By Mikiya Ellis-Glunt & Norma Sorto
Baltimore Watchdog Staff Writers
The Problem
When the COVID-19 pandemic forced everyone online last March, students and professors had to find a way to adapt to the new environment. One major challenge everyone has faced: engaging with each other and forming strong connections.
In the pre-COVID world, students were able to connect with their professors and peers in person. Students would take advantage of office hours to enhance their understanding of assignments. In a traditional class setting, professors could interact with students and help with any concerns or needs. Group projects were usually manageable because students were able to interact with each other physically. The on-campus setting made it easier for students to build relationships to help them with their professional goals.
With online learning — a.k.a. Zoom school — came real challenges. Professors had to learn on the fly how to teach and interact in online classrooms. Cultivating a sense of community, as many learned, is hard. There are limited opportunities for interactions outside of official class time.
Jennifer Pett, a lecturer in the Department of Early Childhood Education at Towson University, noticed that her students were not fully engaged in her online lectures and during class discussions. Throughout the past year, Zoom fatigue is one of the factors in the decrease in student engagement. Research shows that 80 percent of college students found it harder to stay focused and present during classes online. Students were often reluctant to turn on their cameras and share their concerns and frustrations about online learning.
Student engagement in online learning has also decreased. A survey conducted by the organization Active Minds found that 74 percent of students are challenged in maintaining a routine due to COVID-19.
“It’s hard when we are still expected to do the same assignments,” said Maya Smalls, a Towson student. “You can’t physically be with people in person. We’re relying a lot on Zoom and GroupMe just to coordinate people’s schedules. It has diminished those relationships. There’s people that I know now for a year, but I have never met them in real life.”
The Solution
Pett knows that making connections is vital for learning. She said teaching college students is just like teaching any age group. It’s all about how you approach them. Last year, she developed new systems so her students can feel not only engaged but share their perspectives in a positive online environment.
Pett teaches courses on emerging literacy for children ages from birth to 5 years old. She helps to guide her students on the best practices to use to help younger children communicate their feelings, needs and wants. Even before remote learning was introduced, Pett said she always made sure she would start her classes by asking her students to share how they’re doing or feeling. Instead of doing it in her classroom in Hawkins Hall, she has done that online over the past year.
When Pett accepted that lecturing on Zoom was going to be the new normal, she asked herself: How am I going to own the Zoom rather than the zoom owning me?
“I spent the summer researching really interactive technologies and ways of presenting the information,” Pett said. “I took an online course this summer on just engaging learners in this space and learned lots of tricks and techniques.”
The course she took over the summer helped Pett apply tools to engage students early on in the class by ensuring her students are mentally and physically doing well. Rather than simply asking how they are, she made an activity out of the process to keep them engaged.
Pett has several ways of connecting students virtually. One way is maintaining the same breakout rooms throughout the semester. That way, she’s able to foster mini-communities, so students stay connected with the same individuals.
Pett introduced a new opening for all of her classes by starting every class with either a funny poll or an activity called “joys and pains.” At first, Pett said many of the students remained hesitant about sharing because they had a wall built up of “does she really wanna know?” Pett was able to guide her students through by sharing her own joys and pains that she was experiencing in her day-to-day life. The process goes a little like this:
“Today my joy is that I have had a really quiet morning of being able to get some writing done,” Pett said. “My pain is that, oh my gosh, I’m going to have to make dinner again, do you know how many days in a row I’ve made dinner? Like 400 days in a row.”
After sharing her joys and pains, she asks if any of her students would like to follow up and share next. She tries to encourage conversation to come naturally — she doesn’t force it if students don’t want to share. Pett said she realizes that not everyone wants to talk, but they will be in the chat speaking going back and forth with other classmates. So she makes sure she monitors the chat as well to make sure every student is acknowledged.
Pett said she wants to remain authentic with her students by making sure they know things that are hard for her at the moment but also good for her. The joys and pains activity goes hand and hand with deep listening, in Pett’s opinion.
Insights
Pett’s methods have created an environment where her students feel comfortable expressing themselves. Pett noticed that using the breakout rooms and assigning small groups has helped create mini-communities among her students. She also shares her joys and pains during class to show her students that she empathizes with their feelings.
It was easier for Pett to share content quicker and interact with her students in an in-person classroom setting. However, being online has changed the way students respond to new content. Pett finds that students are struggling with Zoom fatigue throughout the semester. While implementing these methods, Pett learned that students need flexibility and honestly in a virtual setting.
“Community is fostered when the instructor sets a precedent of seeing, knowing and understanding the students,” Pett said. “Sometimes a half an hour at top of class, we are connected, and I think that’s vitally important time, especially in this remote environment.”
Pett finds that being open and vulnerable with her student allows her to create a sense of community. She wants her students to know that they are both walking on the same path together to the finish line. So far, her methods are working. Students engage more in a class by sharing their joys and pain, turning on their cameras, or chatting in the chatbox. However, it takes time for her students to open up.
Evidence of Effectiveness
Through this new technique Pett has integrated into her classes, she has noticed promising results that could be everlasting into the future, even post-pandemic. Students are more engaged as the semester progresses, she’s found, and more open to sharing.
Many of her students have shown perseverance throughout this journey. Students show up to class even when it may be difficult for them to juggle jobs, other courses and take care of family members throughout this pandemic. Pett said students are motivated on their own — she’s just helping them through the process.
Smalls is one of Pett’s students. She said Early Childhood Education 360 Early Literacy is one of her favorite classes because she feels connected to her professor. The exchanges feel genuine.
“Professors doing that shows that they actually care, and they want to know what we’re going through,” Smalls said. “Some of them would ask how you’re doing but don’t actually care, and that’s where it gets annoying cause don’t ask me if you actually don’t want to know.”
Limitations
The transition to online learning hasn’t been easy for everyone. While implementing new methods in her class, Pett has noticed that extroverted students respond differently than introverted students. She sees that her methods work well when there is a mixture of extroverts and introverts in her class. Her introverted students don’t like to turn on their camera and share their joys and pain. It takes them a while to open up in class.
“If you have a class that is primarily introverted, it takes a lot more to draw them out,” Pett said. “I tailor my joys and pains. I am not going to get a lot of verbal responses from them.”
Pett has seen how many students experience heightened fatigue with being in the virtual space this semester. Unlike last semester, Pett has noticed many students were settled into the Zoom space versus now, where they are becoming more burned out. Therefore she’s noticed it has required more effort into engaging some of her classes than others.