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A greater sense of connectedness between the students and the instructor makes participants care more about what they’re learning. The stronger this social presence, the more motivated the students are to learn. Here’s how to use Microsoft Whiteboard to strengthen belonging in the virtual classroom.
Feedback and asking questions
It’s crucial for an instructor to give feedback to online learners and let them do the same. Whiteboard has tools to create basic polling with these ideas.
- Ask students to jot a sticky note about how they feel about a task.
- Get students to ‘like’ sticky notes, text blocks and images to test the popularity of an idea and to encourage easy participation.
- Ask students to upload an image of an animal, for example, to represent their feelings on an idea in a less-intimidating way.
- Let participants draw or ‘stick’ a pin on a scale of ‘agree’ to ‘disagree’ to give learners a less precise, more fluid way to answer a question.
- Use an image, a hand for example, as an icebreaker to ask a question such as ‘Where on a hand are you most likely to miss washing?’.
- Identify common themes from feedback and present these back on the shared screen of Whiteboard.
Social interaction
Whiteboard puts less emphasis on intimidating perfection, and instead encourages social interaction through experimentation and play in these ways.
- The drawing and writing tools are easy to pick up and use immediately. The interface, especially the web version of Whiteboard, is simple, with a very small barrier to entry for students.
- The drawing tools show an individual’s handwriting and allow ‘imperfections’ and fun to happen.
- All participants can see each other’s cursors scribbling in real time, which can create a sense of a shared space and connectedness.
- You can plan group problem-solving tasks and open the door to sharing personal stories.
Create a visual logbook of personal experiences. Students in different time zones can contribute to a whiteboard in their own time. You can use this as a meeting space to talk about something such as ‘My favourite dish’ or ‘The best and worst thing about…’.
Accessibility in Whiteboard
MS Whiteboard has an ‘accessibility checker’ (in desktop only) that lets you add alt text to all the image elements. The image descriptions are readable by screen readers, used by students with a visual impairment. Background colours and patterns can be customised too (in desktop only).
Hybrid learning
In hybrid learning, which moves between classes in-person and distance education, the physical- and digital whiteboard can sit across both spaces. The ‘ink grab’ feature in Microsoft Whiteboard lets you take a photo of a real whiteboard and then drop it into the online Whiteboard as an editable drawing. This is useful for continuity between the two spaces, especially for sudden shifts to online lessons.