Template 4: enabling participation in large group lectures on Zoom

Scenario: This document offers options for building interactivity into a large (30-200 students) Zoom session through the use chat, mic sharing, polling and Zoom ‘breakout’ rooms.

Advance preparation:

Lecturer

PowerPoint slides for a presentation which includes opportunities for students to raise questions or respond to prompts
Advance Moodle post which outlines the session and any preparation required of students.
Screenshot of a Zoom screen displaying a chat box and mic for students who are new to Zoom. They can become familiar with the required icons (mic, hand, etc.) and where to find them on their screen.

Set up a poll in Zoom (if applicable)
Series of questions to guide break-out discussions
Send students instructions about how to join Zoom and what to expect in the session
Review the Eden advice on leading an online seminar
Review the Zoom video on using Breakout rooms

Review Eden template: interactive Zoom session featuring small group work – this guidance includes detailed directions for using Breakout rooms.

Students

Do relevant preparatory work
Review any Zoom instructions that have been sent in advance. (For an example, see Appendix B in this document.)

Procedural issues to consider as the session begins:

Mute everyone and only unmute to enable individual students to make spoken contributions.
Show the screenshot (see above) to students so that they know where the key icons necessary for the session are located.

Articulate procedural issues for students at the start: how will students indicate they wish to ask a question (possibly by clicking the ‘raised hand’ icon OR typing in chat); will the chat function be used and monitored? If it is and you don’t have a helper, will you pause periodically to review comments and questions?
Additionally, determine how students will signal to the group if they can no longer hear the presenter or see the slides. (Again, the chat facility can be helpfully used for this.)
Is the session being recorded? This can be useful for students who cannot attend or who wish to use the session for revision. Additionally, if you choose to record, the recording can be paused and re-started if there are topics/discussions/activities that you wish to omit. Remind participants the session will be recorded (if applicable) and that the recording maybe viewed by students/people who have not taken part in the session (if applicable).

Ways to enable participation with a lecture-style online presentation:

Students pose questions and comments in real time in the plenary:
Option 1: With all students ‘muted’, ask anyone with a question/comment to raise their hand using the blue hand icon in Zoom. The questioner could be ‘unmuted’ to ask their question. A second colleague could help the main presenter keep track of the order in which hands are raised. This enables students to speak but makes the interaction with a large group manageable from the presenter’s perspective.

Option 2: Student could be encouraged to write questions in the Zoom chat facility while the teacher is presenting.  (This approach is fairly typical in online conferences/webinars.) A second colleague could monitor the chat contributions and then communicate the key themes/questions arising to the main presenter to address. All student mics stay muted throughout.

In a large Zoom meeting, it can be useful to operate a back channel using phone text or a chat platform (such as MS Teams) through which the main presenter and one or two colleagues communicate behind the scenes to enable the type of co-ordination described here; however, this is not essential.

Use Zoom tools to operate polls/multiple choice questions:

Option 1: You could ask the students to respond to a question by using the icons in the participant box. They can select Yes (green tick) or No (red X) in response to a prompt and you can roughly gauge the overall responses by scanning the list in your participant box.

Option 2: For a more systematic response, use the Zoom polling tool. You can set up questions in advance or during the lecture. These questions can be either single response (‘Is this statement True or False?’) or multiple response (‘select 3 European capital cities from this list’.)

Use the Zoom breakout rooms facility to enable small group discussion

At any point in the plenary session, students can be put into breakout groups. Zoom can automatically assign people to up to 50 groups and this facility can accommodate up to 200 students.

In small groups of 4-6 participants, students can discuss issues with their peers for perhaps 5-10 minutes. Upon returning to the plenary, a representative for each group could pose a question or comment to the lecturer based on that group’s discussion. In a large digital lecture, it’s unlikely that all questions can be addressed in the plenary, but the lecturer might respond to some questions subsequently in a Moodle forum. Another advantage of breakout groups is that it gives students some spoken interaction with peers. Please see our guidance on using Zoom breakout rooms for interactive small groups for more detailed advice.

Combine Zoom with Moodle for pre and post discussion

Option 1: post-lecture questions: You could run the main session on Zoom, have a brief Q and A in real time and then open up a Moodle discussion forum for further questions and comments. This could run for a set time – perhaps 24-48 hours. The resulting questions could either be answered by the course convenor or class teachers within the Moodle forum and/or be discussed in subsequent classes.

Option 2: pre-lecture question: Students could be asked to consider key questions in advance of the lecture and to post their responses on a Moodle forum. The lecturer could then address these in the Zoom session.

Option 3: Pre-recorded lecture You could record the main presentation in advance – perhaps in 10-20 minute segments and upload these to Moodle. Students are then asked to view these and post questions and thoughts on Moodle. The Zoom meeting can be a mixture of Q and A and small group discussion and feedback.

Eden Digital

Template 4: enabling participation in large group lectures on Zoom

Advance preparation:

Procedural issues to consider as the session begins:

Ways to enable participation with a lecture-style online presentation:

Other Eden guidance that can be read in conjunction with this piece includes: