Fostering Fun: Engaging Students with Asynchronous Online Learning
June 17, 2020 Lisa K. Forbes, PhD
Today, faculty are being asked to abruptly expand their teaching practices in ways many of us would never have imagined. For many, teaching online is something they’ve never done and for some, it’s something they never desired to do. I have some experience with digital pedagogy but for me personally, asynchronous online teaching holds the highest level of difficulty because my style of teaching induces and relies on a sense of community, connection, and interaction within the classroom.
I’ve been playing around with making my own online teaching more fun and playful to create an engaging student experience, because I believe engaged students are more eager and active in their learning and assume more responsibility for their learning. I have experimented with incorporating fun, play, and games in both synchronous and asynchronous formats and have found it really matters to students. The narrative that follows demonstrates some ways I have attempted to make the asynchronous portion of my online class more fun.
