Introduction
School life is an integral part of a student’s overall development in life. It shapes their thoughts, molds their identity, and gives them all the qualities they need to advance in life. Teachers have a huge role to play in making school life a wholesome experience for students. The way they interact with the students, involve them in the class, making them interact with the teacher and with each other - these all make the overall experience of the students pleasurable. However, when it comes to the online scene, the fundamental dynamics of a class change, and so they have to adapt to it accordingly.
Activities to Make Their Online Classes Fun
Teachers need to embrace the new online world they are inhabiting and take charge of their classes in every sense of the word. They will have to know their way around the application they’re using to conduct the class and know which features help with what. Teachmint is one such application that offers a very easy interface and a shallow learning curve. So once they know their way around the application, they can apply their class engagement skills effectively. Here are a few things to make students’ online school life fun and memorable.
Have Quizzes from Time to Time
Quizzes might seem like a boring thing off the face of it, but it is quite effective in making class sessions. Here is an activity the teacher can do - divide the class into different teams and name them A, B, C, D, and so on, with one team leader being given the chance to answer for the team. Give the students a day’s or week’s time to prepare for the quiz so that they are all given equal opportunity. The quiz can be conducted through either of the two methods:
The Hand Raise Feature
Once the teacher announces the quiz in the online live class, the teacher can turn off access to the microphone and chat to ensure that none of the students can hear each other. Each team can make use of a third-party app to separately be connected as a team but they must all be present in the class for them to qualify. The teacher can also choose to tell the students to keep their cameras on to make sure there is no cheating or misconduct involved. Once the quiz starts, the questions can be asked by the teachers one by one, following which the allotted team leader can make use of the Hand Raise feature to notify the teacher that they have the answer. The Hand Raise feature shows the list of students who have clicked on the button in the order it was clicked, hence giving the teacher a chronological list of the answers, following which the teacher can ask the first team to answer. If they get the answer right, points can be awarded to them, or else the next team in line can answer.
The Live Poll Feature
The Live Poll feature takes conducting quizzes to the next level. The teacher can simply ask the question while taking the class or enter the poll question in the field provided and conduct the poll. Once the poll is done, the teacher will know which students got the right answer, and they will also know how many seconds into the poll the student had selected the answer, hence making choosing the winner even easier.
Once the quiz is over, the teacher can give a reward of some kind to the students, such as giving them a paid ebook for free, discount coupons, or virtual gift cards. This will be a memorable experience in their virtual school life and will help them bond with the teacher as well as generate interest in the class.
Conduct Debates in the Class
Conducting debates in the classroom is a fantastic way of engaging students with the class, as well as developing soft skills. Teachmint can help conduct debates in online classes as easily as in a brick-and-mortar classroom. Firstly the teachers can split the class into teams - for and against the topic. The teacher can either assign the topic of the debate before or during the debate. Then using the Hand Raise feature of the Teachmint application, the teacher can make each student who wants to speak up do so and again, with the same feature, help students ask cross-questions and keep the debate lively. The teacher can then choose to reward either the best debater or the best team.
Show and Tell
This is another very interesting way to keep the students engaged and interested in class. Tell students to show something cool that they own - or even create a theme and tell them to bring something to the virtual class that suits that theme. Show and Tell can help students with similar interests connect with each other better and even form interest groups.
Extempore Speeches
Teachers can use the online class venue to conduct extempore speeches. Each student can be called out on the basis of their roll number (or whatever order the teacher or students prefer) and assigned a topic. This is a great way to help students improve their soft skills like critical thinking skills, public speaking skills, memorization skills, and learning retention, among others. The teacher can even reward the best speaker to keep the event interesting in the future and an incentive to get better.
Virtual Games
Virtual games for classrooms are now plenty in number. There are a lot of group activities and games that can be conducted in an online setting. They increase excitement among students and make them feel like they are actively taking part in an event. It helps give a fresh take on online classes in general and makes them feel like it’s a place where they belong. Click here to get ideas for some really cool virtual games you can use in your classroom today.
Conclusion
So, keeping the class alive and kicking is a really important part of the whole class’s engagement and fun. School lasts only for so long - and childhood even shorter. So, it is the responsibility of the teacher to make their school life memorable - because, at the end of the day, that’s what makes school memorable; it is not just what you learn, but what you experience that makes school life truly something to cherish and hold close to heart. A good lively teacher and class can make them feel much more at home in online classes than in a traditional classroom.
Teachmint helps schools envision a future where their students are equipped with 21st-century skills. With our advanced learning management system, you can improve the teaching-learning experience. Our offerings like education erp, admission management system, fee management system, and others conveniently digitize educational organizations.
Suggested Read: CSIR Innovation Awards for Students
