Safe welcoming space, encourages new approaches without fear of judgement. Make connections with your students and get to know each other. Remember that it is important to share why we are using active learning and its effective role in learner centred education. This is in line with KI's pedagogical policy on providing a pschologically safe environment for students: "In a psychologically safe environment, participants can present ideas, ask questions, share concerns, or admit mistakes without running the risk for being punished, ridiculed, or embarrassed."

Relevant activity:

Explicit learning design and well developed session learning outcomes: clear, measurable, achievable outcomes will allow you to link your active learning activities to session learning outcomes. This will mean that your activity has a real purpose and is not just seen as busy work by the students. Inform you and your students of their current level and act as formative assessment activity. You may want to refer back to our pages on backward design and constructive alignment in module 1 on learning design.

Select the right exercise:

Identify what you want your learners to do and at what level.

Consider learner population - their age? will they work well in groups?
Consider learner persona of the group, are they chatty? Or are they quieter and may need more time to compose answers. Review options, so many options to choose from and adjust the activity to suit the context.
Challenge your learners. Active learning activities should address higher order thinking and should not be passive or too easy. You can provide support if needed.

Identify any preparation for the activity.

Do the learners need to prepare for the activity? Do you need to prepare digital content to support them or do you need to provide clear instructions and guidance well in advance to allow your learners to prepare. How will learners know how well they have done in the activity? Do you need to set up some mechanism for feedback?

Consider linkage (i.e.: the link to other session elements).

How does the activity fit into the session flow? How will you transition before and after the activity. How will the activity fit with the assessment in the course? This is a screenshot from Chris' video which illustrates how you can link activities. Learners tend to value learning activities that prepare them to do well in the course but may resist activities that feel like busy work.

tip 5 Consider linkage to other session elements

Plan how you will introduce the activity.

This is especially important when first introducing active learning activities:

What are we doing?
Why are we doing it?
How will we do it?

Plan the logistics

Time the activity, monitor progress, ask questions. Feedback on key takeaways. Provide brief reflection period for students to process their learning.

How will you judge the success?

Enjoyment? Retention? Post activity follow-up? For example, minute paper, discussion post, Quiz, etc.

Just do it!

Start small and experiment!

Iterate and Expand.

Start small, iterate and build and then expand.
Not too much of drastic redesign - make manageable.

On this page:

Visualisation plan for your active learning activities