Inter­ac­tive learn­ing empha­sizes engage­ment through hands-on activ­i­ties, col­lab­o­ra­tion, imme­di­ate feed­back, and tech­nol­o­gy-enabled expe­ri­ences. In the class­room, edu­ca­tors can achieve inter­ac­tive learn­ing through group dis­cus­sions, col­lab­o­ra­tion, review games, and by incor­po­rat­ing tech­nol­o­gy into every­day lessons.

Benefits of Interactive Learning

Get­ting stu­dents to stay engaged in the class­room is get­ting hard­er and hard­er nowa­days. Tra­di­tion­al learn­ing often falls short when it comes to engag­ing stu­dents due to lim­it­ed atten­tion spans and a lack of appli­ca­tion of the learn­ing mate­r­i­al. For some stu­dents, being in a dis­tract­ing envi­ron­ment like a class­room can make focus even hard­er to come by. But when edu­ca­tors cre­ate inten­tion­al, inter­ac­tive learn­ing envi­ron­ments, it makes learn­ing active for stu­dents, mak­ing it impos­si­ble to sleep through a class or get dis­tract­ed else­where. Inter­ac­tive learn­ing encour­ages stu­dents to inter­act with learn­ing mate­ri­als, explore con­cepts in depth, fos­ter deep under­stand­ing, and devel­op crit­i­cal think­ing skills.

 

What are some dif­fer­ent forms of inter­ac­tive learning?

  • Dig­i­tal Sim­u­la­tion: This allows stu­dents to repli­cate real-world sce­nar­ios and exper­i­ment in a con­trolled, explo­rative environment.
  • Group projects: Projects encour­age stu­dents to col­lab­o­rate and work togeth­er to achieve com­mon goals.
  • Peer teach­ing: This method allows stu­dents to take turns teach­ing each oth­er. It rein­forces under­stand­ing and retain­ing infor­ma­tion, but also encour­ages communication.
  • Inter­ac­tive pan­els: This tech­nol­o­gy allows for dynam­ic pre­sen­ta­tions and full-class par­tic­i­pa­tion where stu­dents can engage direct­ly with the mate­r­i­al pre­sent­ed to them, or add dis­cus­sion thoughts.
  • Gam­i­fi­ca­tion: This method encour­ages edu­ca­tors to inte­grate lessons into learn­ing games, mak­ing the mate­r­i­al more engag­ing and fun. 

 

All in all, inter­ac­tive learn­ing can be an educator’s class­room engage­ment gold­mine. It encour­ages stu­dents to inter­act with learn­ing mate­ri­als, explore con­cepts in depth, fos­ter deep under­stand­ing, and devel­op crit­i­cal think­ing skills. So let’s get you started. 

How do you incorporate interactive learning into your classroom?

You don’t need to com­plete­ly rein­vent the wheel to add inter­ac­tive learn­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties to your class­room. You could sim­ply tack it onto a les­son you’re already teach­ing, or incor­po­rate it as part of a review for an upcom­ing assessment. 

 

Gam­i­fy­ing assess­ment reviews is the eas­i­est way to start! Jeop­ardy and Kahoot! are games that have quiz-like attrib­ut­es. For a team-style review, a Jeop­ardy web­site like Jeop­ardy­Labs lets you build your own Jeop­ardy game for free! This can be a fun, com­pet­i­tive review for stu­dents that presents their learn­ing mate­r­i­al in a new way. You’re sure to see the ener­gy in the class­room come to life!

 

If you’re look­ing for a more col­lab­o­ra­tive way to start, try using an inter­ac­tive dis­play in your class­room. Inter­ac­tive dis­plays are a great tool for stu­dents to use to be hands-on with their teach­ing mate­r­i­al. Inter­ac­tive dis­plays that have full Google com­pat­i­bil­i­ty and EDLA cer­ti­fi­ca­tion make it easy to down­load apps or vis­it web­sites as a class­room. Web­sites like PhET Inter­ac­tive Sim­u­la­tions have engag­ing sim­u­la­tions you can present after a les­son, or have stu­dents come up and try as a class. QOMO’s Bundle­Board i is a great option for larg­er class sizes; this inter­ac­tive dis­play fea­tures 50 points of touch, a faster proces­sor, and screens as large as 98” so every­one can par­tic­i­pate at once!

 

QOMO Class­room Tip: Inter­ac­tive learn­ing can also be some­thing your stu­dents do inde­pen­dent­ly. If you teach a lan­guage or math class, use apps like Duolin­go for indi­vid­ual review or extra cred­it incentives!

Use interactive learning tools to see what works well with your students

Every stu­dent is unique, and edu­ca­tors under­stand that they don’t all learn in the same way. By imple­ment­ing inter­ac­tive learn­ing into your class­room, you’re tak­ing the extra step toward a per­son­al­ized learn­ing expe­ri­ence for your stu­dents. 

 

Per­son­al­ized learn­ing is impor­tant because it meets indi­vid­ual stu­dents’ needs in the class­room. Some stu­dents learn by read­ing and tak­ing notes, some by visu­al demon­stra­tions, and oth­ers with hands-on activ­i­ties. While it can be chal­leng­ing to gauge what your stu­dents will suc­ceed with at first, imple­ment­ing a vari­ety of learn­ing strate­gies will help you meet your stu­dents where they are—interactive learn­ing is part of that.

 

How do you know if it’s work­ing for your class­room? While it can be chal­leng­ing to mea­sure how stu­dents are doing in real time after an activ­i­ty, audi­ence response tools make it sim­ple with­out induc­ing the stress or anx­i­ety of a for­mal assess­ment or pop quiz. The QClick is an inter­ac­tive learn­ing tool that keeps things fun for your stu­dent, all while deliv­er­ing instant insights that help you do more of what is impact­ing your students.

 

QOMO Class­room Tip: Cre­ate your own true/false quiz or sur­vey about com­pre­hen­sion. Hand out your QClicks and let stu­dents sub­mit answers as you go. Lat­er, you can check how they did—and have infor­ma­tion on each indi­vid­ual stu­den­t’s thoughts and comprehension.

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