A. Implement course design and construction strategies to improve equity

A2. Provide opportunities and guidelines for student peer-to-peer support and connection.

Creating opportunities for students to interact and support each other can allow them to practice sharing their ideas, build community, and examine and learn from different perspectives. As with all teams, generating guidelines for peer support and interaction helps to ensure these teams can work effectively and serve as a supportive space for student learning.

 

Examples

  • Offer time in class or asynchronously to form study groups or use tools like Catme to form teams.  
  • Create online forums. Students can build connections through asynchronous forums/discussion boards in the LMS where students can ask questions and reply to other questions. Additionally, encourage students to use the forums to introduce themselves and provide another opportunity for connection outside of the classroom.
  • In large classes, use informal opportunities to get students talking to each other. For example, before having students answer an iClicker question, give students 1 minute to discuss their answers with their neighbors.
  • Collaboratively develop classroom participation agreements. Developing group norms for student engagement helps ensure peer learning can be safe and supportive. Begin by outlining your perspective on participation in your classroom. Then, encourage students to share what helps their learning. Together, you can craft a norm around what supportive peer groups look like.

 

Considerations

When encouraging students to work together in a study group or otherwise, be sure to clarify when collaborative work is allowed or not for different assignments to support academic integrity. Keeping students on task during small group discussions can be challenging in larger classes, discuss with students how you will call them back from small group discussions, so that they know when to wrap up their conversations.

 

Resources

A better way to do peer review of writing in large classes. Faculty Success Lauren McCarthy, Legal Studies and Political Sciences. Center for Teaching and Learning.

How do I facilitate effective group work? Center for Teaching and Learning.

How Do I Increase Engagement with Classroom Participation Agreements? Center for Teaching and Learning.