As we covered in last week’s blog, starting the semester off right includes building community in the classroom, promoting student engagement, co-creating classroom expectations, designing an inviting and inclusive syllabus, and growing considerations of student well-being. This week, we will dive more deeply into the steps you can take to build community in your classroom.

It may seem intuitive that creating community in your classroom is useful. Research bears this out and details the specific benefits of doing so: students who feel that your classroom is a welcoming place where they belong and have the support of peers and the teacher are more likely to learn more, persist in their studies, and report higher levels of satisfaction with their education overall.

Creating community is thus not just a ‘feel good’ goal: when you are successful in creating your classroom community, your students are fixed on common academic goals. Their peers are seen as ‘academic friends’ whom they can trust to ask for help and offer support to as needed. They will perceive the classroom as a place that allows them to take risks and explore new ideas.  And their confidence will grow because they are not alone against all odds, but rather accepted for who they are and what they bring to the table.

This sense of belonging and confidence leads to a new ownership of their own learning:  rather than learning to ‘please the teacher’ or ‘defer to the smart student’ or ‘to get an A’, they focus more squarely on what they are learning for themselves. Adopting such an attitude leads to a mindset that allows for life-long learning. In other words, the successful classroom community you create can affect the lives of your students beyond their academic studies.

Get to know each other

Building community in the classroom involves remembering that you bring your whole self to the classroom as an instructor, and that your students are also bringing their whole selves to your classroom. This includes their minds, bodies, hearts and spirits. The events of their day, their stresses and successes, their fears and insecurities, all of these are present within your students when they arrive to your class. Teaching the whole student means acknowledging this truth and inviting students to be themselves in your class- learning about them, including their families, their friends, and their lives. Providing students with opportunities to check-in and learn about each other at the beginning and throughout your course can deepen their engagement and motivation.

Let students get to know you

As the instructor, you have the opportunity to model vulnerability and authenticity to your students. Allowing your students to get to know who you are as a person is a foundational aspect of building community in the classroom. You can decide how personal to get- you can share where you are from, where you were raised, how you came to teach in your discipline, whether you have a family or pets. You can draw from local Indigenous protocols or the protocols of your ancestors when introducing yourself. Sharing what brings you joy, your excitement about what you teach, your hopes for your students is a great way to begin relationship-building with your students. This can be done online or in person with a self-introduction that begins to answer those questions, and can be practiced throughout the semester as well. As we mentioned in the previous blog, you can include an introductory video to let students know who you are before they even get to your first class. Your self-introduction might also include messages of your openness to student questions about the class, how you hope they will communicate with you about their learning, the kinds of support you provide and a list of University-offered supports they can use to succeed.  

Invite your students to share who they are

In the early days of your course, you can ask students to answer some questions as a way to get to know them and welcome them to the course.  The questions might include things like:

• What is your name and pronouns? When asking students for their pronouns, make sure you do not make this a requirement, as some students may not wish to disclose this information. You can simply model by offering your pronouns, or you can invite students to share their pronouns if they wish.
• What brought you to this course: what do you hope to get out of it?
• What are your previous experiences with the content—either academic or out in the world?
• What are the academic things you’re good at?
• What academic or other skills do you want to strengthen?
• What is something not related to your studies that is interesting about you?

Such questions welcome the students into the course as themselves. They can help you to see where they already are in relation to the course learning outcomes, to make groups or teams based on diverse skills and assets, and give relevant and personalized feedback throughout the course.

Ongoing connection

The first few classes are important, but what unfolds throughout the semester is also key to creating community in the classroom. Inviting students to continue to share their thoughts and feelings with you and the class through multiple modes of engagement is very beneficial.  

Gathering together in a circle, beginning class with a check-in or a practice of mindfulness, exploring reflective journals as assignments, providing students with opportunities to create something together, welcoming laughter and tears, if done in the spirit of community-building, can all enhance the learning and growth in your class. Sometimes, this can look like changing your teaching plan for the day to respond to what is unfolding in the classroom, or sharing food together while working on a group activity. As the 2021 Horizon report highlighted, a sense of belonging is central to successful learning outcomes.

Build relationships and community through place

Build Community between Peers

Use Multiple Avenues for Communication

• Use VIULearn’s announcements feature which makes it easy to post a message for the whole class. It can be used for announcements, but also for general feedback on an assignment or activity for all students.  
• Use VIULearn’s class email list, to send a message to each student individually or all of them in one message.
• Clarify assignment due dates and readings or homework by using checklists in VIULearn at the beginning of each module of your course. 
• Schedule regular and flexible office hours.  Office hours are excellent for fostering interaction and personalization of learning. Once you’ve set a schedule of office hours, express your enthusiasm for seeing students there regularly. Encourage them to visit you in small groups or teams for discussion. Include the option of making extra appointments for those students who cannot attend regularly scheduled office hours. 
• Consider using Zoom in new ways: the waiting room feature allows you to offer online office hours in addition to (or alongside) traditional face to face office hours; the breakout rooms feature allows you to facilitate small group discussion during online class meetings.
• Create spaces for asynchronous communication using VIULearn discussions. Online discussions can be used to facilitate different communication needs, such as small group discussion spaces, a watercooler chat where students can ask and answer general questions, or a semi-private journaling space visible only to the instructor and individual students.
• Use your synchronous (face to face or Zoom) sessions to give feedback and respond to student thinking rather than as an opportunity for information transfer.  Your expertise shines most brightly when you are responding to students’ specific questions and struggles. Most information transfer can be taken care of outside the time you have to spend directly with students.
• Check in with students who seem to be struggling. Sometimes, the best support is simply feeling that someone has noticed you and cares about you. Referring students to the available supports is encouraged as well.

Want to Learn More?

The CIEL has created a curated resource on VIULearn about well-Being and inclusivity in the classroom, which offers perspectives on building community as well as tips on how to take your class outside, how to write an inclusive syllabus, and many other practices which centre student belonging. If you would like to be added to the course to access all the resources, please email learnsupport@viu.ca.

Check Out these Additional Resources:

• Using Introductory Videos in Your Courses – The CIEL Blog (viu.ca) [Blogpost]
• Land Acknowledgements: From Recitation to Real [5 Page PDF]
• Why is community important? Research on sense of belonging in the classroom [Short Article]
• Outdoor classes in higher education: A pedagogical guide to support teachers [21 Page PDF]