Ways to Make Online Learning Sessions Fun

Teaching through virtual classrooms is not always easy and it takes a lot of creativity and hard work to keep students engaged in an online classroom and keep their brains stimulated.

The fact is that teachers require a completely different skill set when they are teaching in an online classroom compared to that when they are teaching offline.

When students are in an online class mostly they are at their homes and surrounded by a number of potential distractions. Thus keeping students engaged, motivated and making learning sessions fun for them is one of the biggest challenges online teachers face.

Fortunately, there are a lot of tips and tricks to help teachers to make online learning sessions fun.

A Few Tips and Strategies to Make Learning Fun

Find What Inspires Your Students

The key behind an interactive online learning session is that teachers should know what inspires their students and give them reasons to be engaged in the classroom.

Whenever you are teaching online use the same medium which you use in a real-life classroom so that students do not feel anything different.

Also do not hesitate in trying various teaching methodologies for your students until you find what works best for them.

Break Down The Lesson In Small Parts

As a general rule we all know that students get bored faster in an online session than in a face-to-face session thus teachers should break up their lessons differently as they would in an offline class.

Teachers should keep small chunks of lessons so that can be easily digested by the students. Mixing up the lessons with some activity can also be fun for students and prove to be a time fly-by for students.

Teachers can also use free lesson planners available online for this purpose like Planboard.

Your Presentation Skills (Audio & Video) Should Be At Your Best

Make sure that when you are using a webcam you should be looking presentable and your background should be simple to avoid any distractions.

If students can see you and you look interested and engaged in their queries, that would be 100 times more motivating for them. Also, your slides should be neat and clean and the visual materials you use are to be of good quality.

Work a bit on your tone and your storytelling skills. Also, any audio or video clips you use should be of good quality. Make sure your internet connection is stable because disrupting online classes take off students’ attention from the class.

Make Use Of Technology

Teaching online comes with a lot of challenges which can be sorted out with the help of technological tools available. Whenever you use whiteboards, pointers, virtual games, text editors, drawing tools, file editors, etc you can use the technology you have to add a variety to your lessons and keep the students engaged.

First of all, you should know how to use these tools effectively. So take your time to learn them, and then think about how you can use them to liven up your lessons.

Set Goals For Your Students

Another way to keep students motivated is to set short-term goals for your online students and remind them from time to time about their goals. One simple way is to make sure that each lesson has a clear outline that you share with your students so that they know where they are in the learning process.

Then you can also think of rewarding your students when they complete a task, you can give them badges, points or stars, or other fun-related stuff that your students might like.

You can also do a progress check of students by taking short quizzes on previous topics. You can also build up a portfolio of work with them to keep their long-term records.

Keep It Interactive

In an online class, it’s tough to read dense and lengthy texts (it’s much easier to break things into chunks). Keep things in your ppt that help students actively participate in the online class or you can communicate with them during the class through the chatbox. Keep asking the students whether they understand or not every 3 minutes or so and do not forget to take the feedback in the last.

Make Students Feel Valued

Students feel demotivated in an online classroom mainly due to loneliness in an online classroom as compared to a real-life classroom and they might think no one cares if they even miss a class. To eliminate this problem teachers can learn students’ names and use their names throughout the class. Also, ask them questions related to the previous chapter and give regular feedback on their work so that they feel valued and motivated.

Be Patient With Your Students

As everyone knows that young kids sometimes cannot pay high attention so it would be sometimes hard for them to focus on what you are teaching.

This is totally normal so try to give them a break in between and be patient with them.