Finding Sense Of Community In Online Learning Journey
Building a sense of community is crucial for learning. The pandemic has profoundly affected the way we learn, work and live. We started our online learning journey because of this pandemic. Whether you are starting a new online course or attending the normal online course don't forget to rely on your community to maintain focus and stay connected during this online learning journey. The sense of belonging always increases the students satisfaction with their academic programmes and willingness to help each other. Feeling like you are part of a community is an important part of the learning process. In online courses, community is particularly important to make the students not feel isolated and alone. Establishing a community helps the learners work well together. There are many factors that can influence students' sense of belonging and community;
Define A Common Goal
Defining common goals and values are the first step to creating a sense of community. Common goals help to build trust and connections among students and it also helps to develop a sense of responsibility. Defining a common goal increases the students motivation towards learning and it will hold them responsible for achieving their objectives. This will help the students and teachers to take actionable steps to accomplish their desire.
Establish Social Presence
Social presence is an important concept for finding a sense of community. Immediacy, interactions and intimacy are several factors that influence social presence. You can ask questions and doubts to make others notice you. Strong social presence establishes an environment of comfort and safe risk taking.
Social presence of the instructor is also important. It reduces the students' feeling of isolation while building connection. Learners always want to get to know the tutor as people instead of their role as content experts. This prepares the learners for the interactions in the class.
Create Communication Plan
Communication is essential to any relationship whether it is student-teacher relationship or student-student relationship. Frequent and effective communication has very much importance in encouraging community. Communication can strengthen individual attention and personalized education. Keep the communication going even after the lecture and create a space for sharing your learning experience. Having backchannel discussions is a great way for learners to maintain connection with students in online class. You can keep the conversations going either through collaborative spaces, black boards, blogs, chats or forums.
Encourage Peer Learning
Rich resources that provide individuals is one thing that draws learners to communities. Peer learning is an outstanding approach for motivating your learning experience. Peer learning is a powerful way to create trust, connectedness and interdependence between the students. It helps them to appreciate the work of their classmates.
If teachers try to provide opportunities for students to share information is a useful strategy for helping to develop community. Few options you can use for this is to create study groups for the course, include a relevant resource section for the course and create a common space.
Use Collaborative Learning Techniques
Collaborative learning helps to reduce the feelings of isolation. In an online environment, getting to know their peers can improve students' overall experience. Including discussions will help the students to know their peers. Collaborative learning provides the opportunities for students to get to know one another and increase the connection between them. The more students and teachers see and hear one another, the more they are able to develop connections and it helps them to build a sense of community.
Teachers Make Themself Available
Teacher is the touchstone of an online course community. So teachers always try to make themselves available for the students anytime. When the students are comfortable with you, they are more comfortable with learning and participating in the online learning environment.
Participate In Non Curriculum Related Topics
During the class time take an initiative to include non curricular activities. Virtual interactive activity will definitely help the students to relieve their stress and it also helps to find out the hidden talents of the students. Simple things like working together in a group, creative writing, painting together or discussions on several topics within a given time frame will help the students to relax.
Co Teaching
Co-teaching can definitely benefit online learning. It always encourages the students to think and talk about their ideas. Co teaching will help the students to connect to a sense of community in the class. It also supplies the teachers some teaching ideas that are applicable for future instruction. It allows the students to create a lesson plan and practice their own teaching style. Co-teaching definitely helps to deepen connections between students, increase students' commitment and it allows teachers to learn from students' teaching style.
Encourage Peer Evaluation
Allowing learners to review each other's work helps them to understand what they are learning. It will stimulate students' thinking and actively involve them in the learning process. It also promotes higher order thinking on a deeper level. It makes the students feel more connected with the peer groups and with the course also.
Hold Live Events
Since the online courses sometimes feel isolating, having some live events can really help students to relax. For this you can hold live question answer sessions. You might even consider holding a real life meet up once or twice a year. The events don't necessarily have to be related to the course.
Provide Feedback
Getting feedback is an excellent way to interact. Both teachers and students can ask for feedback. It can be as simple as asking for suggestions or asking a general question about your performance. Taking feedback will always help you to improve your course.
Teachers can invite responses, discussions and questions. It encourages ongoing suggestions and opinions.
Create Support Groups
In virtual classes, creating smaller support groups to connect with others is always helpful for you to provide an additional mechanism for learning. It will improve the emotional connections, student involvement and maintaining focus. It will introduce students to new perspectives and lead to healthy collaborations.
