Get Students Talking to Each Other

Building a community of learners begins on the first day of class and in an online/remote environment you must be very intentional about keeping students connected. It's important they get to know you and each other as people they can relate to, connect with, feel comfortable asking questions in front of, and ultimately work with to solve problems and master the content and skills you are teaching.  Ten Best Practices for Teaching Online Links to an external site. notes that nurturing a learning community as part of an online course is almost as significant in your online class as your instructor presence.

 

Help your students know there are people behind the screen and that they aren't learning alone. Students engage more in online courses when they have an opportunity to interact with their peers and when they feel like they are part of a community of learners. Teaching Strategies Links to an external site.such as providing opportunities for students to interact academically AND opportunities to interact socially with classmates are key.

From Ten Best Practices for Teaching Online Links to an external site.

• About Me Discussion: Launch the class with a personal introduction so students get to know one another and you.

• Virtual Student Lounge: Set up an open discussion area called the Student Lounge. Encourage students to socialize there- leave it open for them. 

• Small Groups: Consider setting up small groups for some assignments. This gives students the opportunity to develop deeper connections with a few others.

•Q&A Forum: Set up a discussion board for students to request help from each other. Consider assigning student teams to monitor this.

Get your students interacting with each other by having them teach each other content and skills. In an online anatomy and physiology course students signed up each week for a topic, and then had to create a product (a drawing, audio, video) that explained the topic. They then shared it with their classmates on a virtual corkboard.  It can also be shared in a Canvas discussion. Students were very creative and helped each other to learn very dense subject matter.

In the health sciences, there is a time-honored method of learning new skills called See One, Do One, Teach One. It is based on a 3-step process: Visualize, Perform, Reproduce.
Sometimes it is not enough to think we understand a concept.  It is only when we need to communicate effectively about something that we truly understand it--even if the audience is ourselves. 

Once you have submitted your assignment there is one more step. I want you to share one—with your classmates—by posting the photo of your drawing on our Week 1 virtual cork board.   Remember, you are drawing to learn and this assignment is not about artistic ability.  Create something that helps you understand your topic—and by sharing we will be helping one another. 

Here is an example of a cartoon depicting insulin.