Creating a Classroom Community

🤔 How might you infuse more experiential elements into even the most standard Q&A session? This was my question to myself when wrapping up a facilitation course for a client that included a Q&A session. I wanted to be sure it complemented the other experiential sessions and was aligned with the positive adjectives of how participants had already described the course. First and foremost - here is my issue with Q&As: 👎 They are only focused on knowledge transfer, but not not memory retention (the brain does not absorb like a sponge, it catches what it experiences!) 👎 They tend to favor extroverts willing to ask their questions out loud 👎 Only a small handful of people get their questions answered and they may not be relevant for everyone who attends So, here is how I used elements from my typical #experiencedesign process to make even a one-directional Q&A more interactive and engaging: 1️⃣ ENGAGE FROM THE GET-GO How we start a meeting sets the tone, so I always want to engage everyone on arrival. I opted for music and a connecting question in the chat connected to why we were there - facilitation! 2️⃣ CONNECTION BEFORE CONTENT Yes, people were there to have their questions answered, but I wanted to bring in their own life experience having applied their new found facilitation skills into practice. We kicked off with breakout rooms in small groups to share their own experiences- what had worked well and what was still challenging. This helped drive the questions afterwards. 3️⃣ MAKE THE ENGAGEMENT EXPLICIT Even if it was a Q&A, I wanted to be clear about how THIS one would be run. I set up some guidelines and also gave everyone time to individually think and reflect what questions they wanted to ask. We took time with music playing for the chat to fill up. 4️⃣ COLLABORATIVE LEARNING IS MOST IMPACTFUL Yes, they were hoping to get my insights and answers, however I never want to discredit the wisdom and lived experience in the room. As we walked through the questions, I invited others to also share their top tips and answers. Peer to peer learning is so rich in this way! 5️⃣ CLOSING WITH ACTIONS AND NEVER QUESTIONS The worst way to end any meeting? "Are there any more questions?" Yes, even in a Q & A! Once all questions were answered, I wanted to land the journey by asking everyone to reflect on what new insights or ideas emerged for them from the session and especially what they will act upon and apply forward in their work. Ending with actions helps to close one learning cycle and drive forward future experiences when they put it to the test! The session received great reviews and it got me thinking - we could really apply these principles to most informational sessions that tend to put content before connection (and miss the mark). 🤔 What do you think? Would you take this approach to a Q&A? Let me know in the comments below👇 #ExperienceLearningwithRomy

Learning flourishes when students are exposed to a rich tapestry of strategies that activate different parts of the brain and heart. Beyond memorization and review, innovative approaches like peer teaching, role-playing, project-based learning, and multisensory exploration allow learners to engage deeply and authentically. For example, when students teach a concept to classmates, they strengthen their communication, metacognition, and confidence. Role-playing historical events or scientific processes builds empathy, critical thinking, and problem-solving. Project-based learning such as designing a community garden or creating a presentation fosters collaboration, creativity, and real-world application. Multisensory strategies like using manipulatives, visuals, movement, and sound especially benefit neurodiverse learners, enhancing retention, focus, and emotional connection to content. These methods don’t just improve academic outcomes they cultivate lifelong skills like adaptability, initiative, and resilience. When teachers intentionally layer strategies that match students’ strengths and needs, they create classrooms that are inclusive, dynamic, and deeply empowering. #LearningInEveryWay

Jigsaw Reading: A Powerful Collaborative Strategy for ESL Classrooms Looking for a student-centered strategy that boosts communication and comprehension in your ESL lessons? Try Jigsaw Reading—a cooperative learning technique where every student becomes both a learner and a teacher. What is Jigsaw Reading? Students are divided into groups and assigned different parts of a text. They first become "experts" in their assigned section, then return to their groups to teach what they've learned. This approach promotes active reading, listening, and speaking skills—all essential in language acquisition. How to Implement It: 1. Divide students into home groups (4–6 students). 2. Assign each member a unique section of the text. 3. Students join expert groups to study and discuss their section. 4. Return to home groups—each student teaches their part. 5. Wrap up with a class discussion, quiz, or reflection activity. -Why It Works for ESL Learners: Builds communication and collaboration Encourages peer teaching and accountability Supports reading fluency and comprehension Boosts learner confidence with manageable text chunks -Pro Tips for ESL Teachers: Scaffold with vocabulary lists and sentence starters Use visuals to aid understanding Monitor and guide group discussions Choose level-appropriate, culturally inclusive texts Integrate speaking or writing tasks as follow-up -Bonus Tip: You can extend this strategy into a project-based task—students create a summary poster, infographic, or even a mini-podcast to present their topic! Let your students lead the learning—because when learners teach, they remember more. #ESLTeaching #CollaborativeLearning #JigsawReading #ActiveLearning #ELT #ESLStrategies #TeacherTips #TESOL #TEFL #LanguageLearning #StudentCenteredLearning #EnglishTeaching #ReadingSkills

📖 Reading doesn’t have to be a silent, individual task. What if your students could teach each other while reading? Discover the Jigsaw Reading Method and other powerful strategies to make reading interactive and meaningful. Unlock Reading Skills with the Jigsaw Method, Students become “experts” on text parts, then share to build the full story. 2. Step 1 Break the text into smaller, manageable sections. 3. Step 2 Form expert groups—each group dives deep into one section. 4. Step 3 Reassign into mixed groups where students teach one another. 5. Step 4 Reconstruct the narrative together—everyone sees the bigger picture. 6. Helpful Supports ✔ Annotated passages ✔ Graphic organizers ✔ Guided prompts 7. Other Effective Reading Strategies ✨ Reciprocal Teaching – students take roles (summarizer, questioner, clarifier, predictor). ✨ Think–Pair–Share – quick reflection, peer discussion, then class sharing. ✨ Close Reading – multiple focused readings for deeper meaning. ✨ SQ3R Method – Survey, Question, Read, Recite, Review for structured comprehension. ✨ Reader’s Theater – dramatizing texts to build fluency and engagement. 8. Enhance the Experience 🔹 Use digital breakout rooms 🔹 Add visuals & timelines 🔹 Encourage peer questioning 🔹 End with a reflection or short writing task. Students don’t just read. They analyze, collaborate, and own the learning process. How do you make reading more interactive and collaborative in your classroom? #TeachingStrategies #ActiveLearning #ReadingComprehension #EnglishTeaching #EdTech #CollaborativeLearning #TeachingTips #StudentEngagement #LearningStrategies #OnlineTeaching

5 Fun Speaking Activities That Make Students Actually Want to Speak English 🎤📚 One of the biggest challenges in language classrooms is helping students speak confidently without fear of making mistakes. The good news? Speaking practice becomes much more effective when learning feels natural, interactive, and enjoyable. 🌱✨ Here are 5 simple classroom speaking activities that consistently increase student participation and confidence: 🔹 One-Word Story Each student adds one word at a time to create a collaborative story. Great for creativity, listening, and quick thinking. 🧠 🔹 Describe & Draw One student describes an image while the other draws it without seeing it. This improves communication, vocabulary, and listening accuracy. 🎨 🔹 Speed Chatting Students switch partners every minute and respond to short speaking prompts. Perfect for fluency and spontaneous conversation practice. ⏱️ 🔹 Role Reversal Students become the “teacher” and explain a concept to classmates. Teaching others strengthens confidence and understanding. 👩🏫 🔹 Would You Rather? Fun, opinion-based questions encourage natural interaction and critical thinking. 💬 💡 One important reminder for educators: Students speak more confidently when the classroom feels safe, supportive, and low-pressure. Sometimes, simple activities create the most meaningful communication. Focus less on perfection and more on participation — fluency grows through practice, not fear. 🚀 #EnglishLearning #SpeakingSkills #LanguageTeaching #ClassroomEngagement #StudentCenteredLearning #ESL #Education #TeachingStrategies #CommunicationSkills #TeacherTips

Active Learning Strategies Active learning transforms students from passive listeners into active participants who question, apply, and connect their learning to real-world contexts. By engaging in doing, discussing, and creating, students retain knowledge more deeply, develop critical thinking and confidence, and see the relevance of what they learn. Collaboration with peers further builds empathy, teamwork, and essential lifelong skills beyond the classroom. The following strategies offer practical ways to bring these principles to life and help students actively engage with their learning. 💎 Students can have 2 minutes to prepare and gather their thoughts individually, then discuss in pairs for 10 minutes, before sharing perspectives with the class and having a class discussion. 💎 Students can have various roles to bring pro/con, or stakeholder perspectives to spark critical engagement. 💎 Students can be the “summarizer,” the “challenger,” or the “connector” (linking ideas to previous content), when it comes to group discussion. 💎 Students get a chance of extending conversations outside class by uploading their short 2-3 minute video reflection in the discussion forum. The video can include 3-5 key points or quotations from the resources that you brought to class, together with student reacting to them. 💎 Students present realistic scenarios and to solve or analyze them. 💎 Students act out decision-making situations (e.g., business negotiation, patient care, policy debate). 💎 After a mini-lecture, students get a 5-minute challenge where they can apply the concept to an example. 💎 Students create something tangible (a business plan, a design prototype, a policy brief) that has the key takeaways of the concept you taught. 💎 Students take short, low-stakes quizzes in groups where they remember and apply knowledge. 💎 Students individually or in a group teach a concept to the class and bring resources to support understanding. 💎 Each group learns one part of the content, then teaches it to others as a Jigsaw activity. 💎 Students make short videos, explainers, or infographics for presenting their findings to their peers. 💎 Students review each other’s work and provide constructive feedback, reinforcing their own understanding. What are some of the strategies that worked for your students?😊 #ActiveLearning #TeachingStrategies #StudentEngagement #DeepLearning #CriticalThinking #CollaborativeLearning #HigherEducation #InnovativeTeaching #LearningDesign #Pedagogy #EducationTransformation #LifelongLearning

Group work doesn't fail because students can't collaborate. It fails because the task lets them hide. Put four students around one worksheet and you have built a machine with a well-known output: one student works, one helps a little, two watch. Nobody planned that. The task did. Decades of research on cooperative learning point to the same two ingredients (Johnson & Johnson; Slavin): positive interdependence — they genuinely need each other — and individual accountability — nobody can disappear. Most group tasks have neither. Here are 5 fixes: 1. Everyone produces something. One shared discussion, but four individual write-ups. The conversation is shared. The accountability is not. 2. Give information, not just roles. Forget "timekeeper". Give each student a different piece of the puzzle, so the task is impossible without all four voices. That is what jigsaw tasks are for. 3. Make the task group-worthy. If one student could do it alone in ten minutes, it is not group work. It is one worker with an audience. The task should be too big, too varied, or too open for one mind. 4. Make thinking visible. Big paper, mini whiteboards, shared documents. When the work is visible, hiding gets harder and helping gets easier. 5. Ask any member, not the best member. "Anyone in your group might present." Five words that change who pays attention for the whole task. Group work is not a break from teaching. It is some of the most demanding design work we do. When it fails, the answer is rarely "my students can't handle it." It is usually: the task let them hide. So fix the task. What is your best group work fix?

I’ve been teaching at UNLV for 13 years, across many different classes and formats—in-person, online, and hybrid. Course design has always been a priority for me. I think deeply about how to structure each class based on the modality, student level, and class size. For much of that time, I’ve taught ACC 202 – Managerial Accounting, an in-person class with 100+ sophomore business students in three sections each semester. Most students don’t plan to major in accounting—and many start out dreading it. Thank you to Jessica Soria, Ph.D. for the interview (link below) about how I approach teaching ACC 202 and designing large, interactive classes. This interview caused me to reflect on course design decisions I have made in this class. Over the years, I’ve seen major shifts in student behavior and learning styles. In response, I’ve tried to build a course that’s engaging, relevant, and even fun, while driving home a key point: You can’t be an effective manager if you don’t understand accounting and what the numbers mean. Here are 10 lessons I’ve learned teaching ACC 202: (Most applicable to large, lower-division, math-based courses taught in person) 1) Experiment Every Semester Always try new strategies. Gather feedback through surveys. Keep what works—tweak or toss what doesn’t.  2) Know Your Students Use polls, surveys, and office hours to understand how students interact with your course and where they struggle or succeed. Gather a lot of feedback.  3) Make It Interactive I use a flipped classroom: lecture videos at home, in-class group work focused on problem-solving. We bring in current events, short videos, Poll Everywhere, gamified test reviews—and Discord to keep learning collaborative and social outside of class times.  4) Incentivize Excellence Students with a 99% before the final can waive it—if they write a reflection letter. These letters are shared with future classes as inspiration. 5) Focus on Understanding, Not Coverage Hit the key concepts hard. Use vivid, real-world examples. Minimize memorization—students can use notecards on exams to encourage application. 6) Coach and Communicate Students build a plan for their target grade and track their progress. I encourage office hours, send weekly updates, and aim to create a welcoming environment. 7) Be Transparent Align classwork, homework, and exams. Clear expectations make a huge difference—especially for sophomores. 8) Make Attendance Count Poll Everywhere boosts engagement and counts toward participation grades. 9) Celebrate Success A simple email recognizing students who excel on a test builds confidence and motivation. 10) Don’t Take It Personally You won’t win over everyone. Focus on trends in your feedback—not individual criticisms. I’d love to hear from other educators—what strategies have worked best for your large enrollment courses? And students—what helps you stay engaged in big classes? https://lnkd.in/gAb7Ynp6

The best way to teach brainstorming? Let students brainstorm your teaching approach. Today, our design thinking class at the University of Kentucky, TEK 300, "Teens and Screens," reached a pivotal moment. With midterms behind us and spring break over, we faced a critical question: How might we structure the remaining weeks to promote deeper understanding rather than just blasting through the steps of our semester-long project? Instead of deciding for our students, we chose to "eat our own dog food"(as they used to say at Apple). (HT Reinhold Steinbeck, charles kerns) We turned our students into users and co-designers through a structured brainwriting session focused on this challenge. The process was beautifully simple: • Students received worksheets with our "How Might We" question and a 3×5 grid • Everyone silently wrote initial ideas (one per box) in the first row • Sheets rotated three times, with each person building on or adding to previous ideas • We ended with a gallery walk and dot-voting to identify the strongest concepts In just 20 minutes, we generated over 50 unique ideas! The winner? Incorporating hands-on, interactive activities in every session that directly connect to that day's learning objectives. The meta-realization? We were already practicing the solution before formally adopting it. The brainwriting exercise itself exemplified exactly what our students told us they wanted more of. My teaching partner Ryan Hargrove immediately began storyboarding how we'll implement this approach, moving us closer to the collaborative learning journey we want to have with our students. We're moving from "Once upon a time..." (not as great as we could be...) to "Students designed..." (active participation), to "Now we really dig learning all this..." Your students already know what they need; your job is to create space for them to tell you. P.S. What teaching approaches have you transformed by inviting your students to become co-designers of their learning experience? #DesignThinking #HigherEducation #TeachingInnovation #BuildingInPublic #StudentCenteredLearning

"AI will isolate learners!" critics warn. Yesterday, I witnessed exactly the opposite - a moment that revealed how AI can catalyze rich collaborative thinking when thoughtfully orchestrated. My students were tackling Chapter 8 of "Machines Like Me" - McEwan's most ethically complex chapter. But here's the magic: AI wasn't the endgame - it was just act one. We strategically placed strong critical AI users across different groups, and what unfolded was fascinating. The AI helped stage the initial philosophical debate, identifying potential ethical frameworks for each character. But the real intellectual fireworks happened next. In their groups, students began challenging these AI-generated frameworks, with our stronger critical thinkers guiding their peers through increasingly sophisticated questions: "But if Charlie is really a utilitarian, how do we explain his decision about X?" "What happens when Miranda's supposed virtue ethics crashes into Adam's rigid deontology?" "Are we sure the AI's reading of their ethical positions holds up against these later scenes?" What I observed wasn't just AI analysis - it was students teaching students how to think more rigorously, using AI as a springboard for deeper collaborative inquiry. The technology wasn't replacing discussion; it was enriching it by giving students a common starting point to push against and refine. Here's what's becoming clear: When we thoughtfully orchestrate AI use, positioning it as the beginning rather than the end of analysis, and strategically leverage peer dynamics, something profound happens. Students don't just accept AI insights - they collectively build beyond them. The future of classroom discussion isn't about getting AI answers. It's about using AI to stage richer debates, then letting students collaboratively discover the limits and complexities those initial AI insights missed. Educators: How are you orchestrating AI use to spark, rather than replace, peer learning? #AIinEducation #CollaborativeLearning #EdTech #Teaching #GenerativeThinking Dr. Sabba Quidwai Mike Kentz Amanda Bickerstaff Ethan Mollick Rob Nelson Jason Gulya Doan Winkel Nick Burnett Dr. Martha Umana Ryan Findley Daniel Bashir Alan Hilsabeck Chrissy Macso, M.Ed Anna Mills