“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.”
These words by Benjamin Franklin are true and imbibes the essence of education. Teaching must not always be focused on the teacher or the textbook. The crux of the concern is students and how well they understand the concepts. Education is about preparing students for life or at least to face life and the challenges that it may pose.
Syllabus and curriculum are just a part of education. Students and teachers are pivotal parts that can never be taken out of the equation. Ensuring student engagement is one of the major goals of teachers. Classes have now moved online and while teachers search for the best app for online classes and virtual classrooms etc, it is important to keep in mind that online teaching is significantly different from traditional teaching and new methods have to be employed to ensure student engagement. Today, we will take a look at six tips that will help teachers to increase student engagement.
Tips to Increase Student Engagement
- Use Teaching Aids
The importance of teaching aids and the effect that it has on students cannot be emphasized enough. More often than not, teaching aids are overlooked by teachers and this is the first mistake that teachers make. There are different types of teaching aids like visual aids, audio aids, and likewise. These aids are sure to help students remember better and are bound to increase student engagement and student attention.
- Give Ownership to Your Students
Quite often, what happens is that students don’t feel they are in control and rather, feel controlled. So, they create distractions and other noise. When you give ownership to students and don’t control them, they feel a sense of belonging and become attentive. However, this does not mean that you should lose all the control that you have over your class. Just strike the right balance and provide them ample enough attention and space so that they feel heard and valued.
- Include Classroom Activities
Classroom activities are a great way to break the monotony in your classroom and to add some life to it. Classes can get quite drab and boring if you follow the same routine every day. For instance, if you are teaching math, you can include tricky maths questions and reward the students for their hard work and focus. This need not be according to the syllabus. These can be very basic. You can also include activities that have nothing to with the subject that you teach. The point is to bring in a good environment so that students feel motivated to attend your classes.
- Take A Break
The brain needs a break every now and then so that it can function properly. The attention span of an average human brain is 45- 60 minutes and this also differs from person to person. Identify gaps where you can strike a casual conversation with your students and just talk to them. Give them 5 minutes of rest or ask them to just go through what they have learned till then. Ease your students.
- Encourage Group Work
Teamwork and collaboration is a great way to engage students. They learn better when they are put in groups. Peer learning is a beneficial method and a lot of schools and universities have implemented this approach. Group activities increase the bonding between students and this in turn will make them feel safer in the classroom. For instance, when you split students into groups and ask them to work on a specific project or assignment, they will be able to discover skills that they never knew that they even had. They will be able to connect with other students and since they are of the same age, the rapport would be better.
- Understand Students’ Interests
There is no point in trying to fill a pot that has a hole. If you don’t understand what the problems and challenges are that your students face, you can never get complete engagement. Understanding your students is extremely important to ensure student interest and engagement. Talk to your students and see what they like and what they struggle with. Devise lesson plans and strategies accordingly. You can use emotion cards to understand how the students feel after a class. Similarly, you can include other subtle and covert ways to understand what the students are feeling.
Student engagement is of paramount importance for effective learning. The whole essence of education is to prepare students for the future. Concentration and attention are necessary skills that are required for a successful life. These tips mentioned above are sure to help with student engagement and interest. Gathering feedback, regular communication, creating a learning experience, gamification and storytelling are some other options that you can include in your classroom to improve interest. At the end of the day, if the students are looking forward to another class with you, that’s your biggest achievement. The grades and academic performance are secondary.
