Communication Strategies

It’s imperative for instructors to be equipped with effective communication strategies and tactics that provide students with ample moments to interact without feeling uncomfortable or awkward. Following the principles of equity and inclusion, we owe it to every student to provide a vast array of options.

Here are a few that may work for you and your students:

1. Create a virtual conference center: Create a space for students to meet separately in groups, where they can post comments and their findings after completing their assignments or activities. Just like a conference center has different rooms, replicate the same by creating different areas (in the form of discussion threads/ forums) where students can post messages related to their different topics. This tactic may open another segment-specific communication channel for student-instructor interaction. Moreover, the written record serves as a repository of ideas, examples, and information for future reference.
2. Try a “Getting to Know You” survey. Check out Pacansky-Brock’s Getting to Know You survey
3. Be alert for observing cues from class interactions: Notice what questions you receive through the discussion threads and class interactions. If you observe many students asking the same thing, prepare a standard answer and reply to them individually, or post the answer as an announcement or video.
4. Provide module discussion highlights: Shortly before the next class, send a module/ topic discussion key points and questions as a summary. Students may feel better prepared for the next class(es).
5. Develop your cultural awareness for a culturally inclusive diverse classroom: First generation equity practitioners (Bensimon & Gray, 2020) make intentional efforts to improve your cultural competency to fulfill the communication and learning needs of culturally diverse learners. By increasing awareness of these cultural contexts, we can help students develop a sense of belonging irrespective of the cultural practices they follow. Analyze the ways in which students’ cultural background might manifest itself through the language, policies, behaviour they exhibit in the class (Milheim, 2017).
6. Use office hours effectively: Here are a few simple strategies on an old tactic:
   • Rebrand office hours by using a more appealing name with which students may associate themselves better. How about happy hours, or coffee breaks? This may help in breaking the mental barrier of attending office hours.
   • Strategically schedule these meetings when they will be most useful like just before an exam, after a major assignment etc.
   • Dr. Viji Sathy hopes to make office hours more structured and inclusive by following different formats during different stages of the course. In the beginning, he focuses more on introducing and getting to know the learners better. Throughout the course, he shifts to course-related topics for discussion and at the end stage, he emphasizes more on working together. Dr. Sathy suggests holding these sessions at different locations, however, in online settings, you can change the name of your virtual meeting room or break-out rooms to share the intent.

7. Use course and LMS analytics to improve communication: Students who tend to spend more time on LMS are generally more engaged in class. The LMS data provides various indicators of student engagement (Beer, Clark and Jones, 2010). The click count on LMS is an indicator of student participation, which is a predictor of student engagement. Similarly, the average number of visits per student and average time spent on site is indicative of the ease with which information can be accessed on the site. Analytics can provide valuable insights for instructors to help modify their strategies, but it be used to help students to improve upon their engagement levels.