Tip Sheets: Learning Activities

Explore a variety of engaging strategies that promote student participation, critical thinking, and deeper learning through active involvement in the classroom.

Active Learning Classrooms (ALCs) and Flexible Classrooms (FCs) promote collaboration, engagement, and technology-enabled learning. These spaces encourage peer and team-based learning, shifting students from passive recipients to active co-creators. Effective use involves fostering group work, accountability, and adaptable instructional strategies that enhance participation and deepen learning outcomes.

Explore adaptable strategies to foster engagement, interaction, and active learning in large classroom settings.

Enhance classroom dialogue and critical thinking by using six distinct types of questions.

Use Bloom’s Taxonomy as a framework to articulate learning outcomes and design assessments and activities based on three domains (cognitive, affective, psychomotor).

Translate Bloom’s Taxonomy into practical classroom strategies with examples of learning activities and assessments aligned to each level of the hierarchy.

Explore how campus partners can collaborate with instructors to create learning experiences that benefit both students and the broader community.

Visualize and organize complex ideas using concept mapping tools that highlight relationships and connections between key course concepts.

Integrate critical reflection into your course by having students examine their experiences, challenge assumptions, and foster continuous growth and improvement.

Communicate complex information clearly and effectively by applying principles and techniques of data visualization.

Design online components for blended courses with strategies that promote active learning, complement in-person instruction, and enhance student engagement across modalities.

Support reflective learning and showcase student growth with ePortfolios.

Help students prepare for exams with a collaborative review activity that reinforces key concepts, encourages peer learning, and builds confidence through active engagement.

Exam wrappers are activities that “wrap around” an exam to enhance students' meta-cognition and their reflection on their assessments.

Lead classroom discussions with strategies to encourage participation, deepen understanding, and create a respectful environment for diverse perspectives.

Games can introduce goals, interaction, feedback, problem solving, competition, narrative, and fun learning environments, elements that can increase learner engagement and sustain motivation.

Enhance group collaboration by using strategies for  decision making that promote participation, manage conflict, and lead to more thoughtful outcomes.

Design effective small-group tasks that promote collaboration and accountability by aligning activities with clear objectives and structured support.

Choose the right type of small group for your learning goals by exploring various formats that support collaboration, engagement, and effective classroom dynamics.

Improve group effectiveness and accountability by assigning roles that clarify responsibilities, support collaboration, and help students develop key teamwork skills.

Implement effective group work by setting clear expectations, designing purposeful tasks, and supporting student collaboration throughout the process.

Design effective flipped classroom experiences by aligning in-class activities and assessments with pre-class preparation to promote active learning.

Enrich student learning and community engagement by integrating service-learning projects that connect course content with real world experiences.

Questions to consider when involving students in the creation of an independent study course. Including students in this process fosters collaboration, reflection, and deeper learning. 

Advance the success of non-native English speakers by applying inclusive instructional strategies that improve comprehension, lower language barriers, and ensure equal opportunities for participation.

Foster research skills and critical thinking by designing library-based assignments that encourage exploration of scholarly resources, scaffold the research process, and align with students’ academic levels and course goals.

Low-stakes writing tasks support student learning by encouraging idea development, reinforcing course concepts, and providing a safe space for practice without the pressure of formal graded assessment. 

Promote accountability and collaboration in group work by guiding students to co-create group contracts that clarify expectations, define roles, and establish processes for communication and conflict resolution.

Assess group work effectively by providing clear grading expectations, using both individual and group evaluations, and building accountability and reflection through self and peer review.

Diversify your teaching approach by incorporating interactive strategies—such as case studies, discussions, and problem-based learning—that foster deeper engagement, critical thinking, and active participation.

These digital tools can support student organization and comprehension. By visualizing relationships and scaffolding complex tasks like writing, studying, and project planning, students can better structure their ideas.

Enhance collaboration and critical engagement by using online tools that support co-creation and annotation, which enables students to interact with content, share insights, and build knowledge collectively in real time.

Encourage interactive learning and idea sharing by using Padlet to create collaborative spaces where students can post, organize, and respond to content in real time, fostering creativity and engagement.

Deepen conceptual understanding and promote active learning by using peer instruction to engage students in discussion, reveal misconceptions, and reinforce key ideas through immediate feedback.

Boost student engagement and real-time understanding by using personal response systems to pose questions, gather instant feedback, and stimulate peer discussion during class sessions.

Facilitate collaborative learning and timely support by using Piazza to create an interactive Q&A platform where students can ask questions, share insights, and engage with peers and instructors in a structured, searchable format.

Design effective lessons by aligning objectives, activities, and assessments; structuring content for clarity and flow; and incorporating strategies that actively engage students and support diverse learning needs.

Boost presentation impact by using Prezi software to create dynamic, non-linear visuals that emphasize relationships between concepts, maintain audience interest, and support deeper learning through spatial organization.

Encourage meaningful classroom participation by creating an inclusive environment, setting clear expectations, and using diverse strategies that invite all students to contribute thoughtfully and confidently.

Strengthen student learning by using purposeful questioning techniques that stimulate curiosity, promote deeper thinking, and create opportunities for dialogue, reflection, and active engagement.

Explore how screencasts can enhance student learning by delivering content in a flexible, engaging format that supports varied learning paces, reinforces key concepts, and fosters accessibility beyond the classroom.

Empower students to become self-aware learners by teaching metacognitive strategies that help them plan, monitor, and evaluate their learning.

Develop students’ problem-solving abilities by modeling effective strategies, encouraging persistence, and designing tasks that require analysis, creativity, and reflection to build confidence and transferable skills.

Strengthen group work by helping students develop teamwork skills such as communication, accountability, and collaboration, fostering positive dynamics and shared responsibility for collective success.

Diversify student learning and evaluation by incorporating a range of assignment types that align with learning outcomes, support skill development, and offer multiple ways to demonstrate understanding.

Peer review, also called peer editing, peer feedback, and formative peer assessment, allows students to provide and receive feedback on an assignment before submitting it to the instructor

As learning tools, writing exercises are valuable because they help students think critically about course material while encouraging them to grasp, organize, and integrate prior knowledge with new concepts.

Virtual reality (VR) involves the use of technology to enter an alternate, three-dimensional view of the real world, a fantasy world,