Building Community in Online Teaching

 

As we temporarily transition into remote / online teaching, we wanted to share some thoughts and pointers to help ease the transition.  Through some online research and a document set forth by Saint Mary’s College of California, the points mentioned below are strategies that are not just centered on the technical aspects of remote / online teaching but rather pedagogical practices that promote care for the whole student and class collective.

 

Maintaining a Beloved Class Community

• Take time to establish norms for being present, mindful, and safe. You may establish a set of norms for students and have students expand or provide feedback on, and/or co-create classroom norms. 

• • Some examples for students are:
    • Be present. Each class will be packed, so prepare yourself to be engaged throughout.
    • Listen deeply to whomever is speaking in the virtual room.
    • One mic. Try not to interrupt, and if you do, apologize.
    • Be open to learning in a new space. Be comfortable with being uncomfortable.
    • Start on time and end on time.
    • Be free from any distractions including texting, watching TV or other devices, having conversations or distractions with other members in the household, and/or other multitasking activities.
    • Invite students to brainstorm ideas for norms in these four areas: Student to Student, Student to Teacher, Teacher to Student, and Student to Self.
    • You, as a teacher, may also have to summon a higher amount of energy to demonstrate your excitement and engagement in the class as a model for them.  
• Engage students in check-in prompts throughout the sessions (beginning, middle, end).  You may get creative and come up with a check-in prompt that both allows students to share how they are and is related to your class content. Some general examples of checks are:
• • Raise your hand feature in zoom
  • Represent your week in an emoji or hashtag
  • Let students share announcements or celebrations- these are things students usually share with each other in person as they walk into a classroom, so it can be good to make intentional space for them.
• Just because you are online does not mean you can’t do things like mindfulness practices to center the class.
• Take time for students to share appreciations with one another at the end of class, for anything big or small, related to the class or not. Again, this helps in fostering community when you are not in person. 
  
  
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Be Prepared

• Share an agenda with learning objectives and activities for the day so students know what is coming. Think of this as your learning targets.

• • You might ask them to have the agenda up while you are teaching so that they see your face and the agenda.  
  • If you have breakout groups, make sure to give them a “protocol” or clear guidelines about what you want them to do.  In person, we can “read” the room more easily to have an idea of which groups are struggling and move there to redirect.  Remember that, they can reach out to you for more support, but you won’t have the ability to “read” the room.  Circulating among groups and making sure everyone is on the same page on what they have to do (check in on task clarity before breaking out into small groups) can help a lot.
  • If you normally have a routine when students enter, e.g. a warm-up or “do now,” continue to do those or you may start implementing them because students will trickle into the online space.
• Have an array of instructional activities; class online can be boring if it is just the teacher speaking.

• • Help out students with tech issues if necessary. We should not make assumptions about the tech abilities of students.  You might even think about emphasizing one practice over others every week. 

• • • Examples of instructional activities:  Quick writes, Pair shares, Small group work, Debates, etc.
    • You can also use quick polls to gauge understanding of a concept and reteach if needed.  
    • The breakout room function allows for you to automatically assign groups or manually assign groups.  If you do a Google Form or survey before class, you may have a better idea of how to structure your groups.  
      

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Fostering Equitable Participation

• Check in on access- is anyone having difficulty accessing: internet connection, a quiet space, a device, or a mic or camera? Are there ways you can support their troubleshooting, resources you can point them to? You can always reach out to admin for solutions to such problems.

• • Check in with students to see if they would be comfortable with recording the session and post them on Google Classroom.   We may have students who become ill or have technical difficulties mid-session.  Recordings allow those students to have access to the class at a later date.
• Use the raise hand function to track who would like to speak.  This may not show up for all students.  Keep an eye for “tech hands” and “real hands” that you see on the screen.  

• • You might even have a protocol for acknowledging hands as they come up:  “Next I have [Name] and after that [Name]” as well as a protocol for students to send an individual chat to you if they have a contribution to the conversation.  
  • If you have to do a roll call check-in on a topic, let students know in advance that you will be calling on everyone and give them time to think of their responses to promote equity and support in their vulnerability on the platform and with one another.
• As students are sharing out, pause to invite anyone to speak who has not spoken yet.
  
  

Group Work and Group Roles

• For group work, you can utilize the breakout rooms function of Zoom. You can have them break into groups that are random or manually assign students to groups. Be clear about what time you will have everyone return so they know how to pace their group work. You can “float” group to group as they work, as you would around the classroom (walking around the class from group to group).

• • Try asking students to designate a timekeeper and build in flex time for students to figure out what they need to do. 
  • Use the broadcast function to let them know when they should transition in their groups from one person to another.  
  • The broadcast function is also great to use a minute or so before you “close the rooms”.  
• You can assign or have students select group roles, such as Timekeeper, Facilitator, Reporter, Recorder, and Equity Manager or Harmonizer. Groups roles increase accountability to one another and in an online format ensure that everyone participates.
• When you come back together, have a specific prompt of what students will be reporting out on. You may have those who share out say what they learned or appreciated from a classmate in their breakout group, so that they are not just repeating what they said in the breakout group.
• Ask students to create and present multi-modal presentations online. This allows for students' involvement to be dynamic and engaging. It also builds their capacity to present in the online format.
  
  

 

Sharing Out

• When you want each person in the class to have an opportunity to speak to something, ask for a volunteer of who would like to begin and when that person finishes, they say the name of another student, “tagging” them in. This keeps the flow going and ensures everyone speaks. Before doing this, you may want to do a pair share, give them time for a quick write, or at least 30 seconds of thinking time so that they are prepared to share and not cold called or put on the spot when it is their turn.
• Utilize the screen share function. Both you and students can share your screen- you can share your whole screen or just a specific document or tab (the latter is recommended so that you do not over-share). This can be great for showing students a presentation or inviting students to present.
  

 

Other Helpful Zoom Functions

• Gallery view - encourage students to use “gallery view” (AKA The Brady Brunch view) and use it yourself. This allows everyone to see everyone else at the same time. It feels more like you are all sitting in a room together, rather than just looking at the person currently speaking. 
• The chat function - encourage students (while adhering to the community norms of course) to use the chat function during class. You may send comments, thumbs up, etc. yourself as others are speaking.

 

Be Flexible, Be Patient, and Be You

• Technical glitches WILL happen. The way something was supposed to happen in-person will not go that way online. Students and faculty alike will be adapting to this new challenge. Remind yourself and students that things can and will go as “unexpected” and that the important this is to be flexible.
• Depending on the length of your class, remember to take breaks - take approximately a 5 minute break per hour; encourage movement and stretching; when you do so, you can ask students to turn their camera off and then turn it back on at the end of the break time. Or better yet, have a 5 minute mindful moment or a yoga exercise to re-center everyone.
• Log in a few minutes before class and chat informally with students as you would normally do; similarly, invite students to ask questions as others are logging off. Also, have appropriate boundaries on your time and personal life as you usually would do.
• Bring your energy! Online learning spaces need energy!