment in your courses–on-ground and online.

Specific strategies for creating an inclusive classroom:

• Use a student’s preferred name. Some students prefer to go by their middle name or a nickname. Other students may be transgender and use a name different than their given name. Regardless of the reason, it is important that we use students’ preferred name in the classroom and other communications.
  • Hint: create a spreadsheet to track students in online courses. Beside their name, add a column for preferred name.
  • Hint: Tell students they can fill out a form to Request D2L Name Change.
• Encourage students to ask questions: Remember the old adage from grade school that there’s no such thing as a bad question? Well, it still holds true. All questions should be answered appropriately and students should be treated with respect.
  • Hint: In an online course, use a Q&A discussion forum for students to ask questions about directions, due dates, and the content.
• Provide clear directions and expectations: Follow the York Tech Best Practices for Assignments and Discussions to help ensure you are communicating clear expectations.
• Encourage a sense of belonging and community to create an environment conducive to learning in your classrooms. Many of the required elements in course setup do exactly this, but in addition to those, think about phrasing and tone in written communication.
• Design content for all students: Content should be designed with all students in mind-closed captions on videos, transcripts with podcasts and audio recordings, formatting documents, spreadsheets, and presentations so that they can be read by screen readers, and ensure that shared URLs have specific context present and are presented as hyperlinks.

Educational Technology Possibilities

Strategic use of instructional technologies may also further engage students. For example, you may use interactive presentation strategies, videos, embedded quizzes and activities, games, or clickable notes to help students participate in the course. You can learn more about educational technology by navigating to D2L Help Button → Faculty Resources.

Here are a few instructional technologies that you may consider adding to your course:

• SoftChalk Lessons or Activities: We can use our institutional SoftChalk account to create full lessons or activities that can be embedded into D2L Brightspace. Some of the activities include charts, quizzes, flash cards, timelines, drag and drops, puzzles, labeling, ordering, and essays.
• Padlet: Padlet is a free online post-it or discussion board. It can easily be used for students to share ideas for test review, discuss topics, or post thoughts and ideas.
• Kahoot: Kahoot is a free game creation program that can be used by instructors and students. You can create review quizzes for students, or you can ask students to create their own review quizzes in teams to share with the class.
• H5P: H5P is a free program that allows instructors to create presentations, interactive videos, scenarios, or add quizzes and many different activities to existing presentations. H5P activities can be embedded right into D2L courses.
• Screencastomatic: York Tech has an institutional Screencastomatic account. This program allows you to record videos that include presentation materials. You can choose to have a video of you, a video of you and your screen, or just show the screen while you talk.
• Flipgrid: Flipgrid is a free tool that allows instructors to create videos and have video discussions with their class. For example, instructors can create a Flipgrid site for a class, post a video prompt, and have students post video replies to that prompt that can be viewed by everyone who has the access code.
• Powtoon: Powtoon offers free accounts that allow you to upload existing PowerPoints, create new presentations, make cartoons, or add interactive elements such as quizzes to presentations.
• Voki: Instructors can create a free account with Voki. Voki allows users to create animated characters who speak to students about course content. Instructors can select from a variety of characters and voices or add their own voice to the lesson. Voki also has a library of pre-made lessons.
• Prezi: Prezi is a presentation software that moves through slides in a variety of ways and allows for embedded videos and media. It is a more active and engaging way to present lesson content and is a great way to show spatial relationships.

Meaningful Virtual Class Sessions

Planning and implementing engaging, meaningful virtual class sessions in online course can help students get to know each other and feel more comfortable in a virtual environment. Here are a few strategies to have more meaningful virtual class meetings:

1. Structure the Sessions for Success: The first step in meaningful virtual class sessions involves structuring the sessions in advance. Although allowing flexibility for student discussions and questions is a best practice, it is also necessary to have a plan or agenda in advance as well as to let students know what they can expect in the session. Here are some tips to structure the session:

• Notify students in advance of the topics that will be covered in the session.
• Tell students in advance what they will be expected to contribute or do during the session. For example, will they need to read a chapter and be able to discuss it with peers?
• Send out session information regarding length and meeting location (i.e. Zoom link) well in advance and send a reminder the day of the session. In many cases, this information will be present in the LMS, so students will become accustomed to times, length, and location and may no longer need this information routinely.
• Plan an agenda for the session that includes short bursts of varying activities. For instance, the first 10 minutes may be a topic overview, the next 20 minutes may be a group discussion, and then the last 20 minutes may be a small group discussion using breakout rooms. We will provide ideas for virtual class activities later in this webinar.
• Decide how you intend to address questions that may arise in the chat or in small groups. We will further discuss monitoring virtual class sessions later in the webinar.

2. Motivate Students: If we want students to participate in virtual class sessions, we must motivate them to engage with us as instructors as well as their peers. Here are a few ways to motivate students.

• Explain in advance how the virtual class session will help students meet the learning outcomes for the course. Be intentional about why they should attend and participate in the session.
• Make sure students know how the virtual session affects their attendance in the course. Will attendance be recorded based on participation in the virtual class session?
• If your experience is that students who attend virtual class sessions make better grades on assignments or assessments, share that observation or data with your students.
• Allow students to take some ownership over the content or direction of the virtual class sessions when possible. For instance, ask students for input about what they would like to cover in the session or allow them to direct some of the conversation.
• Add some personality to the class session. Consider both formal and informal conversations and mix in some icebreakers or conversation starters.

3. Use Time Blocks: Breaking up virtual class sessions into chunks of varying activities or subtopics can keep students engaged. Here are some strategies that can be introduced into virtual class sessions.
4. Virtual Seminars: Provide structured, open-ended prompts that will elicit student response and feedback. The instructor role in this type of activity is as facilitator or moderator and not as an active participant in the discussion.
5. Polling: Use polls to assess whether or not students understand new material, or use them to bring prior learning to the surface. Polling can also be used to determine student response to a topic, assignment, or course component.
6. Breakout Rooms: Use breakout rooms to let students work together on group projects, team discussions, or collaborative activities. Instructors can pop in and out of breakout rooms to encourage conversation and ensure students stay on task.
7. Add short videos or interactive technologies into the session. If you are using Zoom and would like to share video sound, make sure to adjust the volume sharing settings in the session.
8. Keep lectures brief and focused on the most important takeaways. Virtual class sessions are not the best platform for lengthy lectures.
9. Share your screen and walk students through upcoming assignments. Virtual sessions are a great time to help students navigate the LMS or assist them with starting a project or assignment.
10. Schedule some time for peer review. Allow students to work together to review one another’s work and provide constructive feedback.
11. Monitor Student Participation: One concern that sometimes arises from virtual class sessions is that it is difficult to monitor engagement and behavioral concerns. Here are a few tips to monitor the class session:

• Frequently check the chat and make sure to respond to questions and acknowledge comments.
• Encourage students to use their cameras and mics if they are comfortable doing so.
• Call on students who have been silent or have not fully participated.
• Use the Zoom controls and settings to limit any distracting or inappropriate issues. For more information on this, please read “Best Practices for Securing Your Virtual Classroom,” published by Zoom.
• Make sure that students have clear expectations for behavioral and participatory guidelines for virtual class sessions. It is a best practice to inform students of these guidelines in advance or allow the students to work together to create these guidelines as a class.
• Address individual concerns as they arise, in a private setting.

Active Learning - Engagement Strategies

Students are more engaged when they are driven to participate and take ownership over their own learning. The standard lecture based classroom with students taking notes is considered a passive learning environment. There are ways to make it more engaging, such as asking questions periodically throughout the lecture. This section explores instructional strategies and engagement techniques in a variety of circumstances. Some of the topics you may have heard previously are in the list below.

• Flipped Classrooms
• Problem-Based Learning
• Self-Regulated Learning
• Universal Design for Learning
• Project-Based Learning
• Community-Based Learning

Many of the strategies listed in the tables below embody active learning are also examples of formative assessment techniques. More information on formative assessment can be found in Appendix E .

Pair or Group Work Engagement Strategies

Think-Write-Teach: A modified “Think-Pair-Share” method that has students study the material for 2-4 minutes, then write down the information they remember. Finally, students will turn to the person behind (or in front) of them and teach the material.

Learn-Think-Write-Pair-Share: Another modified “Think-Pair-Share” method that has students work in pairs to answer a question or solve a problem. They must first listen to the provided information on the topic, take time to think about and then write down their answer or solution, and then discuss with a partner before sharing with the class.

Roulette of Knowledge: students get into groups and are assigned a topic. Each group will write down everything they remember on the topic in 30 seconds (time can vary). Rotate papers to next group, the next group will write down everything on the topic in 30 seconds and rotate again until all groups have contributed to all topics. Share information on the board or discuss within each group.

Fishbowl/Role Play: Approach in different ways: 1) Have students work in groups to act out a process or concept with one of them narrating (they have time to prepare this) or 2) ask for volunteers to act out a process as you describe the steps.

Problem-Based Learning: Students work in groups to solve case studies or other real-world problems.

Science case studies: http://sciencecases.lib.buffalo.edu/cs/

Business: http://businesscasestudies.co.uk/teacher-resources/#axzz3i8VreUgv

Math: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK44917/

Psychology: http://www.psyweb.com/Casestudies/CaseStudies.jsp

Economics: http://www.ibscdc.org/economics_case_studies.asp

Continuum/Value Line: Prepare a statement that encapsulates an important or controversial issue in the field where attitudes and opinions will vary. Place numbers 1-5 around the room (strongly agree to strongly disagree). Form groups based on choice.

Send a problem: Try to solve a problem as a group, and then pass the problem and solution to a nearby group who does the same. Discuss the variations.

Debate: Form teams and ask students to analyze an issue in preparation for a debate.

Sub-group discussion: Have students discuss a topic or question in a small group and elect a spokesperson to share with the class. You can a0ssign everyone the same topic to see the different perspectives that arise, OR you can assign different topics and use the activity as a student teaching opportunity.

Pass the podium: Give students a list of questions for homework and assign a completion grade (to make your life easier). In the next class, assign one question to each student so that they have to provide an answer when they “pass the podium” (the podium can be as simple as a clipboard - for an added level of randomness, you can have the questions listed out of order on the clipboard so that when they get the podium, they have to answer whatever question is next on the list - keeps them on their toes).

Collaborative Clock Partners: This is an activity that is more focused on creating pairs than reviewing content. On the first day of class, give everyone a printout of a clock face, with the numbers 12, 3, 6, and 9 in bold. Students must first find a partner for the 12 o’ clock spot, writing their names on the other person’s clock (each person can only sign one clock). Then repeat this for 3,6 and 9. Now when you do activities, you can ask them to find their 12, 3, 6, or 9 o’ clock partner to keep things mixed up.

S3: Everyone STANDS UP and you lead the class through a discussion that requires participation. When someone SPEAKS UP to participate in the discussion, they may SIT DOWN after their contribution.

Round robin: Form small groups and ask the students to brainstorm important pieces of information from the assignment or demonstration. Go around the circle and seek participation from each individual.

Three-step interview: Have pairs take turns interviewing each other, asking questions that require a student to assess the value of competing claims and then make a judgment based as to the best.

Rhyme: With a partner, come up with a rhyme or poem to discuss what you have learned. Be prepared to share with the larger group.

Visual & Creative Engagement Strategies

Concept Map: Create a map of the major concepts for a topic. Write the topic and put facts or comments around the topic. Organize the major ideas for a concept.

Doodles/Sketch Pad: Students make a drawing, logo, or other visual representation of major concepts for a topic.

Sim-Dif’s: Similar to venn diagrams, students assess a specified number of similarities and differences in overlapping circles.

Infomercial: This can be approached two ways: 1) Have students prepare an infomercial about an assigned (or chosen) topic, or 2) Plant numbered questions that are provocative or thought provoking in the class and use them to guide your lecture (similar to the “I’m so glad you asked” method used in infomercials).

Word Webs: Ask students to analyze course-related concepts by generalizing a list of related ideas & then by organizing them in a graphic, identifying relationships by drawing lines or arrows to represent connections.

Learner-Created Skit: Learners role play or create skits demonstrating what they learned

Reflective Learning Engagement Strategies

Exam Wrappers: Everyone gets a structured reflection tool with each test. It asks these three questions in varying, but specific, ways: 1)What did you do to prepare? 2) Where did you make errors in the exam and why? And 3) How will you change your preparation for the next test? More info here: https://www.purdue.edu/learning/blog/?p=7050

Gate checks: Use a Google form to assess understanding at the completion of a key concept (questions with short responses). Your results from the Google form are provided in a spreadsheet that can be used to identify trends, clear points and muddy points.

Response cards/Exit Pass: Give everyone an index card at the beginning of every class and then provide pauses throughout the lecture to allow them to write down concepts that are still confusing or questions that they are nervous to ask in class. Everyone turns these in at the end of class (you can do names on the cards or allow them to be anonymous) and you use them to guide your review at the beginning of the next class.

Red Light/Green Light: Pass out a red and green index card. Throughout the session, ask yes/no questions and have them hold up the card that corresponds with their answer. You can also use the cards for agree/disagree, love it/hate it, okay/no way.

Sequence chains: Analyze and depict graphically a series of events, action, roles or decisions. Discuss the order and logic of the sequence.

Case studies/ What If? : Students respond to topic related case studies that pose challenging dilemmas with multiple courses of action.

10-2-2: When lecturing, introduce content for about 10 minutes, then take 2 minutes to have students summarize their understanding of the topic in their notes. Finally, give them 2 minutes to discuss with a neighbor (ask about holes in their notes, check for understanding, review).

Peer Editing: Students critically review and provide editorial feedback on each other’s essay, report, argument, research paper, or other writing assignment.

3 minute pause: Take three minutes after a covering a topic to allow students to catch up on notes, ask questions, quiz each other, etc.

Note taking pairs: Pair students up for the last 5-10 minutes of class and share/compare class notes. Discuss the key points to ensure clear understanding.

Three Before Me: When a learner poses a question, rather than answer it, take three answers from the group.

Learning Stations/Post-it: Place questions or discussion topics at stations around the room. Assign students to groups at each station and have them answer or provide feedback on post-it notes. Then rotate groups to the next station. At the end, you can discuss all of the feedback as a class, or have the last group summarize. Use as a launch pad for further discussion.

Content or Informational Engagement Strategies

Direct Questioning: Instead of asking students to raise their hands or call out answers, the instructor calls on people at random. You can do this by drawing names from a hat, putting names on popsicle sticks and pulling them out of cup, rolling dice to determine which row and seat number, or any other creative method that randomizes the selection process).

Mini-Writing Assignments: Provide a short prompt at the end of a class to help students integrate the concepts of the day into a “big picture.”

Fill-in-the-blank: Provide worksheets that teach vocabulary by having students fill in the correct term.

Pre-/Post Tests or Quizzes: Test understanding with a short 5-10 question quiz before and after a unit to measure progress.

Beat the Clock: You have 60 seconds to quickly write down 10 facts about the topic

Vocabulary match-up: Create a worksheet for students to match vocabulary with definitions.

Ordering: Give students a list of processes (example: instructions for experiment or writing a paper) and have students put the list in order.

Mnemonics: students will create a mnemonic to remember content material.

Cross It Out: provide a series of statements related to the content. Students cross out any statements that are false/unrelated.

Scaffold (Review - Preview - Review): Structure the class and all major concepts using the R-P-R scaffolding method so students can continually tie new information to what they already know/have learned. 1) Review previous concepts, 2) Preview what’s coming and then do it, and 3) Review the new info before moving on - make connections to existing knowledge.

Group grid: Students are given pieces of information and asked to place them in the blank cells of a grid according to categories, themes or defining features.

Panel of Experts: Select students in advance and give them information to present to the class at designated times. A variation of this is to have students work in groups on different topics, then one member of each group rotates to exchange information with other groups.

Hatful of questions: Provide a “hat” (bowl, cup, etc) of questions related to the unit and ask students to draw a question to answer on their turn. This is a good activity to review at the end of a unit.

One Person Experts: Assign each person in a group a section of the readings, a key phrase, or a specific section of a worksheet. Each individual reads the material, researches the topic or completes the workshop. That person is now the “expert” on that topic and shares the summary with the group. (you can also assign small groups one topic and they work together to become group experts and then share with the larger group)

Yellow Ribbon: pass out a ribbon or piece of string. As you cover an important point, tell the leaners to tie a knot in the item. Do this 4-6 times. At the end of the lecture have them share with a partner the significance of each knot.

Shout Outs: encourages learners to state what they know or have learned by orally responding to a question; shout out three ways to use the information we have covered. Shout out one word that summarizes what you have learned. Tell me 10 key ideas you learned today.

Games as Engagement Strategies

Jeopardy: Create a jeopardy game for students to learn content or as a review for a test (Try this web-based game generator: http://home.jeopardy.rocks/)

Bingo: Create bingo for students to play. Ask a question and the student has to find the answer on the bingo sheet.

4 corners: Tape a letter in each corner of the room. Ask a multiple-choice question and have the students go to the corner with the answer.

Hot Potato: students stand and toss a ball around the room while listening to music, when the music stops- the student holding the ball has to answer a question or share what they have learned.

Snowball Fight: On a blank piece of paper students will write a quiz question. Students will crumple up the paper into a ball and toss it around the room. Once instructor calls time, students will pick up a paper and answer the question.

Myth or Fact Game: Each table group is given a stack of index cards on which are printed some myths or facts about the topic. Groups collaboratively sort the cards into two piles, then check their answers against an answer key. Learners can also create the game cards and exchange them with others before playing the game

Volleyball: Divide the class into two groups and either have them taking turns asking your questions or as a group asks a question, they have to also pose a question to the other group.

Warm-Up Engagement Strategies

The Evocative: Provide a quote, photo, scenario, question or song that requires students to explore a concept covered previously, or a concept that is about to be introduced. Have them work in pairs or small groups to discuss and then share with the class.

Data Manipulation: Ask students to diagram their current understanding of the topic using figures or graphs that you provide (what does this data show us?, match the equipment to the process, put these events in sequence, etc). Allows you to identify misconceptions by walking around the room.

Wordsplash: Give students a list of vocabulary and ask them to predict the meaning or how the word relates to that day’s lesson. After hearing several predictions, give the real meaning and put it into context with visuals, applications, or case studies.

Whips: Give the first part of a sentence about the content and ask students to fill in the rest (it is good to use this for brainstorming or where there are many right answers. Ex: “A characteristic of all living things is…” or “A good essay/speech includes…”). This can be paired with the Learning stations/post-it activity.

Free Association: Call out a word or phrase and students write/draw/call out whatever comes to mind (can pair with the web-based padlet tool).

List/Group/Label: Provide students with many slips of paper in an envelope, each paper containing a word related to the topic, plus a few blank slips. The students have to group the labeled papers to create lists of related words. Then they use the blank slips to label each list. This makes them think about the words and what they mean to put them into groups.

Web-Based Engagement Strategies

Socrative: http://www.socrative.com. Create a “Race” quiz for student groups to compete. You can pick an icon for the “race” and students will see the icon move across the screen for each correct answer. Or, you can create an exit quiz for students to answer a review question at the end of the class.

Polleverywhere: http://www.polleverywhere.com. Online resource allowing you to poll your students by asking content questions - helps to identify “muddy points.”

TED Talks: https://www.ted.com/talks Great resource of monologues ranging from a few minutes up to 30 minutes or so. These can be discussion starters or used for inspiration.

Cram.com: http://www.cram.com/ Online flashcard site that turns flashcard content into games. Has existing flashcards for many topics.

Jing: http://www.techsmith.com/jing Free web-based tool that allows users to record audio and video that includes screen captures, labeling, highlighting, and hand drawings that are less than 5 minutes in length. Other options may include Panopto, Camtasia Studio, Camtasia for Mac, SnagIt, and more for more robust recording and editing capabilities.

Screencastomatic: http://www.screencast-o-matic.com/ Free, web-based tool that allows you to record lecture presentations (15 minutes max) and host/share with students.

Scopit: http://www.scoop.it/ Create resource compilation such as an annotated bibliography. You can have all your information compiled in one place.

Thinglink: http://www.thinglink.com/ Create interactive images where students click on parts of the image to receive further information or explanation

Prezi: https://prezi.com/ Online platform for creating dynamic and interactive presentations. Major functions are free, advanced functions are paid.

Wordle: http://www.wordle.net/ Free, web-based tool for creating “word clouds.”

Kahoot: https://getkahoot.com/ Game-based learning platform. Instructors can create quizzes or polls for classroom use.

Padlet: https://padlet.com/ Online “bulletin board” function. Great for collaborating or sharing ideas without intimidation.

Todaysmeet.com: https://todaysmeet.com/ Backchannel that can be used to voice questions or contribute to discussions in real time. Info from a single “room” or session can be saved for a specified period of time for students to refer back to.

Remind 101: www.remind101.com - A safe way to text your students. Student or instructor phone numbers are not disclosed but you can send a text message to your students. Also try Twitter as a microblog option or MailVu to send brief video messages to your students.

Powtoon: http://www.powtoon.com/ Create memorable animations to emphasize particular topics. OR ask students to create presentations on a topic - helps them learn and good ones can be used in future classes.

Voki: http://www.voki.com/ Allows you to create a talking avatar that can be incorporated into class activites. The site also has lesson plans for various subjects and levels of education.

Weebly: http://www.weebly.com/# Create your own website, E-portfolio. Additional options - Yola and Wix