This section presents a curated list of activity repositories. You may find some new activities for your course!

The Learner Volcano

Students’ learning and life experiences set the foundation for how they engage in your class. Understanding about the varied perspectives and experiences that students come into your class with can help you better support them in their learning. The image of the volcano below represents a learner in your class. The hotspots on the image below (indicated as green dots) include observed learner behaviours, approaches to connect behaviours to drivers and motivations, and suggestions for questions for you to ask your learners about their previous experiences so you can learn about their reasons and motivations for their responses to specific class activities. In this way, you can ensure class activities can be constructed to meet their needs.

How to engage students with the questions identified in the three magma chambers above?

There are many ways that you can engage students in considering and sharing their experiences and perspectives. Here are some activities that you could consider:

• Group contribution to a single resource. This can allow students to see their contributions as part of the class perspective. These are some ways you can solicit group contributions to a single resource:
  • Padlet or Jamboard: Students can anonymously add their responses to a Padlet or Jamboard.
  • Sticky notes: Students respond to prompts using sticky notes and then add them to categories or questions on flip chart paper, a whiteboard, or a wall. Following this, the faculty member can compile information and bring it back to share with learners.
  • LMS discussion forum: Students can respond in small groups or individually to questions as a starting place for a class discussion. One caveat: this is often not anonymous.