Use this page as a resource for lesson planning; these are best practices gathered from a variety of sources and organized to help support the transition from traditional classroom to blended or hybrid and distance learning.
or Think-Pair-Share
Use breakout meeting rooms in online video conferencing platforms to simulate small group discussions.
Give group assignments and workshop formats for small teams to hold online brainstorm meetings and create things together using collaboration tools between live sessions
Pose an equivalent question to the asynchronous students, either in video or text, and ask the students to respond in a small group discussion forum. The group reports can be shared to the larger class discussion forum.
Ask students to use digital pin boards to share content and have discussions
Set up small groups of 3-5 students. Pose a question. Could also use a zoom room or google doc to help with communication. Could send pairs out of class for easier socially distanced discussion elsewhere on campus with set return time, have discussion outside of class time and report during class or outside of class. When sharing with class, consider it practice in projecting voices so all classmates hear.
Use the chat feature. Ask a question and let the students reply with a brief response. Read them out loud to the whole class. Could also use meeting rooms with a reporter to share.
Assign partners and pose a question, asking them to share their ideas, in a discussion forum for the pair, email or other tools like flipgrid or padlet.
Assign partners in the classroom that can talk 6 ft apart. Alternatively, students can "talk" through texts on group.me or through a shared google doc or slide show, when distance would make the volume in the room difficult for some students to learn.
Another option is to assign a Google Slidedeck to groups of about 8 students. Provide instructions in the slide deck. Here is an example.
Use shared spaces for small groups to record ideas using collaborative tools such as SeeSaw, Padlet and Google docs/slides/draw/Jamboard, and then view those with the whole class. Some tools could be padlet, Google, etc.
Use shared spaces for small groups to record ideas using collaborative tools such as SeeSaw, Padlet and Google docs/slides/draw/Jamboard, and ask students to review these ideas as part of the module’s activities.
Hang poster boards around the room. Dismiss one student from each group to go a different poster board and record a response. When they finish and return to their seat, dismiss a second student. Continue until the entire class has been able to record responses. Read/ review the posters with the class or save and use to start the following class period. This activity encourages movement, individual response, and can serve as an assessment of students opinions or understanding (depending on the questions). You may need to think about options for students that are not moving around the room. One option is to consider using virtual poster boards.
Students can take turns role playing/miming a solution and others can watch and respond in chat or live discussion. Encourage students to turn off webcams so focus can be on the student miming.
You could also run a "pictionary" version online at Skibbl. Skribl allows users to join private rooms, and even to create a specific word bank.
Students can record themselves with role play/miming a solution and others can respond in a discussion forum.
Students can take turns role playing or miming a solution for others to critique, watch, etc
Students in fishbowl can be remote (participating in a Meet, Google doc, or Zoom conversation as a small group), while F2F students are outside the fishbowl listening, and then professor leads whole class discussion among listeners afterwards.
At the beginning or end of a class/ module, ask students to respond to a question in the chat or discussion forum or use a polling program to ask questions (in Meet, Zoom or add-on).
At the beginning or end of a class, ask students to respond to a question in the chat, poll or discussion forum.
At the beginning or end of a class, ask students to respond to a question. These can be turned in to the instructor. Alternatively, you could use a polling program to ask students questions.
Using Google doc or KAMI, students share their work with a peer and (using a rubric) provide feedback on their work. Students conference via chat or Meet as they review suggestions and comments. Student may then share their comments with the teacher and/or make the prescribed changes before (re)submitting their work.
Using Google doc or KAMI, students share their work with a peer and (using a rubric) provide feedback on their work. Students share their ideas via comments within the document or via separate document or email. Student may then share their comments with the teacher and/or make the prescribed changes before (re)submitting their work.
Student may shared digital copy of their work via Google doc or KAMI or may share a print copy. Then, using a rubric, student will provide feedback to their peers. Students will conference at a distance, sharing their insights and suggestions. Student may then share their comments with the teacher and/or make the prescribed changes before (re)submitting their work.