Artefact : Google JamBoard

Online teaching has brought forth new challenges to the teaching profession. One of the main issues is student participation. It is hard to keep a class engaged for the entire two and a half hours, even with asking questions and making polls. One successful way that I was able to keep my students engaged was through the use of a Google JamBoard. The students had just come out of break-out rooms where they talked about mental health. As a way to destress from a highly emotional topic, I created a Google JamBoard where they could anonymously share with their classmates what they do to destress.

The Google JamBoard's anonymous nature encourages more participation, especially within a FLS environment, as students with linguistic insecurities are more compelled to participate as any errors made will not be linked to them. Additionally, as the Google JamBoard has everyone's opinion, it creates many talking points for the teacher to use. For example, since many students mentioned they like to watch movies to destress, the teacher can ask for movie recommendations as a low-risk question.

Anonymous collaboration, either with Google JamBoard or Padlet, are great tools to encourage student participation in an online environment.