I believe the secret to getting virtual learning to work for students is to put our attention to how our students are feeling during our time in virtual classes.
Think back to all the things you did in the physical classroom to make students feel good. You greeted them at the door with a smile, eye contact, probably a “hello” and even a handshake (will handshakes happen again so freely as they had before…). Once inside the classroom, our expressions, proximity, our posters on the walls, and sometimes the little touches like class pets in aquariums, a bean bag chair, decorations on the walls, or flowers and pictures on our desk all had the potential power to make our students feel good.
Now, we turn on our computers, open our Team or Zoom or Google Hangout, and meet our students digitally, where they are, in the place their parents or guardians have control. We teachers no longer control what our students see around them while learning our content. We have lost the control to help our students feel the way we want them to feel in our class—welcome, supported, and part of the community.
Before we move into these 31 ways to encourage students to turn on their cameras, here are some points to remember as we go through the techniques to exercise patience and understanding while implementing them:
1. Inside our physical classroom, we had control over the time, place, and task, our students were inside of in our classrooms. This gave us teachers a huge edge over instruction and student learning that we can probably all agree on now, we took for granted when we had it.
2. Anyone can show up differently given where they are at the moment. For example, you probably heard from parents, or you know as a parent, children do not always show up their best at home as they do for people outside the household. When I was in the classroom, parents would email me or text me asking if I was having trouble with their children in the classroom since the parents were having a lot of problems at home. 99.9% of the time I was not seeing the same disrespect or lack of cooperation these parents were seeing in their teenage child. Now, with students at home doing school, some of what parents see on a daily basis we may see in our virtual classrooms. We are all different people at home than we are out in public. Be cognizant of this dynamic when students are learning from home.
3. Our physical classrooms gave our students a break from home. In some situations, that was a good thing. Children who were living in homes with families that had a lot of problems could escape all that anxiety and negative energy when they were in our halls and walls for six hours a day. Now, they are learning in those same places that sometimes is difficult to live inside as a young human being. To have the mindset to shift and code-switch from living at home to learning at home is a trait that most adolescents would be good at as they are going through a lot of hormonal shifts.
4. The times we are in are not normal. With the pandemic and the social unrest in our society, it’s not only tough to be an adult, but also really hard to be a child. What are students are hearing, reading, and seeing in the news, on their phone, or in their community makes them uncertain, uneasy, and possibly unsafe? Remember young people do not have the wherewithal to take control of their feelings and emotions and compartmentalize them to get into school mode in a hot second. Many of us as adults have trouble doing that well. For these reasons, students’ social-emotional wellness needs to be our priority as their teacher in our class, so the instruction and learning have room to happen for the student.
5. Remember when we were in the classroom with our students? Do remember knowing the power of your influence and how you could bring out the best in your students? Well, that advantage is harder to grasp since students are learning at home; we’ve lost at least half of our power of influence, if not more. You know what I mean…being in the presence of someone, you can feel their energy, their support, and their genuine attention to you and what you are doing? Our students are missing our influence and now, they need to be their own influence, their own cheerleader, time manager, and initiator. And as a young person, that’s hard to do.
6. The Last point to think about is probably the simplest to keep in mind. When we were in the physical classroom, we had the role of the teacher and our students had the role of the student. Now in our homes, we teachers may be teachers at the same time we are mothers, and caregivers, and the cook, and the spouse, and the teacher of our own children. Our students are in the same shoes. They have more roles learning at home while they are learning at home than just the role of a student. They are the child, could be the caregiver of younger siblings while a parent is working, and sometimes they could be the male in the household, keeping everything in running order. See the multi-role person who is showing up as a student on your screen.
I point out these six particulars because meeting students where they are at is the first step in getting them to do what you want them to do in our live virtual classes while they are in their homes and we are in ours.
Below are some techniques that work in LIVE virtual classes to encourage students to turn on their cameras. by making them feel comfortable. Some of the techniques are easy and some will take some time talking students into them. But know, one technique, a variety of techniques, or a combination of techniques are all your options to find out what works best with your students in inspiring them to turn on their cameras in LIVE classes.
1. Take one class period to teach the students to create backgrounds on either a PowerPoint slide or a Canva graphic with a horizontal orientation to use as a background when in virtual classes. This move will give students the privacy they may need to feel comfortable in live classes. Ask the student to create a background that they will use as their background when their cameras are on in class. Give students ideas of what they could place in their background. They could place an image about a hobby, or their favorite musician, or the video game that takes up a lot of the free time. You could even hold a contest and give a prize each week for the best backgrounds if it becomes a weekly ritual to change their backgrounds, given you ask students to feel free to change up their backgrounds. You could also ask students to create a background around your social studies lesson, or ELA, science, or math lesson for the week. Look for the directions you can give your students to create their virtual backgrounds in my 31 Ways to get your Students to Turn on their Cameras FREE Guide.
2. Give participation points for turning on their camera. Offering an incentive to bring up their grade by simply turning on their cameras gives students a positive push in their grades and their feelings about your class when sometimes our students need all the points they can get in virtual learning. As you know, be appropriate with the number of points so these participation points do not skew a student’s average grade.
3. Have a lesson about respect. Ask students what respect is and how you show respect to others. Ask students how they feel when they feel respected by others. Then, go into explaining how you may not feel respected when students do not have their cameras on in live virtual classes. One of the male teachers I spoke with told me he tells his middle school students to make sure their cameras are on during virtual classes. He shares with his students that not having their cameras on in his LIVE class is like putting your head down when we are in the physical classroom. That analogy I believe makes perfect sense to students and they understand where the teacher is coming from since they remember how putting your head down in class was unacceptable when we were in our physical classrooms.
4. Give badges to students who have their cameras on all five days of the week, or for all LIVE classes in the week in case you are meeting with them four days a week. Even if you do not use an LMS (Learning Management System) like Canvas which automatically awards badges, you can create a simple camera on a checkoff spreadsheet with checks in the date columns when specific students have their cameras on. For example, if they have their camera on all five days or all the LIVE classes for the week, you award them a badge. Create your own badges using a free tool like Open Badge Designer - https://badge.design/. I suggest embedding the spreadsheet into a page in your online space so students can see who has the most checks for the week. They will want to see a checkmark in all their week’s cells, and it should work as an incentive. Look for the tip on how to do this in my 31 Ways to get your Students to Turn on their Cameras FREE Guide.
5. Designate class leaders whose one responsibility is to remind students to turn on their cameras at the beginning of class. You could say something like this at the start of class, “Jerry, will you please do a camera check before class while I take attendance?” That way, students can either remind another student politely (may have to create some guidelines for your class leaders) with verbal prompts or messages in the LIVE class chat. I would also take turns with who your class leaders are and would start with the student who does not like to put on his camera to be one of the first leaders. Again, you will give these class leaders more than just this responsibility, so they do not feel you chose them because they do not turn on their cameras in class.
6. Give students times in each class when cameras are optional. Choice always empowers our students and if you give them some downtime around this expectation, they tend to turn on their camera when you ask.
7. Teach a lesson about community and how we are social beings. Belonging to groups, and the importance of seeing people’s faces and hearing their voices appeals to our senses as humans. Seeing each other not only builds community but also feels better especially since we are not seeing each other in person. When students know you want them to turn on their cameras because of community reasons, and not because you want to ask them to do one more thing, they understand the motive behind the ask. You also want to talk with students about the benefits of relationship-building and how having relationships can make us feel better, support us, and give us a sense of community when isolation may be a bigger feel at the moment.
8. Open with a show-and-tell bellringer. Ask students to find something in the room they are in that makes them laugh, and then show it to the class by holding it up to the camera for everyone to see. Or, for example, to connect it to the day’s lesson, if the lesson is about photosynthesis, ask students to show you something that is needed for photosynthesis to happen. For example, they could show in the camera a sunny window, or a glass of water, something that is green to represent chlorophyll or even a plant. Tie your show-and-tell into your lesson and make it your lesson’s hook.
9. Start the class with a scavenger hunt, but students can’t get up out of their seats to find the items. Ask students to find a list of items such as a phone, pen, adapter, charger, book, a piece of paper, glasses, tissue, etc. You want to list items they probably have close by, on their desk, in drawers, or in their bookbags. Set a time limit by getting your phone and setting the timer. Hold up your phone to the microphone so students hear the buzzer or use a fun online timer. Give points for the person or people who has the most items and you can ask students who think they may have the least number of items, and then that student wins the golf score (lowest score in a game of golf wins!).
10. Teach students how to talk using American sign language in your class. There are so many reasons why using sign language can help students communicate to the teacher, and to their peers, without disrupting anyone who is speaking, which is another common situation in the LIVE virtual classroom. Check out my video here about what sign language gestures you may share with your students that work in the classroom to keep things running smoothly and helps you gauge their learning. Again, I like to take part in a class to explain ASL (American Sign Language), the benefits of using ASL in LIVE classes, and then teach them a different sign each day. Also, create a graphic that shows the ASL signs you want students to use in the classroom. Students need to have their cameras on for us to see their sign language gestures. Look for the tip on how to do this in my 31 Ways to get your Students to Turn on their Cameras FREE Guide.
11. Include a criterion in assignment rubrics, such as when students are giving and listening to presentations, they have their cameras turned on when they are the presenter or in the audience. Teaching good audience skills in virtual settings is definitely a skill our students will need for the workplace and for virtual college classes since there are more meetings and classes leaning over to more virtual gatherings. Remember to introduce the rubric to the students when you give the assignment and go over each criterion, so students know the expectations. Before students give presentations, for example, I always remind the speakers and the audience of the expectations given the rubric.
12. Use EdTech tools like Flipgrid where students record their own videos to answer questions, do demos, offer a book report, or explain the steps of solving a math problem. Then play the videos for all the students in your LIVE classes. Students get used to seeing each other’s faces on the screen and then turning on their cameras is no longer a big deal. Here is a link to my 50 Ways to use Flipgrid in the Classroom FREE Guide.
13. Having a meeting with parents about norms around cameras during LIVE classes makes our job easier as teachers. Explaining to parents the advantages of students turning on their cameras (builds relationships and community, prepares them for college classes and the virtual workplace, helps with social-emotional wellness in times of isolation, etc.) hopefully turns parents into a supporter at home to encourage their children to turn on their cameras. This parent-teacher alliance makes our jobs so much easier. I am a big believer in the power of the Student-Teacher-Parent Triangle. When we are all connected for the best interest and success of the student, the student will naturally do better. This conversation can also include creating a space in the home where it is quiet and calm for students to learn online.
14. Always show appreciation and acknowledgment to the students who have their cameras on during your LIVE classes. Let them know how it makes you feel to see their faces as you teach to and communicate with them. Use phrases like, “Great, I just saw all the nods that you understand what I just said”, or “It looks like I just surprised everyone by seeing the expressions on your faces.” Make having their cameras on a norm in your classroom by making what you see a part of the conversation.
15. On Fridays, hold a Theme day for class, such as a Sports day when students can wear their favorite sports apparel, or a school celebration or spirit day where they were school colors or a HAT day where students wear their favorite hats. We would never probably do that in school so having school at home where they can wear hats is kind of special for our students!
16. Do role-playing in your LIVE classes at least once a week. Again, not only do the role-players have their cameras on but so do the audience. Remember what I wrote earlier about teaching students solid audience skills in our classroom.
17. Treat students to Game Days when they turn on their cameras while you are all playing a Kahoot game for review in the classroom. When students play games, they laugh, smile, get excited, and light up. Seeing each other happy in the classroom makes all your students feel good.
18. Have student teachers each week, a 15–20-minute period where a student or pair of students teach their peers in the LIVE virtual class. Again, asking students to turn on their cameras for their student teachers is another way to make cameras turned on a habit and shows support for their peers who are teaching. The student teachers want to see their peers and their peers want to see their friends teach. This is one strategy that almost always works.
19. Start class out with their favorite (school-appropriate) music and ask students to turn on their cameras and talk while you take attendance, get your presentation file ready, whatever you want to tell them you are doing so they have some time to ease into class with their friends. Making your virtual room feel comfortable to students gets them to feel more comfortable to turn on their camera.
20. One of the best ways to get students to turn on their cameras is to ask students to show off their pets, like having a Pet Show. Maybe you have a different student show off their pet each day and talk about the pet with their peers for 3 minutes at the beginning of class or as a transition. Animals do something to us humans. It’s probably due to the unconditional love we feel around pets. Undeniably, pets give students a sense of ease and calm. This is one reason why teachers have aquarium pets in their classrooms.
21. You want students to have the intrinsic motivation to turn on their cameras. This may need to start with extrinsic motivators like homework passes, free time, extra credit points, a prize, or something mailed home like an Uber Eats or Amazon gift card. Yes, these types of rewards can add up money-wise, but many times, they work for the students who have the hardest time in virtual learning.
22. Hold a Comedy Central five-minute opener. Have students take turns telling jokes or funny stories, again, all school-appropriate, of course. Creating a comfortable, fun, community environment makes cameras turned on something that not only makes sense but is what they want to do and feel relaxed and safe doing.
23. So, this strategy is one that is super unique and of course, can’t be done all the time or at all levels. Many of our students were in a position that they need to make their own lunches in the school day because a parent is not home during the day. And many times, they were cooking and preparing food for themselves and their younger siblings. Create a caring community by taking a 15-minute time period at the beginning of class and demo making an easy nutritious lunch in your kitchen. A cooking or food prep demo may sound a bit odd, and again, may have nothing to do with your lesson, or it may have something to do with your lesson. If you are mixing and baking, there is a chemistry lesson. If you are doing the measuring, there is a math lesson. If you are talking about the presentation on a plate, there is an art lesson. If you are showing students how to prepare one of your family’s traditional ethnic meals, there is a social studies lesson, and if you are talking about nutritious choices, there is a health lesson. Get creative and unique. Students will show up to your classes with their cameras on because they want to be a part of what you are giving. If you are fully giving visually, they will naturally mimic you. It’s a human thing to mirror back what you see in another person when you are in their presence, physically or virtually.
24. Start your class with a physical warmup. Maybe everyone does jumping jacks, or runs in place, or runs around the room they are in during your class. Once more, make it fun and physically and verbally exciting so students want to be a part of the fun, but ultimately they feel they are a part of your community. The alternative is their quiet and probably boring room, which gets old weeks on end.
25. Personalize the content. Place your content in a context where students can relate to it, which brings comfort as well may ignite prior knowledge. Share with your students why they are learning the content and why it is relevant to them, their interests, and their lives. Ask students questions. Have students talk more than the teacher. And create interactive lessons using Nearpod and Peardeck.
26. Take camera breaks and encourage students to look away from the screen to a farther distance for eye health, and yes, I would teach them why this practice is especially important now, with all the time our eyes are focused on the screen. Make lesson transitions about getting out of their seat, doing jumping jacks, or running in place. If your transitions now between learning segments in your lessons get students active and looking away from the screen, when you need them to come back, they come back keeping their cameras on.
27. Some teachers do this next tip really well in the physical classroom. It is the use of clap rhythms. You know, when a teacher, for example, claps two short claps and when the students hear these claps, they get quiet and clap three times, if that is the rhythm that the teacher taught the students to do as a reaction to her two claps. This strategy not only gets students quiet and focused, but it works really well in the virtual classroom when we want to bring them into the instruction if we see they are phasing out. We want the virtual classroom to feel as much like the physical classroom felt. If we did physical clapping in the physical classroom, this familiarity helps students relax, get settled, and be more ready to participate in the next part of the lesson.
28. At the beginning of class, ask students to turn on their cameras and greet one another. Ask one student to start it off, so a student looks at the screen, for example, sees “Sally” to the left of him, he actually turns and looks left (not looking into the camera), waves, and says, “Hi, Sally.” Then Sally does the same as the first student, finding a student on the screen to say hello to, turning in that direction of where the student is on the screen from her place on the gallery view, and waves hi and says, “Hi”, and the name she is waving to. She has full freedom to wave hi to someone who is all the way on the other side of the screen. Students need to watch who was waved hi to until every student was welcomed and waved to as well as hearing their name. This greeting gets everyone paying attention to detail at the beginning of class, gets everyone’s cameras on, and makes all feel good when they hear their name at the beginning of class.
29. This beginning of class strategy is like the one above, but instead of waving, you are passing an imaginary ball. So, the first student holds a fictitious ball in her hand, looks over to John who is to the right of her face on the screen, and then says, Hey, John, catch the ball. John looks to see where this student is on the screen, he physically turns in that direction (not looking into the camera), catches the imaginary ball, and continues the game. Again, while the students are warming up, having fun with the cameras on, it creates the type of community that gets students ready to learn since they had some fun at the beginning of class. Again, each student hearing the student’s name at the beginning of class is auditory 🍭 candy 🍭 to students.
30. Hold a freeze dance exercise as a transition inside your lesson to get students up and moving. Ask your students to stand up, you start playing music, and ask students to dance, move, jump up and down, run in place, whatever they want to physically do. Play music as the students are moving and then when you stop the music, everyone freezes. You could also connect it to content, when students are frozen in place, read out a definition of a vocabulary word they just learned prior in class before this physical transition, and the first person who shouts out the vocabulary word gets a point. Again, find ways to get students up and moving, with their cameras on, and insert learning when you can. Mixing it up like this inside the lesson is a welcomed transition for students. Think about how much students moved around in your physical classroom inside one class period to sharpen their pencils, walk up to your desk, participate in a gallery walk, pair up with a friend, the list goes on and on. It is critical we get our students moving inside our LIVE virtual classes whenever we can.
31. Here is a way to end the class with everyone’s cameras still on. Hold an Exit Ticket Round. Ask the student whose face is in the upper left corner of the screen to share with everyone what is one point he learned today OR one point he wants to learn more about tomorrow. Students will go in succession, left to right, top to bottom, stating one thing the student learned today or what the student wants to learn tomorrow. This gives them a reason to look at the screen. Students have to watch the screen to know when their time is up. Also, it gives everyone in the class a chance to speak before the class is over and at the same time, it is a great review and an awesome segue into tomorrow’s lesson.
Overall, encouraging students to turn on and keep their cameras on help make online learning more personable, more appealing, more stimulating, more social. We, teachers, need to use ways to make our students feel comfortable and safe in our LIVE virtual classes. Creating the right energy at the beginning of class is so important in virtual learning as well as throughout class to the end of our LIVE virtual classes. Planning a strategy at the beginning, middle, and end of class is best for the best results.
Would we have done half of these strategies in the physical classroom? Probably not. But we teachers need to get creative to put the people's energy back into our online classes. Seeing a name in the participants’ pane with no camera on is not conducive to engagement, community, or connectedness in the classroom. We want to provide opportunities to our students to develop physically, socially, and emotionally, all development they are missing out on not going to physical school and being with their friends five days a week.
Inspiring students to turn on their cameras is extremely important. What we want to do as teachers find ways to have students who may feel disconnected from their friends and the whole school vibe feel once again connected and that they belong. Turning on their cameras and celebrating communities helps the learning, sharing, feelings, and overall social-emotional wellness of our students. And when all of this is better, they do better in school. Guaranteed.
