Managing large classrooms
The management of large classrooms can be challenging but consider the following in your learning design and teaching practice.
How do I do it?
Develop a learning community from the beginning
It is important to consider the three presences (cognitive, social and teaching) in the design of your learning environment. These three presences are important in the establishment of a safe learning environment which facilitates the construction of knowledge and negotiation of meaning and different perspectives.
Provide students with opportunities to get to know each other
This refers to the development of social presence in your environment and this should be encouraged early on in the semester. Consider the range of ice-breaker activities that are available as well as the development of video-based material that can be used to introduce the teaching team.
Communicate frequently with students and early on in the semester
This is very important because it provides students with a sense of their value and importance in the learning community. This can go a long way to the establishment of belonging. To do this, it is important to set guidelines for your nature and frequency of communication with the student cohort.
Ensure that the foundations of your online learning environment are solid
The foundations of your learning environment are central to the development of cognitive presence in your unit. If students are unclear about upcoming learning activities, the nature of tutorial sessions or assessment tasks, this is likely to decrease their cognitive engagement with your unit and this will have an effect on the learning community. Foundations of your learning environment include considerations related to constructive alignment, learning design, scaffolding and active learning strategies that place the student at the centre of the learning process.
Develop a staged and scaffolded set of assessments to help with marking load
Consider the balance between the demands on your time and providing an effective learning environment for your students. How can assessment tasks be spaced out over the course of a semester to help with workload balance? This is also an important question because assessments provide you with an opportunity to connect with your students and to provide feedback for improvement and balanced tasks over the semester provides you with an opportunity to do this.
This outline was adapted from Sydney University’s document on design strategies for teaching and learning.
