Effective instructional strategies go beyond those daily teacher-centric tips and tricks. They are those tried-and-true methodologies that help you, as an educator, reach your teaching and learning goals throughout the school year. When it comes to instructional design, teachers infuse their lesson plans with effective instructional strategies. Many such learning strategies are steeped in research from educational psychologists, philosophers, and researchers such as Piaget, Freire, Dewey, and Papert (just to name a few!).

What are the characteristics of effective and efficient instructional tools?

Meaningful learning experiences motivate students to dive deeper, explore further, and make personal connections. When it comes to personalized or individualized learning, technologies such as Nearpod support teachers in tailoring and targeting learning activities for each and every student. Such experiences put the students in the driver’s seat and give them a sense of agency to become lifelong learners.

Foster a love of learning in every student with Nearpod. Teachers can sign up for free below to access and create interactive lessons. Administrators can schedule a call with an expert to unlock the full power of Nearpod for schools and districts.

7 Essential strategies for designing effective instruction

1. Student engagement

Student engagement is one of those ubiquitous phrases that educators use to speak about their goals for teaching and learning. What is student engagement? It’s that rapt attention that teachers strive for—students leaning forward in their seats, participating with thoughtful questions and meaningful dialogue, eyes bright with those epitomized lightbulb moments, jumping over one another with their curiosity piqued.

Children are naturally curious; just think of a toddler’s persistent question, “Why?” Educators try to nurture this sense of curiosity into a pursuit of lifelong learning by designing effective exploratory or experiential instruction. Often teachers strive to provide hands-on activities to literally let kids get their hands dirty in the process of learning. Such kinesthetic and tactile tasks improve muscle memory, increase energy, and nurture cognitive and emotional development.

Another way to support student engagement is ensuring lessons have clear and authentic real-world connections. By showcasing how skills apply to everyday life or with career goals in mind, students are more likely to embrace instances of practice. Constructivist Bruner lauded the process of student-centered discovery, and Papert celebrated constructionism to provide children with meaningful challenges they’d be excited to tackle.

Nearpod offers a treasure chest of interactive activities specifically designed to champion to engage students. From engaging educational games like Time to Climb to Interactive Videos and immersive Draw It activities, Nearpod transforms learning into an exciting journey, challenging and motivating students along the way. Nearpod effectively brings abstract concepts to life, fostering students’ active participation and turning the traditional classroom into a dynamic, student-centered discovery hub.

2. Active learning

Active learning involves all facilities. It underscores that learners aren’t just consuming but creating, making connections, and building upon prior knowledge. It asks that students do the heavy lifting and thinking in a lesson. Piaget claimed students aren’t just “empty vessels” waiting to be filled. Freire warned against the banking method of education in which students are treated as passive receptors, thus limiting their creative and critical thinking.

Active learning transforms students’ educational experiences and improves academic outcomes. For students of all ages, active learning practices lean quite a bit on activities that pull in kinesthetic movements to encourage students to hone multiple learning styles as they digest and retain new information. Such participatory roles promote active learning across the curriculum.

Nearpod creates active learning environments where every student participates, increasing engagement and challenging students through interactive features that puts them at the center of learning. Interactive features, such as Polls, Open-Ended Questions, and Collaborate Boards, can be one of the most effective instructional practices to spark students’ prior knowledge at the beginning of a lesson or for metacognitive reflections to assess what students learned by the end.

3. Collaborative learning

Collaborative learning brings students together in a joint venture to search for understanding or meaning. This framework of effective instruction is a great way to promote a community of learners as well. Students take a more active and participatory role when they’re engaging in peer-to-peer learning. And today’s technologies allow students to “discuss” while leaning in on their preferred learning styles.

VAK (Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic) is a common way educators begin to address where a child’s strengths lie when it comes to processing and retaining new knowledge. With collaborative learning, students develop and lean on one another’s strengths, benefit from their varied perspectives, and challenge each other for problem solving and deconstructing a problem differently.

Collaborative learning and building connections are of paramount importance in creating active learning experiences. Nearpod provides multiple opportunities for teachers and students to collaborate and build connections. Collaborate Board enables students to work together in a shared digital space and share their thoughts via text, images, audio, video, and ever-so-popular GIFs. Teachers can hear from every student by having them use multiple formats to develop their ideas further. This fosters teamwork and cooperation and builds communication skills among students and teachers, creating a collaborative learning environment.

Our digital world (inside and outside of the classroom) challenges how we need to learn and refine our social and interpersonal skills when communicating and collaborating with one another. Nearpod’s interactive lessons and activities prepare students to use technology effectively, safely, and appropriately, all while building positive and empowering school climates. Nearpod’s social and emotional learning (SEL) activities and lessons highlight these core life skills.

4. School culture

A positive classroom and school culture are crucial to creating a welcoming and supportive environment inclusive for all students and their families. It’s helpful to set and share expectations at the beginning of the school year to emphasize what your goals are for your students. Level setting with such shared routines and procedures can help create a cohesive climate.

Invite all stakeholders to have an active role in your classroom. Encourage all stakeholders to model leadership with positive behavior and a can-do attitude or growth mindset. By focusing on forming authentic and caring relationships, you can motivate students on their learning journeys. And don’t forget to celebrate the daily small and big wins! With such dedication, schools can actualize a student-centered vision for all and implement effective instructional strategies.

Nearpod plays a significant role in connecting and building school and classroom culture through its various features and functionalities. Nearpod allows educators to see every student and create active learning experiences where every student participates through:

• Interactive lessons, videos, activities, and formative assessments 
• Dynamic media and gamification activities like Time to Climb
• Collaborate Boards that build connections through class discussions

5. Formative assessment

Formative assessment can help guide an educator on how best to keep each student on a personalized learning path. Such techniques—whether it is a simple thumbs up/thumbs down, a poll, an exit ticket, or a quiz—provide teachers with a plethora of data, allowing them to take a data-driven approach to designing meaningful learning experiences. Teachers can use this intel to monitor students and modify the next steps in instruction.

Does a lesson need to be revisited? Does the content need to be modeled in a different manner? How can you take students from comprehension to mastery? Data can range from active participation to a test score. Educators can look for patterns to best understand how individuals and small groups are progressing against learning objectives and goals. Formative assessment is a continuous process and bolsters designing elements of effective instruction.

With nine types of formative assessment tools within Nearpod, teachers can design interactive lessons that promote engagement and progress.

6. Real-time insights

Today’s technologies allow us to economize gathering student data across the curriculum so we can analyze and glean insights in real-time. Data can be visualized in many ways, making it easier for teachers to digest and act upon the insights effectively.

Teachers can monitor student progress more readily and provide immediate feedback when the child has a question or meets an obstacle. The value of immediate feedback is immense—students feel more self-aware, motivated, and confident. Such constructive feedback can thwart bad habits or misinformation from being further cemented. This feedback cycle encourages students to reflect more on their learning journey and rely on internal and external feedback.

Nearpod empowers teachers to effectively measure student understanding in real-time, enabling them to make instructional decisions at the moment. Having access to real-time insights, teachers can make more informed instructional decisions and visualize learning in various ways to drive instruction.

Nearpod keeps students and the learning process at the forefront of every class through:

• Formative assessments that provide real-time insights to guide instruction
• Post-session reports informing your next lesson
• Tool and content to scaffold instruction and meet students where they are

7. Differentiation

Meeting a child where they often mean a teacher has to be ready to differentiate instruction for lessons, whether that be to modify a particular activity to support a student better or add a layer of complexity to challenge another further. By understanding your students’ diverse learning needs, you can individualize your lesson plans to ensure immediate feedback, varied instances of practice, and increased engagement.

Similarly, schools often face a challenge of amassing and providing a rich diversity of resources for an equally diverse set of students. Educators seek to deliver high-interest resources so kids can go beyond the old adage of amassing knowledge that is a mile wide and an inch deep. Instead, they grow their depth of knowledge and expand their interests. Such resources encourage teachers to design effective instructional strategies and differentiate learning experiences so students have options and various ways to meet learning objectives through different paths and channels.

Nearpod’s quality content library plays a crucial role in supporting differentiation in the classroom. With over 22,000+ standards-based interactive lessons, activities, and videos, Nearpod gives educators the flexibility to meet students where they are in their learning journey. Teachers can easily tailor their instruction by selecting materials catering to different learning styles, abilities, and interests. Whether it’s providing additional challenges for advanced learners or offering extra support for struggling students, this content library lets teachers create personalized and engaging learning experiences that cater to the unique needs of each student.

Design effective instruction with Nearpod

Having these seven essential strategies as habits of mind when engaging in effective instructional planning will result in more dynamic classroom interactions. When it comes to personalized or individualized learning, technologies such as Nearpod support teachers in tailoring and targeting learning activities for each and every student. Nearpod’s all-in-one platform aids and supports teachers and students alike. From interactive lessons and videos to real-time student data, such experiences put the students in the driver’s seat and give them a sense of agency to become lifelong learners.

Foster a love of learning in every student with Nearpod. Teachers can sign up for free below to access and create interactive lessons. Administrators can schedule a call with an expert to unlock the full power of Nearpod for schools and districts.

Darri Stephens

Darri Stephens is a dedicated LX (learning experience) designer, passionate about creating quality content and programs for kids, families, and educators. With MAs in Education from both Harvard and Stanford, and work experience at best-in-class ed tech organizations including Wonder Workshop, Nickelodeon, and Common Sense Education, she is steeped in the design thinking process and committed to agile and iterative project management, which has resulted in multi-award-winning programs and products.

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Collaborative learning is all about coming together with others to understand a concept or work on a common task. In the classroom, collaboration is a great way to practice life skills that students can take into the future. Classroom communities often reflect a smaller version of a future workplace or project where students must work together on a joint task.

Use Nearpod’s Collaborate Board for collaborative learning

With Nearpod’s Collaborate Board, teachers have an opportunity to connect technology with pedagogy in the classroom. Students work to understand how their individual thoughts, ideas, and contributions fit into a larger shared collection of thoughts in Nearpod. Whether you are new to Nearpod or an experienced user, an individual feature like Collaborate Board can offer many unique ways to bring student-centered discussions to life.

New to Nearpod? Teachers can sign up for free below to access these resources, interactive activities, and engaging lessons. Administrators can schedule a call with an expert to unlock the full power of Nearpod for schools and districts.

5 Ways to create collaborative learning experiences in the classroom

1. Make collaborative classroom discussions part of every lesson

Classroom discussions in any subject are an essential part of the learning process for students. Discussions are an opportunity to brainstorm creative ideas, put students at the center of their learning, learn from peers, and develop critical thinking skills.

When discussions happen in the classroom, students are at the center of learning. They listen to and learn from their peers while actively absorbing knowledge from each other’s thoughts. Additionally, discussions emphasize the need and importance of multiple and different perspectives.

However, most students don’t naturally engage in discussion around academic content that builds their understanding of something they’re learning. Sometimes students choose not to participate in a traditional classroom discussion. When students aren’t engaged in classroom discussions, they aren’t benefiting from the critical thinking and problem-solving skills of their peers.

With Nearpod’s Collaborate Board, student-centered discussions merge with technology to ensure students have a platform where it’s easier than ever for their ideas to be heard, shared, and developed. Using technology to support discussions helps all students develop the confidence to participate, which broadens the different perspectives and ideas all students are exposed to in the classroom.

Teachers use Collaborate Board to pre-assess students’ knowledge of a new concept they’re about to learn, check in on students’ well-being, and foster a sense of community around academic learning. Collaborate Board provides students with even more opportunities to build confidence around discussions in the classroom. Just add a question for students to respond to and let them take charge of their own learning.

2. Keep feedback at the center of classroom discussions

Discussions are most beneficial when students receive feedback on their contributions. Student-centered feedback is especially effective. Feedback and ongoing conversation during a collaborative learning discussion help students develop skills like learning to agree and disagree respectfully, leadership skills, and social skills and allow them to learn and grow from each other.

In today’s classroom, students are engaging with technology more than ever, and digital citizenship skills are especially important. Learning social and interpersonal skills in the digital world can be especially challenging. Still, with student-centered technology like Collaborate Board, teachers can support students and model how to recognize ideas, cooperate, and share appropriately. Teachers can even model how a student’s idea may change someone’s perspective, helping to create a safe environment and boost confidence in the classroom. To take cooperative learning a step further, split students into groups and assign roles for team building games such as scavenger hunts or role playing to practice social skills.

Students can provide feedback on each other’s posts on a Collaborate Board with hearts. Teachers with a School or District Premium Plus license can allow their students to comment on each other’s posts, bringing even further development to classroom ideas and higher-level thinking skills. This feature ensures that discussions brought into Nearpod don’t end at individual contributions. Instead, those initial posts and thoughts from students can change and grow over the course of a discussion with additional input from their peers.

3. Make collaborative learning visible

Visual learning helps students break down information into manageable pieces that are easier for them to understand. Classroom discussions are often not visual. However, when you can connect technology to a classroom discussion, teachers have the opportunity to give visual purpose to every discussion and reach visual learners.

Collaborate Board helps students collect and share thoughts or information all in one spot, making it easier for every learner to track the discussion and digest the information. When students learn in ways they like and understand, students are more likely to engage, pay attention, and be motivated to participate. Making learning visual in a discussion will also increase students’ interest in that subject matter which leads to long-term retention and makes communication easier and quicker.

4. Collaborate and contribute in multiple formats

In a traditional classroom discussion, students raise their hands and participate by talking. It can be difficult to hear from every student and increase participation in a method that only some students may feel confident using. When integrated with technology, students can participate in multiple ways. Providing multiple media formats values everyone’s contributions to the class. It helps personalize student learning and can even boost comprehension for students. 

Collaborate Board allows all users to share their thoughts with more than just a text or image post. Students can record an audio response, upload a video responding to a discussion, or even post a GIF to support your collaborative teaching initiatives.

In order to get all students actively engaged and collaborating in a classroom, students need their different needs met. Some students may require specific scaffolds or support. Collaborate Boards allow teachers to add new reference media to support student understanding. Teachers can provide a web link, video, PDF, an audio file, or image with their discussion question as a way to ensure all learners can access the information or have the support they need to engage confidently in a discussion. Consider trying problem-based learning by setting up group work opportunities for think-pair-share and encouraging team members to discuss a specific topic.

5. Build community and social emotional skills

Each classroom’s community is representative of the types of communities students will find themselves in as adults. Building a strong sense of community in class will help set up students for success when collaborating and building those life skills they’ll take into the next stages of life.

Collaboration helps build relationships by allowing students to access diverse viewpoints, acknowledge their peers’ differences without critique, and create safe, comfortable learning spaces. When students are in a learning community, they build interpersonal skills that allow them to work with all types of people. Engaging in culture-building and social emotional learning activities further enhances students’ ability to develop empathy, emotional intelligence, and effective communication within their learning communities.

Collaborate Board can be used at any point in the classroom to not only facilitate academic and collaborative learning strategies but to build community at the same time while practicing academic skills. We encourage teachers to use opportunities to collaborate in every lesson and ensure every student’s voice or perspective is heard during discussions. Create active learning experiences for team teaching with these collaborative learning activities.

Start using Collaborate Board

Technology only makes collaboration easier in the classroom by giving students multiple ways to collaborate and the supportive tools to make it happen. It brings so many benefits to 21st-century skills students will take anywhere in life. Using Collaborate Board will help nurture responsible citizens with global perspectives who can collaborate to solve real-world problems. Here at Nearpod, we can’t wait to see how working together in the classroom creates a better learning experience and positively impacts student achievement!

New to Nearpod? Teachers can sign up for free below to access these resources, interactive activities, and engaging lessons. Administrators can schedule a call with an expert to unlock the full power of Nearpod for schools and districts.

Nearpod Team

Nearpod’s award-winning platform is used by thousands of schools around the globe, transforming classroom engagement.

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However, all teachers know that active participation in the classroom is the key to academic success and success in life. Encouraging student voice in the classroom doesn’t have to be an ongoing struggle. Technology tools like Nearpod are designed to help you build student expression strategies to benefit all your students.

New to Nearpod? Sign up to access these resources, interactive activities, and more!

Why is it important to encourage student voice in education?

Students come from a variety of backgrounds and bring with them different personality types. Some arrive fully motivated and confident in their abilities, ready to take risks with a growth mindset. Others, for various reasons, are held back by a lack of self-esteem and self-confidence. Perhaps they’re shy or introverted. Maybe they’re dealing with learning difficulties, established or hidden. Or perhaps they come from a culture outside the mainstream, leaving them marginalized and not included. In many cases, a sense of panic and anxiety can set in, leading to passivity in the classroom.

Teachers can dial down the panic, anxiety, and boredom by creating a supportive, comfortable, challenging learning environment using effective student voice examples and tips. The goal is to create an active environment where all students are engaged, on point, and ready to tackle the learning goals for the day.

Allowing students to express themselves in an orderly manner through interactive activities gives them a growing sense of who they are. It gives them a chance to experiment and modify their values, opinions, and beliefs and grow into the adults they are meant to be.

In turn, this growing voice provides teachers with a rich repository of student preferences, passions, and interests to build lessons. The classroom becomes a wellspring of give and take, heard and be heard, and academic achievement often increases. 

How is student voice in the classroom impactful?

According to the Quaglia Institute for School Voice and Aspirations, students given a voice are seven times more likely to be academically motivated than those who do not view themselves as having a voice.

Heather Wolpert-Gawron, an award-winning middle school teacher and author of Just Ask Us (Corwin, 2018), expresses this idea succinctly. “Give them a voice in their decisions. In a society that barely listens to each other, listen to our students. Let your classroom be one that allows voices to trickle up in a system that can be a flood of top-down. In our classrooms, we have the brains that will solve the problems of tomorrow, but to give them training means we have to give their neurons a chance to solve problems today.”

Encouraging students to progress from a passive presence in the classroom to active learning can be a joy for students and teachers. All students walk away with better retention, improved critical thinking skills, enhanced collaborative skills, and increased motivation.

Teachers rely on specific strategies to foster student participation during lessons. And it’s always good to replenish that library with fresh tips. Here are five tips you can use with Nearpod to break the silence and get those neurons sparking.

5 Student voice examples to encourage passive learners in the classroom

1. Create trust in the classroom

On a scale of one to ten, building trust has a value of ten on the scale. Helping students feel accepted, and part of the community can go a long way in encouraging them to take the risks needed to learn something new or complex. A simple task like striking up a conversation before class and listening and responding without judgment can prompt students to open up. Make sure to let them know their thoughts are valued. As their comfort level increases, they will likely speak up more often. Nearpod supports the whole class with social emotional learning (SEL activities). They’re a great way to start a lesson and promote a conversation.

2. Make learning relevant

Relevance can make or break the amount of student voice in the classroom. How often have you heard students say, “Why are we learning this? I’ll never use it.” Make sure you explain how helpful this knowledge can be in their lives. Watch enthusiasm rise when lessons connect to students’ experiences. A quick and easy way to communicate with students is through Nearpod’s Ice Breaker Mini-Lesson for K-5 or 6-12. It’s a great way to find what students are thinking, which can inform how you create lessons in the future. Students are encouraged to articulate their interests while learning how to use Nearpod’s interactive assessments. These are the tech tools students will use throughout the year to amplify their voices and demonstrate their learning.

3. It’s okay to make mistakes. Put yourself out there.

Making a mistake can sometimes be debilitating. But fearing mistakes can impede the creative process. The key is to normalize the act of making mistakes. Educators can help turn a fearful experience into a joyful and playful session by modeling the creative process. Work along with your students to create something. Have the students join in to write a narrative, for instance. Guide them through the process and show them it’s okay to make mistakes. Let them hear how you work through a problem and solve it. This transparency helps them in future projects, gives them a sense of control, and motivates them to participate.

Collect students’ ideas using a Collaborate Board and encourage them to help you write a narrative using the Whiteboard. It takes the mystery out of writing and helps them step away from themselves and embrace the fear of failure to produce something they never thought they could create. It’s a great way to model the advantages of a growth mindset, and it will probably change a few beliefs and perceptions along the way. Guaranteed, they’ll look for more creative opportunities as the year progresses.

4. Allow Student Choice to Encourage Participation 

Giving students choice helps them put skin into the game. It gives them a sense of control and increases their motivation to learn. It empowers students to decide how they want to present their learning. Do they want to create a video presentation or express their understanding through art or something else?

Nearpod offers a variety of ways for students to demonstrate their learning and empower them with effective student voice examples and activities. Students can record their understanding via a recording if they’re inclined to talk. Draw It showcases students’ thoughts through images, text, annotation, and highlighting. Socially motivated students can share ideas using the Collaborate Board. And some might even want to demonstrate knowledge through rap using Flocabulary’s Lyric Lab.

5. Let Them Self-Report Their Progress

Giving students the responsibility to design their learning options can be one of the most exhilarating exercises your students will experience. Teacher-led assessments are the most dreaded aspect of the learning process. The thought of getting something wrong can be a humiliating experience. But yet, how are we to check for evidence of understanding?

The trick is to hand some control over to the students. Let them, on occasion, create their assessments (formative or summative), so they can see the connection between performance and assessment.

Many kids play sports or some competitive activity. They learn the rules and then perform. Afterward, they self-access and often plan with a coach on how to improve for the next game.  Bring that same dynamic into the classroom, and watch the light bulbs go off.

Fostering student-led assessments requires some planning on your part. It’s essential to set up a framework for them. Here’s an example: 

• 1. Prepare a list of basic requirements they need to know to meet the learning target. 
• 2. Create a list of non-negotiables to ensure there are criteria for success. Provide some structure and scaffolding to help guide them in developing assessment ideas. 
• 3. Let them brainstorm on the Collaborate Board and develop ideas for Nearpod assessment activities that meet the standard. 

This strategy may become the ultimate assignment of the year. Kids will love it, and participation will go through the roof.

Start encouraging student voice with Nearpod

Opening doors and encouraging students to be dynamic participants in the learning process opens a world of opportunities for your students. Encouraging “quiet” students to dial down the panic and anxiety and experience the joy of learning and the opportunity it brings can be the best gift you can give your kids. It paves the way for confident, competent lifelong learners who unlock their inner talents and find purpose in life. 

Implementing these tips takes a little more time and thought. Still, planning activities with all students in mind can result in a rich, dynamic, and inclusive learning environment where all students matter and all have a voice. Who knows. That passive student at the back of the class just might blossom into a class leader. That’s the moment teaching becomes the greatest job on earth! 

New to Nearpod? Sign up to access these resources, interactive activities, and more!

Interested in reading more about this topic? Check out this blog post: 6 ways to create opportunities for student voice in Nearpod

Rose Lattanze

Rose is a freelance content writer and former education technology sales consultant who spent eight years helping teachers and administrators improve their practice. She now hangs out at the corner of pedagogy and edtech, building her writing business in this dynamic and gratifying niche. Her spare time is spent fly fishing the beautiful, crystal clear streams of Pennsylvania with her husband.

The post 5 Student voice examples to teach passive learners appeared first on Nearpod Blog.

As educators and parents grow increasingly concerned about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on students, “learning loss” has become the center of many conversations. Often, the discourse implies that educators should focus on precisely measuring and monitoring the amount of knowledge and skill lost to the pandemic. But this narrow view of the issue may miss the true scope of the problem. This unprecedented period of loss goes far beyond lost learning—milestones missed, loss of normalcy, and lives lost.

This is why, at Nearpod, we’ve reframed the issue around what we should do moving forward: How can educators create an environment where both learning and whole child needs are maximized?

The problem of learning loss is: It’s not the only problem

To address this question, we must confront a reality that the pandemic has only exacerbated; COVID-19 has compounded existing inequalities. As a result, learning loss (as well as other losses) is predicted to affect Black and Latinx students disproportionately. This has the potential to impact educational outcomes for years to come. Therefore, any solutions must be culturally responsive and equity-based. 

There won’t be one simple answer; overcoming the impact of this period of loss will take innovative solutions and a dedication to students’ social and emotional needs, as well as their academic ones.

In these efforts, we know that teachers will be critical, which is why at Nearpod, we build tools and content that equip and empower teachers to address the unique and diverse needs of their students. 

The collective results of over 20 studies clearly support the efficacy of using Nearpod to improve learning outcomes and facilitate a classroom community where students feel a sense of belonging and emotional safety, which is more critical than ever.

Unlock the full instructional power of Nearpod with the unlimited access, collaboration, integrations, and support your teachers need.

4 Strategies to overcome learning loss and build social emotional learning skills

Below, we outline four research-backed, equity-minded strategies teachers can use to maximize whole-child benefits in the wake of unfinished learning.

1. Foster strong relationships in the classroom

Relationships are a core tenet of a culturally responsive classroom, and they are crucial to addressing learning loss. Students need to trust and feel safe in their classroom community in order to be comfortable with the vulnerability that learning entails. Consistent social and emotional learning activities practice results in productive habits that shape student learning and life experiences.

Using Nearpod makes it more likely for students to identify themselves as members of the learning community. This is accomplished through authentic interactions with their teachers, as well as strengthened peer interactions.⁽ⁱ⁾

Here are three Nearpod strategies to help foster a sense of community in your classroom and build social emotional learning skills:

• Post an anonymous Collaborate Board to check in with all your students at the beginning or end of class.
• Whether you’re in-person or remote, try our Ice Breaker Mini-Lesson for K-5 or 6-12 so students can get to know their peers.  
• Use our Gratitude Jar or Helpful Habits SEL activities which are a part of *Nearpod’s 21st Century Readiness Program.

*Nearpod’s 21st Century Readiness Program provides an easy way to integrate SEL practices like positive interactions, gratitude, and reflective moments into daily learning to help create safe, inclusive, and effective classroom environments.

2. Facilitate authentic and relevant experiences for students

For students to learn most effectively, they need to see themselves reflected in their curriculum; this is especially true for BIPOC students, who are often underrepresented in the curriculum. This is a tenet of both culturally responsive pedagogy and trauma-informed teaching. Not only do these methodologies help students feel a sense of belonging, but they also can increase critical thinking skills and contribute to gains in reading comprehension and mathematical thinking. 

Nearpod lessons and videos are designed to be culturally relevant and inclusive of all learners, which is one of the core reasons research shows Nearpod provides more effective learning opportunities for students.⁽ⁱ⁾ Here are three examples: 

• Nearpod Original Interactive Videos feature inclusive casts, work against stereotypes, and reflect the diverse backgrounds of K-12 learners.
• The Racial Justice lessons are a curated collection of our best resources for anti-racist education.   
• The Virtual Reality experience and lessons help bring the world into your classroom and can help make students the experts in their own cultures and backgrounds.

3. Deepen the use of regular formative assessments 

Before you can solve a problem, you need to identify it. That said, experts warn against jumping to standardized tests too quickly. Instead, they encourage teachers to incorporate creative and less formal checks for understanding into instruction. Learning loss is difficult to quantify holistically, but formative assessments provide in-the-moment glimpses of student thinking and pinpoint where understanding breaks down. At the same time, lowering the stakes on assessments allows teachers to build the positive learning environment that is crucial for students to thrive. 

Nearpod offers countless ways to incorporate formative assessments into instruction, supporting more effective and informed instruction.⁽ⁱ⁾ Below are some examples:

• Poll, Draw It, and Collaborate Board were designed to ensure students had low-stakes ways to share their thinking.
• Time to Climb gamifies the quiz experience, engaging students in a fun and quick assessment that provides important insights to teachers.
• On the Lesson Library, you can find thousands of lessons with formative assessment activities and dynamic media already built-in.

• Nearpod activities include 2,000+ quick and easy-to-implement checks for understanding using some of our best-loved engagement tools.
• With Interactive Videos, you can embed multiple-choice or open-ended questions in any video or choose one of the 5,000+ pre-made interactive videos from the Nearpod Video Library.

4. Adapt instruction frequently

In a classroom of diverse students with a range of identities and abilities, flexibility is of the utmost importance. Add to this the inequitable impacts of unfinished learning, and it’s clear teachers will need to be more adaptable than ever before. They may find an unexpected need to re-teach material from the previous year or to re-teach material to only a segment of students without making those students feel alienated or put on the spot. 

Real-time insights into student thinking allow teachers to more frequently and effectively adapt their instruction. Here are three Nearpod ways teachers can adapt instruction to fit student needs:   

• When students are struggling, it can help to see information presented in a different way. With the Whiteboard feature, teachers can model for students at any point in a live lesson, launching a virtual whiteboard for all students to see.

• Teachers can’t always anticipate when they’ll need a quick check for understanding. Using Quick Launch, teachers can bring up an Open-Ended Question, Draw It, or Collaborate on Board at any point, on the fly.

• Sometimes, a quick review of prior knowledge can go a long way. With the Nearpod Activity Library, it’s easier than ever to find and launch a short review before jumping into new content. 

Start using these Nearpod strategies for overcoming learning gaps

Unlock the full instructional power of Nearpod with the unlimited access, collaboration, integrations, and support your teachers need.

References

Below are the efficacy studies about Nearpod that support the conclusions presented in this blog:

1. Audi, D., & Gouia-Zarrad, R. (2013). A New Dimension to Teaching Mathematics Using iPads. Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences, 103, 51–54. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2013.10.306
2. Bessel, A. G., & Kloosterman, V. I. (2017). Nearpod Platform Program Evaluation: Polk County Public Schools, (June).
3. Delacruz, S. (2014). Using Nearpod in elementary guided reading groups. TechTrends, 58(5), 62–69. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-014-0787-9
4. Mattei, M. D. ., & Ennis, E. (2014). Continuous, Real-Time Assessment of Every Student’S Progress in the Flipped Higher Education Classroom Using Nearpod. Journal of Learning in Higher Education, 10(1), 1–7. 
5. Ryan, B. (2017). Near Peers : Harnessing the power of the populous to enhance the learning environment, 2(1), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.22554/ijtel.v2i1.16
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8. https://nearpod.com/l/case-studies/hendry-county-research/ 

Rebekah Bergman

Rebekah Bergman is the Senior Director for Content Development at Nearpod.

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