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personalised learning

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Active learning helps students to develop their creativity and collaborative skills.

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it increases students' performance

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Build connections between students

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we can organize outdoor activities, clubs.......

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Try a Think-Pair-Share activity

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Active Learning Techniques to Try

1. Try a Think-Pair-Share activity to encourage all students to interact with the material. In this activity, the instructor states an open-ended question. Ask students to spend a minute or two thinking about and writing a response. Then ask students to pair with a partner to discuss their responses. Reconvene the class after a few minutes, and call on individual students to share the pair's responses.

2. Use a One Minute Paper or Muddiest Point Paper in your class as a formative assessment. At the end of class or just before a break, ask either: "What are the two most important points from today's session?" or "What was the muddiest (least clear) point from today's session?" Give students 1-2 minutes to write brief responses to turn in anonymously as they leave the classroom. Address student responses either during the next class or online.

3. With Peer Instruction, you pause during class and ask students a conceptual question. Give students a few minutes to think about the question, and then have them provide answers, possibly using clickers. Then, have students spend a few minutes talking about their answers, usually in pairs, and try to convince each other that their answer is correct. Then have students answer again.

4. Asking students to work together in groups is a very effective way to actively engage them with your course. For example, Gallery Walk is a cooperative activity during which groups move between stations to build on solutions or discussions begun by others. The Jigsaw is a structured cooperative learning activity that relies on individual accountability to reach group goals.

5. Student groups can discuss case studies to apply course content to solve real world problems. Cases for the sciences can be found at the National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science. The Case Consortium at Columbia University provides a collection of case studies for the fields of journalism, public policy, public health, and other disciplines.

Additional Resources

Classroom Assessment Techniques - Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching
Information on Classroom Assessment Techniques, which are in-class activities that give useful feedback on the teaching-learning process as it is happening.

National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science - National Science Foundation
A collection of case studies for classroom use in the sciences.

Case Consortium - Columbia University
A collection of case studies for the fields of journalism, public policy, public health, and other disciplines

Confessions of a Converted Lecturer - Eric Mazur, Harvard University
Active learning advocate Eric Mazur, a physics professor at Harvard, shares why and how he decided to change the way he teaches.

References

Armbruster, P., Patel, M., Johnson, E., & Weiss, M. (2009). Active Learning and Student-centered Pedagogy Improve Student Attitudes and Performance in Introductory Biology. CBELife Sciences Education, 8(3), 203-213.

Bransford J., Brown A., & Cocking RR. (Eds.) (1999) How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School. Washington (DC): National Academy Press.

Cooper, James L., Robinson, Pamela & Ball, David. The Interactive Lecture: Reconciling Group and Active Learning Strategies with Traditional Instructional Formats. Exchanges: The Online Journal of Teaching and Learning in the CSU (PDF).

Prince, M. (2004) Does Active Learning Work? A Review of the Research. Journal of Engineering Education, 93(3), 223-231.

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Active Learning Techniques for the Classroom - Duke Learning Innovation

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Five active learning techniques to help students think, create and solve problems in the classroom, including resources and references.

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All Posts

Written by Justin Raudys

Category

Teaching Strategies

Teaching Tools

As a teacher, one of your biggest challenges is to plan lessons that inspire your students to stay actively involved in the learning process.

But you've probably noticed that traditional, teacher-centered learning plans aren't always conducive to achieving that inspiration.

That's where active learning strategies come into play. You can use them to empower, engage, and stimulate a classroom by putting students at the center of the learning process.

Get inspired by these 8 strategies that will help students talk more openly, think more creatively and -- ultimately -- become more engaged in the process of learning.

This article is accompanied by a downloadable list of active learning strategies to keep at your desk for quick reference.

Active Learning Strategies

1. Reciprocal questioning

Use reciprocal questioning to encourage an open dialogue in which students take on the role of the teacher and create their own questions about a topic, reading section, or lesson.

After covering a topic of your choice in class -- or after assigning a reading selection -- divide the class into pairs or small groups and have students come up with a few questions for discussion with the rest of the class. To facilitate the process, you can provide students with "question stems," which provide a foundation for a question but still require students to think critically about a lesson, text, or other section of material by completing the query. Consider the examples below.
Comprehension Question Stems
Describe x in your own words. What does y mean? Why is z important? How could x be used to y?
Connector Question Stems
Explain how x and why z. In what ways are x and y similar? In what ways are x and y different? How does x tie in with that we learned before?

Use these question stems to anchor and explore concepts in course material, helping students investigate a range of new topics and points of view associated with your lesson.

Much like student-generated test questions -- a type of of experiential learning activity -- reciprocal questioning involves students in the learning process to help build their comprehension of course material.

Reciprocal questioning can be particularly useful when:

Preparing for tests or exams

Introducing a new topic or section of course content

Discussing reading or writing materials in greater detail

2. Three step interviews

A cooperative learning strategy, the three step interview encourages students to develop active listening skills by quizzing one another, sharing their thoughts, and taking notes.

To use the three step interview process, divide students into groups of three, and assign three roles: interviewer, interviewee, and notetaker.

After also assigning a theme or topic of discussion, have students participate in a five to 10 minute interview to discuss what they found to be the key information relating to the topic.

After each interview, have students rotate roles. Depending on factors including the grade level of your students and their experience with the strategy, you may adjust the length of the time for each interview.
One interpretation of the three-step interview process. Feel free to experiment with the duration and number of students involved in these steps. Image courtesy: Kagan Publishing
Before using the strategy, you may find it useful to have students explore the types of questions reporters ask in interviews and at what point in an interview they ask them. You may also want to provide recording sheets to use when they are assigned the "reporter" role.

The three-step interview confers benefits including:

Helping students learn and apply different questioning strategies

Strengthening students' connection with course material in a creative and engaging way

Producing a sense of accountability, with students working together to complete a task and grasp a lesson

3. The pause procedure

Use the pause procedure to intersperse strategic pauses into your class lectures and enhance student understanding of teaching materials.

To use the pause procedure, arrange for pauses of two to three minutes between every 10 to 15 minutes of lecture time.

During these brief breaks, encourage students to discuss or rework their notes in pairs to clarify key points covered, raise questions, and solve problems posed by the instructor.

Alternatively, students can work together to write a paragraph that connects or highlights key ideas set out in their partner's notes.

A 2014 study concluded that breaking a lecture into brief pauses can increase student attention and learning outcomes. The pause procedure, the study determined, is "a good active learning strategy which helps students review their notes, reflect on them, discuss and explain the key ideas with their partners."

The use of the pause procedure involves a minimal amount of extra time, but can confer significant benefits in comparison to lectures that continue without breaks.

4. The muddiest point technique

The muddiest point technique involves asking students to write notes on the most unclear or most confusing element of a given homework assignment, lecture, or class discussion.

Asking students to write down what they find to be the least clear is a powerful exercise because it compels them to grade or rate their own knowledge of a topic.

In short, the exercise helps students reflect on the lesson and identify concepts needing further examination or study.
Example of a "muddiest point" handout to issue to students. Image source: TeachersPayTeachers.
From your perspective, the activity can serve as an insightful source of feedback.

For example, if more than a quarter of the class mentions the same "muddiest point," you may wish to schedule a further time to discuss that topic, or create a new lesson plan or assignment to tackle it.

5. The devil's advocate approach

The devil's advocate approach asks one or more students to take the opposing side of a predominant argument or point of view being discussed during a lesson.

Once you have completed an assignment or lesson plan, select a topic that is suitable for discussion and debate. The topic should serve as an appropriate subject for providing arguments from both sides.

The activity is flexible and should be tailored to suit your students' grade level. In its simplest form, divide the class into two sections and coordinate a class-wide debate based on a selected topic. Alternatively, you may have students annotate reading texts and respond to contentions by creating counterarguments. Then, have students debate the proposals discussed during a mock town hall meeting.

While this approach can be used across a number of grade levels and subjects, consider this list of thematic claims used as primers for a devil's advocate activity in a secondary ELA class.
Image source: Bespoke Classroom.
This approach can help cultivate active learning in the classroom by encouraging students to:

Think more critically, challenging participants to expand their understanding of the perspectives surrounding an issue and to view it through a different lens

Become more engaged, fostering involvement by drawing out opinions to explore the complexity of an issue being studied

Produce a deeper understanding of topics or issues, using rigorous analysis to collectively clarify, probe, and pose alternatives to problems being discussed

According to a study published in the Journal of Theory, Research and Action in Urban Education, the devil's advocate approach can help students become "more familiar with a...topic and its multifaceted viewpoints." The same study concludes that a classroom using this strategy can:

6. Peer teaching activities

A flexible and multi-faceted approach to active learning, peer instruction encompasses a range of scenarios where students instruct skills or explain concepts to classmates.

Some popular options include:

Reading buddies - A cooperative learning strategy that pairs two students who work together to read an assigned text.

Cross-age peer tutoring - A peer learning strategy involving students in different grades, wherein which one student instructs another on the material in which the first student is advanced and the second student is a novice.

Role play - A group of students is split into smaller groups and given a specific task to complete, like in small group work. However, in addition to working on a specific task, the members of each group are asked to play a certain "role". Unlike in traditional role-play, all members of one group play the same role, not individually assigned roles.

Peer teaching activities help boost vital skills and behaviors including student interaction, accountability, group processing.

7. Game-based learning platforms

Game-based learning platforms and depth and differentiation to the educational process and allow students to work with their instructors to achieve their learning objectives.

Eric Sheninger, a principal, author, and Senior Fellow at the International Center for Leadership in Education (ICLE), writes passionately about the use of technology as an active learning tool. In his article " Shifting From Passive to Active Learning," he writes:

Math games and websites are at the forefront of delivering active learning through technology. One example is Prodigy, a platform that constantly adjusts questions to tackle student trouble spots and delivers math problems with words, charts pictures, and numbers. Better yet, educational content is free to access and aligned with curricula for grades 1 to 8 teachers.

Create and sign into your free teacher account.
8. Rotating chair group discussions

Rotating chair group discussions encourage students to actively listen to selected speakers who follow a pattern of guiding class discussion and summarizing previous points. Students lead and stimulate class discussion as they "rotate" roles, repeatedly selecting the following speaker.

To use this strategy effectively, ensure that students adhere to the following pattern:

When a student wishes to participate, they must raise their hand

The student who is speaking calls on the next speaker, ideally someone who has not yet contributed

The student who has been called upon briefly summarizes what the previous student said before developing the idea further

This process can be repeated across a variety of topics, with your guidance to stay on track and help stuck students.

The benefits of rotating chair group discussions are not only limited to the speakers. Knowing that they may be called upon to summarize the previous topic, all students are engaged in attentive listening, frequently jotting down notes and ideas to stay on track in the spaces between speaking.

Moreover, students are put into a scenario where they learn from their colleagues' ideas, sparking new considerations of material in an active and engaging way.

This strategy is rewarding for students because it encourages powerful and direct engagement with course material.

The Teacher's Role in the Active Learning Classroom

While active learning places an emphasis on the student's role in the learning experience, there is no doubt that the success of any active learning strategy starts with the thought and planning of a conscientious instructor.

"Overall," a 2011 study found, "teachers play an influential role in increasing students' situational interest in the active-learning classroom," while factors like a teacher's social connection with students and subject matter expertise "significantly influence the level of students' situational interest in the active learning classroom."

And, critically, the benefits of active learning go both ways, helping teachers as well as students.

As active learning advocate James Ballencia writes,

As many of the techniques above are open-ended, the active learning strategies underpinning them may differentiate for different types of learners. Be sure to consider how you can differentiate instruction while still enjoying the benefits of these active learning strategies.

Active Learning Techniques: Key Questions

To help the success of these strategies, put yourself in your students' position and imagine how they might experience it. This will help you get a feel for the lesson.

When applying any of these strategies for your course, be sure to ask yourself:

Will this be engaging and exciting for my students?

Can this activity deploy formative assessment strategies?

Is the student placed at the center of this learning strategy?

Will this encourage my students to discuss a topic with one another?

Am I giving students the opportunity to reflect on the learning process?

Is this activity getting my students to think deeply and critically about a topic or lesson or is it simply a comprehension exercise?

Making Space for Active Learning Strategies

While all of the active learning strategies outlined above can be deployed in traditional, lecture-oriented classrooms, the physical arrangement of your room and the number of students in the class can make some of them difficult to perform easily.

While a flexible seating classroom arrangement may ease this challenge, such a solution is not always possible. Plan these exercises with the limitations of your physical space carefully, being mindful of the environmental constraints posed by the unique arrangements of some of the strategies above.

Final Thoughts on Active Learning Strategies

Active learning plainly puts the focus on the learner: what the learner does, what the learner thinks, and how the learner behaves.

But, crucially, active learning doesn't simply happen with a few simple instructions: it occurs in the classroom where the teacher is committed to a learning environment that makes active learning possible.

Ultimately, these active learning strategies will help build understanding rather than memorization of facts, giving students the confidence to apply learning to different problems and contexts and achieve greater autonomy over their learning.

And, after all, that's exactly makes active learning "active": putting students at the center of the learning process as they take the initiative to learn.

Downloadable List of the 8 Active Learning Strategies
Click here to download the list of strategies to print and keep at your desk.
Create or log in to your teacher account on Prodigy -- a game-based learning platform that assesses student progress and performance as they play. Aligned with a growing list of curricula across the world, over 800,000 teachers and 30 million students have signed up to Prodigy Math Game.

Comprehension Question Stems Connector Question Stems

The Muddiest Point: Sample Phrasing What have you found to be the muddiest point so far in this assignment? What topic do you find to be the least clear?

Image source: Bespoke Classroom.

"provide students with multiple perspectives, and challenge students with tough questions. In such a classroom, students will become more engaged and students' critical thinking and writing skills will be enriched."

Some popular options include:

It is really about how students use devices to create artifacts of learning that demonstrate conceptual mastery through relevant application and evaluation...Give kids challenging problems to solve that have more than one right answer and let them use technology to show that they understand. This is the epitome of active learning...

With the goal of teaching mindful learners who actively pursue knowledge, teachers become more actively engaged in how they teach the curriculum and how they develop each student's learning potential. They mix and match a variety of ... tactics to ensure that students not only learn more, better, and faster -- they also learn smarter.

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8 Active Learning Strategies and Examples [+ Downloadable List]

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All Posts Written by Justin Raudys Category Teaching Strategies Teaching Tools As a teacher, one of your biggest challenges is to plan lessons that inspire your students to stay actively involved in the learning process. But you've probably noticed that traditional, teacher-centered learning plans aren't always conducive to achieving that inspiration.

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Every day we read something about the latest progress in technology and how it is going to impact our workplace. We know by now that when it comes to education some things just cannot be replaced by a machine, but how has it been changing the school system so far? In a recent study from The Economist Intelligence Unit and sponsored by Google for Education, Fostering exploration and excellence in 21st century schools", teachers were asked about the best strategies to improve the learning experience with new technologies: this is what they had to say.

Active learning

By far the most visible benefit of Education Technology in schools, according to the teachers who participated in the survey, was active learning. By active learning, we mean "learning by doing". This model of learning is characterized by three phases:

underpinning, this is the base from which students will build their knowledge, a set of skills they will need to approach new information - analysis, evaluation and synthesis. It is a necessary first step for students to become active learners.

, this stage is usually guided by the teacher with assignments and activities. Students are encouraged to assimilate the information through self-reflecting and in some cases relating it to their own personal experience.

, this is where the students start actively participating and engaging with what they have been learning. During this step it is crucial for the teacher to go above and beyond to guide students, encouraging critical thinking as well as creativity.

Project-based learning

Project-based learning is a style of active learning also called inquiry-based learning, where students are encouraged to experience the subject first-hand by researching, investigating and answering a series of questions meant to give them a well-rounded understanding of concepts.

This method helps students in the classroom as much as it helps them in building future academic and professional success, as the skills they learn can be applied to most areas of their lives.

Cognitive activation

By cognitive activation, we mean encouraging students to analyze and improve their learning methods, regardless of what it is they are learning. This can be done by introducing different learning methods into the classroom, from self-testing to top-down or bottom-up thinking, showing students how to make the best of these methods and teaching them to evaluate the most effective ones in each situation. This will help students focusing and maximizing the time at their disposal.

Personalized learning

The methods we have talked about so far are particularly effective because they allow flexibility. The shift we are seeing in modern education will have an incredibly positive effect on the students who used to be penalized by more traditional teaching methods. Thanks to new technologies, education is also becoming more accessible for students with physical and learning disabilities. Clearly, technology alone is not enough, there is only so much a software can do to help students without the lead of a talented teacher.

Useful tools

Not all technology is equally useful in the classroom, and according to the teachers who took part in the survey the best tool a student could have is a laptop. Laptops can bring several benefits to a class, such as easy after-school communication, immediate feedback from the teacher, better management of a large number of students.

Among the most useful tools teachers also mentioned tablets, educational games, videos and interactive whiteboards.

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How active learning can enhance students' skills - Acer for Education

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Every day we read something about the latest progress in technology and how it is going to impact our workplace. We know by now that when it comes to education some things just cannot be replaced by a machine, but how has it been changing the school system so far?

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Moving your class sessions to a virtual space, such as Zoom video conferencing, brings new opportunities for active learning and student engagement. This resource provides simple strategies that combine active learning principles with online tools so students can encounter and engage with information and ideas, and reflect on their learning. These strategies apply to both small and large class sizes, subject to the participant limit of your video conferencing program and license.

Zoom: Annotation and Whiteboard Tools
For more details on how to use these tools, please see: Using annotation tools on a shared screen or whiteboard and Sharing a whiteboard.

What is Active Learning?

Bonwell and Eison describe active learning strategies as "instructional activities involving students in , L. Dee Fink builds upon Bonwell and Eison's definition by describing a holistic view of active learning that includes all of the following components: Information and Ideas, Experience, and Reflective Dialogue doing things and thinking about what they are doing¹." In Creating Significant Learning Experiences . ² This framework can be a helpful tool to consider how your students...

encounter (new) information and ideas
e.g., by watching videos or reading PDFs in advance, or from a short presentation you give using Zoom's Share Screen feature

engage with information and ideas
e.g., through discussions with their peers using Zoom's Breakout Rooms feature and documenting their conversations in collaborative Google

reflect on their learning
e.g., by spending the last five minutes of the online class session engaging in reflective writing and sharing their thoughts through an open-ended poll on Poll Everywhere .

...to meet the student learning objective(s) for your course.

The CTL is here to help!

If you have questions or would like support in developing and implementing active learning in your online course, please reach out to the CTL at ColumbiaCTL@columbia.edu . You can also get one-on-one support via phone or Zoom during our virtual office hours .

Columbia Supported Online Tools for Active Learning

In this resource, we will reference the following online tools supported by Columbia University:

-video conferencing, including the following features*:

Share Screen -share your screen, your student's screen, or a virtual whiteboard

Breakout Rooms -divide the main virtual room into smaller virtual rooms

-launch multiple choice polls

Nonverbal Feedback -allow students to express opinions by clicking on icons

Poll Everywhere -audience response system for polling

*Note: If you do not see any of the above Zoom features in your Zoom meeting space, you may need to enable them first.

If you have questions about teaching with any of the above tools, please reach out to the CTL at ColumbiaCTL@columbia.edu . You can also get one-on-one support via phone or Zoom during our virtual office hours .

Active Learning Strategies

The active learning strategies you select should serve the course learning objectives for your students. Remember, the goal of active learning is not simply for your students to do things, but to also think about what they are doing. As you learn more about the following strategies, consider how effective each would be in promoting the learning you desire from your students.

Here are some questions to think about when selecting an active learning strategy:

What skill should my students be able to perform by the end of our online class session?

Which active learning strategy will allow my students to practice this skill?

When will my students encounter and engage with information and ideas? When will they reflect on what they've learned? (Any of these active learning components can be done before, during, or after the online class session.)

Strategy 1: Polling

Overview Tools used Amount of pre-class preparation required How to Implement
Determine your purpose for conducting a simple multiple-choice poll in your online class session by considering the following:

Here are some possible ways you can use polls for active learning in your online class session:

Create the Zoom poll (see Zoom Help Center to learn how) and determine how much time your students will need to respond to it. Make sure the question title and prompt is clearly worded and not open to misinterpretation.

Prior to launching the poll, provide verbal and written instructions on how to complete the poll. Once launched, you will be able to see in real time the number of students and the percentage of the class that have responded to the poll, the time elapsed, and the results of the poll.

End the poll when the allocated time is up. You can then choose whether to show the class the results of the poll. Either way, be sure to directly address or have your students respond to the results of the poll, and relate it back to the purpose of the poll.
Alternative Tools for Polling

CourseWorks (Canvas) Quiz has an ungraded survey feature that can be used for polls both synchronously and asynchronously.

PollEverywhere can be used for more advanced polling activities such as using open-ended text questions or images. Unlike Zoom, the results from PollEverywhere can be directly transported to CourseWorks (Canvas).

Strategy 2: Think-Pair-Share

Overview

This active learning strategy involves posing a short problem, scenario, or question to your students and giving them the time and opportunity to complete the following steps:

1. Think through the problem, scenario, or question individually.

2. Pair with a partner to discuss.

3. Share their findings or takeaways with the rest of the class.

This strategy not only gives your students time to process and apply their knowledge and skills on their own first, it also gives them the opportunity to consult and collaborate with a peer. This process usually elicits more thoughtful responses while also lowering the stakes of sharing with the rest of the class.
Tools used Amount of pre-class preparation required How to Implement

Think: First, pose a short problem, scenario, or question for your students to work through on their own for about 30 seconds to a minute. Read the question out loud while also displaying it on a slide that you share with your students using Zoom's Share Screen feature. As your students are thinking through the problem, click on Zoom's Breakout Rooms tool so you can enter the number of breakout rooms needed in order for each to contain a pair of students. Zoom conveniently displays the number of participants per room based on the number of participants present and the number of rooms you select. If you have an odd number of students, subtract one from the total number of students and divide that by two to get the number of rooms you should create; Zoom will automatically assign one of the breakout rooms with three students instead of a pair.

Pair: When your students are ready to pair up, let Zoom automatically assign them to the breakout rooms. Give your students about 5 minutes to introduce themselves to their partners and share their thoughts on the assigned problem. To help your students keep track of the given problem and directions, you can the problem and instructions through a message to all the breakout rooms.

Share: When your students are ready to share, close the breakout rooms so all your students return to the main room. Ask for volunteers to share their answers or discussion takeaways by having them use the hand-raise feature in Zoom. Unmute one volunteer at a time so they can acknowledge their partner and share their response with the entire class. Mute the volunteer who has spoken before unmuting the next one. Repeat this process until you are satisfied with the number of contributions and/or perspectives shared.

Alternative active learning strategies with similar setups

Strategy 3: Minute Paper

Overview Tools used Amount of pre-class preparation required How to Implement
Before your online class session, write an open-ended prompt that students can respond to in less than five minutes. You can vary the prompt to target specific knowledge and skill sets or solicit big picture free responses.

Example prompts include:

What questions about today's topic are you most interested in exploring?

What was the most important point of today's lesson?

Share an experience from your everyday life that illustrates this principle.

What steps will you take to maximize your learning for the upcoming test?

Reflecting on the essay you just submitted, what would you have done differently that would improve your essay?

When your prompt is ready, use it to create an open-ended poll in Poll Everywhere (external to Zoom). Using Poll Everywhere to collect minute paper responses allows you to either display the responses as they come in or download a CSV spreadsheet containing all the responses to skim for trends and themes later.

During your online class session, when you are ready for students to complete their minute papers, activate your open-ended poll and use Zoom's Share Screen tool to share the Poll Everywhere window with your students. While the instructions for responding to the poll will be shown via shared screen, you should also read the instructions out loud to ensure all students receive that information.

Give your students about five minutes to go to the displayed Poll Everywhere site and type in their responses to the minute paper prompt. Depending on your goal, you have the option of addressing select responses as they come in or compiling the results after class so you can address them at the start of the next one.
Alternative active learning strategies with similar setups

Strategy 4: Small Group Discussions

Overview
Small group discussions are one way for your students to delve more deeply into a given problem or issue. You can pose an open-ended question or problem, or provide your students with a scenario or case study to work through. The duration is dependent on the task. Groups can then present their results or findings to the rest of the class.
Tools used Amount of pre-class preparation required How to Implement
Reflect on the learning objective that would most benefit from small group discussion. From this learning objective, develop the discussion prompt that you will assign to your students. For example:

Learning Objective: Analyze Figure 3 of the assigned research article.

Discussion Prompt: How well does the data shown in the figure support the author's claims?

When assigning the small group discussion, be sure to include clear instructions on what your students are supposed to do. Examples include:

How many students will be in each group

How much time they have for the discussion

What they need to report back to the class and how much time they have to do so

Upholding discussion guidelines that they previously agreed to

Because your students are having these discussions completely online, it is best not to have too many students in each group; 3-4 students per group for a 10-minute small group discussion allows each student to contribute substantially to the discussion.

To help facilitate the small group discussion and ensure that all students engage, either assign or have your students volunteer for the following roles:

Facilitator + Timekeeper-keep the discussion focused on the assigned prompt

Notetaker-record the main points of the discussion on a collaborative document like Google or

Challenger-push the group to view the problem or issue from different perspectives

Reporter-report the main takeaways of the discussion back to the rest of the class

You could have students rotate roles across the semester so that they get to experience and learn the different skill sets associated with each role.

Let your students know that you, and if applicable, your co-instructor(s) and/or TA(s), may be dropping into each breakout room periodically to check their progress and answer any questions, but that they do not have to stop their discussion if they do not need anything from you.

After providing your students with both verbal and written instructions, give them a minute to ask you any clarifying questions before you send them to their breakout rooms.
Alternative active learning strategies with similar setups

Strategy 5: Short Student Presentations

Overview

Short presentations provide an opportunity for students to engage in peer instruction. This type of activity invites students to synthesize and communicate their knowledge. Students can be asked to research an issue of interest to them that is related to the course topic or work on a problem outside of class, and to present their findings during an upcoming online class session. This allows students to link course content with their own interests and lived experiences, and learn from their peers.
Tools used Amount of pre-class preparation required How to Implement
Identify a course learning objective that would greatly benefit from having students explore the topic further on their own. For example, you could have students use their analytical skills that they developed during the course to analyze a different area, setting, artifact, or scenario of their choice. Alternatively, you could have your students design proposals to address a problem raised in class.

Assign student presentations with sufficient time for your students to prepare their presentation, e.g., at least one to two weeks in advance. Be sure to provide specific instructions regarding the format and duration of the presentation, e.g., "The presentation is 5 minutes long with 10 minutes for audience questions," as well as any criteria for evaluation, which could be represented as a rubric.

This strategy works best if you provide students with preliminary feedback on their presentations prior to your online class session. Consider having a short online meeting with each student presenter or checking in via email to provide feedback on their presentation and to answer their questions at least a few days before your online class session.

When it is time for your students to present during your online class session, first remind the class of the purpose and format of the student presentations. Encourage your students to be active listeners during the presentation, e.g., reflect on how the presentation might apply to your interests, explore how the presentation enriches your perspectives on the topic, type your questions into the Zoom chat, or write down your main takeaways from the presentation.

When the student presenter is ready, unmute their microphone and allow them to share their screen with the class.

While the student is presenting, you may monitor questions that are being submitted by other students to the Zoom chat. Once the presentation is finished, select a few questions for the presenter to address.

When the student presenter is done answering questions, consider having all your students reflect on what they learned. For example, you could ask your students to summarize their main takeaways from the presentation or describe how the presentation connects with different aspects of the course. Have your students share their reflections on a discussion board on CourseWorks (Canvas) or an open-ended poll on Poll Everywhere. You can skim through these reflections to see what your students gained from the student presentations.
Alternative active learning strategies with similar setups

Digital scavenger hunt: Students find or create media (images, video clips, audio clips) that they think best represent assigned course concepts to share with the class.

Student group presentations: Students work in small groups outside of class on an assigned project and present their findings during the online class session. Other students in class focus on asking questions and linking the presentation to course content.

Final Tips

Working in a virtual classroom requires patience. Begin with simple low stakes activities for you and your students to get comfortable with the new format and provide time and opportunity for your students to ask you questions. Eventually, instructors, TAs, and students will gain proficiency with these online tools.

Do a test-run of each activity you plan to use before your online class session, preferably with a CTL Learning Designer or a teaching colleague. Given the number of user-specific settings in Zoom, you will want to ensure that all the features you will be using have been enabled prior to your online class session. Some features cannot be enabled once your online class session has launched.

If you have questions or would like support in developing and implementing active learning in your online course, please reach out to the CTL at ColumbiaCTL@columbia.edu . You can also get one-on-one support via phone or Zoom during our virtual office hours .

References

1. Bonwell, C.C. & Eison, J.A. (1991). Active Learning: Creating Excitement in the Classroom. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report 1. Washington, D.C.: George Washington University.

2. Fink, D.L. (2003). Creating Significant Learning Experiences: An Integrated Approach to Designing College Courses. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

3. Mazur, E. (2013). Peer Instruction: A User's Manual. Pearson Higher Ed.

4. Angelo, T. A., & Cross, K. P. (1993). Classroom assessment techniques: A handbook for college teachers (2nd ed). Jossey-Bass Publishers.

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Active Learning for your Online Classroom: Five Strategies using Zoom

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Moving your class sessions to a virtual space, such as Zoom video conferencing, brings new opportunities for active learning and student engagement. This resource provides simple strategies that combine active learning principles with online tools so students can encounter and engage with information and ideas, and reflect on their learning.