7 Activities to Build Classroom Community with Distance Learning

During distance learning, I grew as a teacher in so many ways. Distance learning was a new way of teaching. I never imagined in my wildest dreams that I would be placed in a situation where I needed to teach Kindergarten online. Throughout the school year, we had built a strong classroom community. My main goal during distance learning was to continue to keep our classroom community strong, because I wanted my students to know that even though we were learning from our homes, the relationships that we had built over the course of the year were still important. Here are seven different ways that I was able to keep us connected during distance learning:

1. Spirit Days

When school shut down and we went into distance learning, there were many unknowns. Would we be returning to school? How do I teach online? How do I support parents at home in helping my students learn?  What is happening in the world? As teachers, these were questions that we didn’t have many answers to, and we were trying to figure them out as we went along. During the first few weeks of distance learning, I created weekly spirit days and challenges. I found that this was a fun way to keep my students engaged and excited about our weekly activities. Spirit days and weekly challenges were optional, but I had close to 100% participation. During a time with so many unknowns, I felt that these spirit days and challenges kept us connected together as a class. It felt like we were all in this together...which we were!

2. Student Share Out

During the school year, we start everyday with a Morning Meeting. During Morning Meetings, students have an opportunity to share about something they’re working on, how they’re feeling, or some knowledge about a certain topic. When we first started our weekly Zooms, it was difficult for students to share out over Zoom and be able to sit and listen to each other for an extended period of time. I still wanted students to have the opportunity to share with each other, because it is such an important part of our daily routine. I realized one way to honor our share, would be by creating a “Share Slideshow”. I emailed families the weekend before what our shares would be for the week. Families would email me pictures or short videos of the shares and I would compile them together into a slideshow. At the beginning of our Zoom, I would present the slideshow and go through the pictures and videos with the class. It was a great way for everyone to see what each other was doing at home and still give everyone an opportunity to share. I received great feedback from students and families about it. The best part was seeing everyone’s faces and expressions on the screen as I would go through the slideshow. What took about 25-30 minutes for the students to share out over Zoom, consolidated the time to about 5-10 minutes with the Share Slideshow.

3. Celebrating Birthdays

Birthday celebrations are a big part of the school year. Students are able to bring in special treats, we sing “Happy Birthday”, and we celebrate together as a class. During distance learning, I still wanted to honor student birthdays, especially since birthday parties with their friends were off the table! During distance learning, I realized I have a passion for making movies. When there was an upcoming birthday, I had my families send in pictures or videos of their child, wishing the birthday student a “Happy Birthday”. Using iMovie, I compiled the pictures and video clips together. On the student’s birthday, he/she received a special birthday video. From the family feedback, the birthday video made their child’s day. It was great to see students and families come together to make a classmate’s birthday special during shelter in place. The power of words and kindness can definitely go a long way!

4. Charades

Charades is a fun game to play with students over Zoom. For this game, one person comes up with a silent movement, and everyone else has to guess what it is.  When playing this game, students really have to practice their listening skills and pay attention to the teacher/student who is doing the movement. I also assigned different categories (sports, actions, animals, insects, places, etc.), because it helped students choose something to act out. You can pick topics based on the curriculum and what your students are currently learning.

5. Freeze Dance

I had so much fun playing freeze dance with my students. It was such a great way to get everyone up and moving. One little twist that I added to freeze dance, was giving every student an opportunity to teach a dance move to the rest of the class. We would practice that dance move together as a class and then put it to music. At the end, we put all the student dance moves together that we learned from one another. It was really fun to see all of the dance moves that everyone came up with!

6. Hangman

For this game, make sure your students bring a whiteboard or a piece of paper to the Zoom meeting. As the teacher, I would start off with choosing the word. Pick vocabulary words or phrases that are related to the curriculum. Draw a space for each letter. Students then take turns guessing letters in the word/phrase. If the letter is not a part of the word/phrase, then you start to draw the person.  Instead of drawing a person, you can mix it up and draw a flower, insect, animal, etc. It may make it a little more kid-friendly, especially if you are working with primary students. The goal is for the group to figure out the word/phrase before you finish drawing the picture. Once you have gone, you can give other students the opportunity to have a turn in the group. Keep playing until everyone has had a chance to have a turn.

7. Pictionary

It took me a few tries to figure out the best way to play pictionary on Zoom. Once I figured out a good system, it was probably one of my favorite games that I played with my students. As with hangman, have your students bring either a whiteboard or piece of paper to your Zoom session. When you normally play pictionary, someone picks a card and then draws a picture based on the card. This isn’t the way that we played online. Instead, I gave students a category (ie., the classroom, holidays, animals, etc.). Each student had one minute to draw something based on that category. When the minute was up, one student at a time would hold up their drawing and we had three guesses as a team to figure out what it was.  If we didn’t figure it out after three guesses, then the student would reveal the answer to us. After playing this game, I realized that the categories could relate to content that you are currently learning about together as a class. It would be a great way to check for understanding while also building community!

*For Charades, Freeze Dance, Hangman, and Pictionary, I recommend dividing the class into smaller groups. I have a teacher aide, so we were able to divide the class into two groups and play with 9-10 students. If I didn’t have a teacher aide, I would probably meet with my class in smaller groups to play these games, instead of playing with the entire class.

I am fortunate to teach in a school district that was able to provide digital devices to families in need. All of my students were able to get connected online, which allowed us to stay connected together as a class. I’m aware that this was not the situation for all students and teachers during distance learning. As we prepare for the fall and next school year, there is still a lot of unknown about what school will look like. Reflecting on this past trimester is a great way to think about what worked well and what didn’t. 

What worked well for you and how were you able to continue to build classroom community with your current circumstances?