Since the Coronavirus pandemic, educational establishments were forced to close their doors across the world. In this time schools, colleges and universities made the quick and necessary pivot to teach online. This was a massive change for institutions, but it was a big adjustment for students too. The experience of sitting in lecture halls and tutorials surrounded by their peers, face to face with their professors, was dramatically transformed overnight. Students have since been learning from their laptops, and many of them, alone in their bedrooms.

Prior to the pandemic, some teachers were already exploring the world of online instruction - but others have had to start from scratch, and radically rethink their approach and technique as their teaching has moved out of the classroom and on to a variety of online platforms.

With planning for the next academic year under way and schools working through their strategy for higher education delivery, which is most likely online to begin with, many instructors will be thinking about how can they ensure that their students are still learning in an online environment?

A good place to start is by looking at student engagement which is an important way to measure the success of your online instruction.

Let’s discuss the four types of learner engagement.

There are four ways main ways to measure learner engagement:

1.  Behavioural engagement 

Of all the types of student engagement, this is probably the easiest to measure. Behavioural engagement is when students are logging in to your teaching sessions, completing their assignments and participating in group work. However, this type of engagement doesn’t necessarily mean that people are engaging with your material on a deeper level, so it’s still important to monitor their engagement in other ways.

2.  Cognitive engagement 

This is defined as the extent to which students are taking an active, willing role in the learning process. Are they organising their own notes? Are they thinking critically about what they’re learning? Do they ask insightful questions? Are they using their creativity to generate their own reactions to your teaching material? These are all signs of engaged learners who are actively involved in the cognitive sense.

3.  Emotional engagement 

Emotional engagement refers to the student’s emotional state when learning. How are they feeling? Whether they are feeling anxious or happy, curious or bored, these emotional responses can have a meaningful impact on how well they process and remember information. In the midst of a global pandemic, it’s understandable that students will be more anxious than usual, both in general and specifically about the impact on their education. So, it’s even more important for teachers to create a supportive online learning environment.

4.  Social engagement 

This type of student engagement can be measured in the way that students interact with one another. Peer-to-peer learning and support is a powerful method of engaging and motivating learners. Again, this is something that is more difficult to replicate with social distancing and online learning - but with the use of forums, chat groups, video conferencing and instant messenger services, it is possible to build a learning environment which promotes social engagement.

1.   Flip the classroom, even when you're fully online

Instead of using your online class time to give a virtual lecture or presentation, you could pre-record your lecture and ask students to watch in preparation for class. This means that they will come to the class already having had time to review and absorb the new information. Then, students can take advantage of their time in the online class with the expert (you) and build on their learning. There’s more time to elaborate on and respond to any issues and make space for group activities and peer-to-peer learning. If students are required to be active participants in class, there’s less opportunity for them to zone out and disengage.

2.  Balance and mix up your activities

As you would in a normal teaching scenario, keep things interesting for your students with a variety of learning activities. Instead of following the route of online lecture - reading – online tutorial - essay, take advantage of this new teaching format and boost student engagement by getting creative. You could put your students in groups and ask them to deliver a different part of the lecture to their classmates. Give students the choice of how to submit their assignments - video or PowerPoint can work just as well as text. Use quizzes and games to keep students on their toes.

3.  Keep students working at the border of their comfort zone

Make the most of online teaching technology to monitor your students’ progress closely. This will allow you to design tasks which keep them working at the edge of their comfort zone, pushing them to develop their skills and deepen their knowledge. Challenged learners are more likely to be engaged learners.

4.  Build the right learning environment for your students

Several studies have shown that, with the right online learning environment, students feel part of a “true, humanised, education environment”, where there is a true teaching–learning process, interact[ing] with their lecturers and peer students.” Now, we’re not suggesting that you design an online space for your students from scratch - but there are innovative, well-designed solutions out there that your college or university can utilise. Speak to colleagues and ask for recommendations, do some research and see what is working in other educational institutions, then trial these in your class. If you’re using the right technology, it’s a big step in the right direction.

Using McGraw Hill Connect, to drive engaged learning

When it comes to online teaching, the innovative use of technology can have a huge impact on not only student outcomes but on student engagement, and teacher workload. Connect is a learning technology platform which is designed to enhance student learning, make managing an online course more efficient for instructors, and improve the overall course experience for everyone. It’s a one-stop shop for all your course content - resources, lectures, quiz banks, homework tasks and assessments. Connect also provides teachers with data-driven insights into student performance. For students, there are adaptive learning features which customise the learning experience, allowing them to deepen their subject knowledge and improve their performance.

If you'd like to learn more about how Connect could work for you and your students ahead of the next academic year, please feel free to reply to this article or get in touch with your Academic Consultant.

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