Who’s responsible for session engagement?

We had a very good group discussion around this question.

I loved the point that ‘Engagement should start before the session’ to build curiosity and set expectations rather than the students showing up not knowing what to expect. This could be done with an e-mail in advance, a homework task / some reading or a teaser at the end of the previous session.

Generally we agreed that engagement usually has to start with the teacher but as we are trying to encourage critical thinking and peer discussions, to move away from sessions that are too teacher-centred, at some point we have to rely on the students to reciprocate. This feeds into Vilhauers definition of play. The teacher needs to be flexible to sometimes let the students steer the direction of the session.

I find this particularly difficult in online sessions. It is impossible to know how engaged or disengaged the cohort is. Often there is very little feedback from the ‘invisible audience’ which brings up the question of how we actually measure engagement. Online the main thing to go by is willingness to switch on their microphones to talk, commenting via the chat and activity on other platforms used during teaching. At the start of every session I use a blank whiteboard with a question or prompt to get students drawing and engaging with each other, often leading to small conversations in the chat. Below are examples from two of my sessions.

Edit 09/05/21: Since the feedback on my teaching observation – that it could feel awkward for students joining a session if there is silence (see OB2 from 04/03/21: Observation by a Tutor) – I’ve been encouraging students to doodle while we wait for more to join and using the doodles to establish light chat at the beginning of the sessions.

Performing in front of an invisible audience

A lot of the points raised made me think of the Vilhauer article about play again. It’s all about how to create a connection with your audience on the other side of the screen and encourage them to be actively engaged in the lesson or performance. 

Here are a few points that stood out for me. Firstly the much-iterated point to look directly at the camera.  

I don’t do that much while teaching as i find it more connecting to look at my ‘audience’, even though they don’t usually have their cameras on and it’s just names and grey boxes on a screen. So why do i find it comforting? Probably because it feels awkward looking at the little black dot. 

I’ll try to do this more during my next session. I might have to change my working setup slightly as the camera is fairly high up and I don’t want to do my neck in.

Another point that resonated with me was ‘Embrace the awkwardness – let your personality in’. 

It is interesting how something that I embrace in others seems to bother me in myself – guess we are always our own hardest critics. This applies both online and face-to-face but I think in online spaces we are much more prone to paying attention to ourselves by being able to look at our own video / reflection. I tend to keep a small piece of my brain engaged with the awkwardness of my gesturing, looks and the angle of the camera on my face. 

It also seems like a great idea to pay more attention to breathing and allow for pauses to take a breath. This comes back to our discussion around pauses or silences. I started letting silences sit a bit longer during my sessions and I think it has allowed my students more space to actually come up with questions or things they might want to share. 

Another aspect that wasn’t really touched upon but that I have noticed before my sessions is that I want to take a bit more time to settle in before starting a session or meeting. I tend to sit down, then get up to ‘quickly’ put a mug into the dishwasher, water a plant, tidy up the coffee table and similar small tasks that aren’t pressing in the moment, then sit down in front of the computer with 30s to spare before the meeting or session starts. I end up feeling rushed and not terribly prepared, trying to find all the files I need during the first 5 minutes of the meeting.

Edit 09/05/21: The switch to looking into the camera was actually easier than I thought and now it doesn’t feel awkward anymore. It does feel more connected (for me) because I’m not scanning the screen for something all the time, it’s a good focus.
I’m still all over the place 5mins before the session though. Might be down to my ADD more than anything else so what helped was get all the documents up half an hour before the session starts so even if I’m fiddling about just before starting – everything I need is already in place.