Classroom Management

4 Tested Techniques to Engage Students

Best Practices from the Christensen Center for Teaching and
Learning

Jing Jing Tsong/The iSpot

Many factors can influence how engaged students are in the classroom—how in-class discussions
flow and are managed, an instructor’s teaching style, or the content of the day’s chosen course
materials.

But importantly, and perhaps counterintuitively, instructors do not need to generate high levels of
energy throughout the entire class discussion to maintain student engagement. Engagement can also
be achieved during periods of thoughtful intensity and even silence, when moments of reflection may
lead to deeper learning than that achieved in the context of heated debates.

Other ideas to heighten student engagement include the use of role play, votes and polls, buzz groups,
and class guests. Let’s explore these four activities in more detail.

Technique #1: Experience Through Role Play

Role play places students in character to approximate a first-hand experience, though the instructor
may decide to play one of the roles during the exchange. Role play can be built into a teaching plan
or pursued spontaneously in the class discussion.

Examples of role play include the following:

• Major productions. Roles are preassigned, and the entire class participates—as with
negotiations or simulations. Objectives may include providing a capstone to a course module
and generating experiential learning.
• Brief planned events. Students play case protagonists. The setup is given at the beginning of
class or on your LMS, and the role play is staged either with the entire class listening or in
breakout groups. Objectives may include raising student engagement, more deeply grounding
the case discussion, and creating experiential learning.
• Spontaneous role play. A student comment acts as the trigger—for example, “I would have
approached it differently,” or “I don’t see how to convince her to do that.” Objectives may
include raising student engagement, personalizing the discussion, and allowing students to
explore alternatives more organically.
Three Stages of Role Play

An effective role play typically requires a three-step process: setup, action, and debrief.

• Setup. Consider which student(s) to pick for the role play. Provide clear instructions for scope
and timing of the role play.
• Action. Listen for content and tone.
• Debrief. Ask role play participants questions about the experience, such as, “How did that
feel?” “Why did you say/do XYZ?” Students observing the role play can be asked: “How
realistic was the interaction?” “What was surprising?” “What would you have done
differently?” “Why are these conversations so hard?

“Taking a few minutes for students to talk among themselves or practice a managerial scenario allows
all students to participate and engage with class content.”

Technique #2: Take a Vote

In-class votes (by hand or with a voting tool) and pre-class electronic surveys can be used to poll the
entire section on a particular question.

Votes are typically used in conjunction with another question type, whether cold call, warm call, or
volunteer.

The results of a vote—for example, deciding to keep or sell, giving a company or individual a letter
grade, or selecting among strategic options—can help identify the distribution of opinions within the
class and determine which students to call on.

Vote taking accomplishes three things in the classroom:

1. It forces students to speak up about where they stand. A vote is a public commitment.
2. It gives the instructor license to then call on students to explain why they voted the way they
voted.
3. It gives the instructor a sense of how the class is weighted among two or three different points
of view—and whether an underrepresented viewpoint may need some support.

Technique #3: Engage in Buzz Groups

Taking a few minutes for students to talk among themselves or practice a managerial scenario in
small groups allows all students to participate and engage with class content.

Buzz Group Best Practices

• Tell students how many students should be in a group, how long they will have in their group,
and how you will signal the end of group discussion.
• Give students space to talk freely; don’t linger by any one group.
• Consider allowing brief report-outs from one or more groups afterward.

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Buzz groups can be particularly effective in the executive education classroom as participants can
sometimes be reluctant to speak out in class discussions. Buzz groups enable students to engage with
content and with each other to help foster relationships and energize subsequent class discussions.

“Engagement can be achieved during periods of thoughtful intensity and even silence, when moments
of reflection may lead to deeper learning than that achieved in the context of heated debates.”

Technique #4: Bring in Class Guests

Carefully selected, well-prepared guests provide depth and authenticity to student learning and allow
students to contextualize leadership behaviors. Class guests also can benefit from insights that emerge
from the class discussion.

There are three ways to involve class guests:

• Case update and guest reflections on class discussion

• Q&A with case protagonist
• Guest as a “live case”

Preparation Is Key

1. Be clear on the pedagogical purpose of the visit—for example, invite guests and students to
wrestle with a set of questions together for shared learning.
2. Set guests’ expectations of how much time they will have for their presentation and Q&A
with students.
3. Coach guests on likely questions and previous relevant discussions to provide context on
student learning and engagement.
4. If possible, maximize the scope of guests’ visits to campus (for example, include lunches and
student club meetings, and video record class discussions or comments for future class use).

Student engagement is one of the pillars of effective business learning. Yet ensuring a successful
classroom experience, with students tuned in and actively thinking and participating, can be a delicate
dance for many professors, old and new, to master.

These tried-and-true approaches—role plays, votes and polls, buzz groups, and class guests—can
help bring even the most apprehensive students into the conversation to further student learning,
increase retention, and improve critical thinking skills.

This article is adapted, with permission, from the Engagement section of the Christensen Center for
Teaching and Learning’s website.

Posted July 10, 2019