As with many of you, in my classroom, I ask students to participate in small group discussions. This works very well in person; I can wander unobtrusively from group to group to monitor, take notes, and answer questions if needed. This looks and feels very different online, and using Zoom means small group discussions take place in breakout rooms. Unfortunately, it’s rather awkward and a bit intrusive for a professor to suddenly pop into a breakout room, and students have told me it feels uncomfortable. This proves to be doubly unfortunate because it’s easy to miss out on key conversations, and the professor becomes heavily reliant on the students to fully share the extent of their discussions when they return to the whole group, which doesn’t always prove as fruitful as one would hope. 

The good news is there is an unobtrusive and sound pedagogical way in which to monitor students’ discussions in breakout rooms. This I discovered while listening to one of my favorite podcasts, Teaching in Higher Ed. The guest that day was Dr. Dan Levy who was sharing some very timely ideas from his latest book, Teaching Effectively with Zoom. I was so inspired that I implemented one of his ideas on our first day of class. I learned that by using two technology tools in tandem, breakout rooms and collaborative documents, I can unnoticeably “walk around” from group to group, similar to being in the classroom, and monitor the “conversations.” I can toggle between the shared documents to compare how, for example, group one is tackling the same question as group three. I can monitor the progress in each breakout room by seeing their progress being written out before me and better facilitate the whole group discussion when everyone returns to the main room. After our first class, the students told me they felt it worked well, and I found it proved to be a clever way to monitor their work and smartly follow up in the whole group session.

I like to listen while walking outside with my earbuds on and enjoying some fresh air. As someone who is constantly striving to engage with new and relevant teaching methods, I find it exciting to ponder the ideas shared, and consider ways to best implement some of these handy nuggets of wisdom in my teaching practice. I hope you, too, will enjoy exploring the wide variety of podcasts available on the Teaching in Higher Ed website, to find value and feel inspired as I have! 

Kristin Halsey works in the Center for Teaching and Learning and strives to learn something new every day.