Creating A Connected Classroom: Digital Ways To Connect With Your Students

Thanks to the virtual classroom, what was once assumed to occur only in person now takes place between computer screens. Instead of managing a class of students, you’re managing learning portals and virtual meetings. Instead of looking at your pupils face to face, you’re viewing avatars and digital camera projections. Feeling frustrated? Realizing your old teaching methods don’t work the same way? You’re not alone. While remote learning offers many benefits, it also creates its own challenges. Many teachers wonder how to keep students engaged and what the best methods are for instruction online. Thankfully, just as you learned ways to improve engagement in person, you can learn to improve virtually. It’s all about developing skills for a connected classroom.

Creating a Connected Classroom

What is a connected classroom? Essentially, you can think of a connected classroom as an online extension of your physical education setting. In the same way you have always created physical places in which to teach your students, so too you now create public online spaces for virtual learning. The virtual classroom is no less significant or powerful than the in-person one, and, to facilitate learning, it likewise requires strategic planning and design.

To get started, think of all the factors that take place in your in-person classroom, such as leading and instructing your class, providing assignments, creating learning opportunities, and getting students to engage with one another and with you. These same activities are crucial in remote learning environments, though they may not look exactly the same. In lieu of verbally asking your class questions, you may run an online poll. Rather than being available in your office at certain hours of the week, you may offer digital office hours when students can web-conference to get extra support. In place of handing out the curriculum, you may post it on a web page, providing on-demand access to students whenever and wherever they like.

Your Potential for Shaping the Classroom

Another principle to keep in mind is that, as a teacher, you still set the pace for your class and lead your students in mastering new information and tools, even online. That’s why it’s vital for you to educate yourself in a variety of online resources, how to use them, and proper online etiquette. Not only will you occasionally need to directly instruct students in new technologies or platforms, but also you’ll constantly be modeling their use. 

Remember that learning online invites different distractions from the in-person classroom, and these distractions can hamper collaboration and connection. In other words, don’t expect the interaction to naturally occur; rather, facilitate it by taking specific actions. Some ideas include using a social media hashtag for your class content or inviting interaction through online comments. Above all, keep growing and challenging yourself to learn new tools, address logistical challenges, try technologies that are outside your comfort zone. The more you learn, the more you can help your class.

While the virtual classroom differs from the traditional ones, it does open up new learning opportunities for potentially more students than ever before—making it undeniably worthwhile. That’s why, to make the most of online learning as an educator, you have to brace yourself for a new experience and jump in wholeheartedly. 

Start each class by thinking through the short- and long-term goals for each unit: What do you want students to have learned? What do they need to understand along the way? Then, spend time strategizing how to accomplish those goals online. Different tools will serve different goals better, but these guiding questions can help you know which way to go.

To learn more about creating a connected classroom and finding digital ways to connect with students, take a look at the attached resource. It breaks down six specific online opportunities to facilitate better learning online.

AUTHOR BIO: Kacie Stoll is a project expeditor at Golden Rule Signs, an LED sign company. Her professional experiences range from marketing and public relations to sales and customer support. Stoll enjoys working with customers and vendors all over the country to execute with speed and accuracy.

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