Articles
Bringing More Spontaneous Interaction to the Virtual Classroom with Proximity Chat
Published January 28, 2021 | Multidisciplinary
As distance and hybrid teaching and learning scenarios have become the norm since spring 2020, teachers and students alike have come to grips with the videoconferencing platforms that enable synchronous class sessions, such as Teams and Zoom. While strategies like using breakout rooms and varying group size or composition increase engagement by changing how and with whom students interact, they cannot equal the level of agency and spontaneity that in-person interaction offers. A new breed of web-based virtual environments offering proximity chat (also called spatial chat) mimic the possibility of speaking or collaborating with one or more peers while remaining in the same virtual space as the entire class group.