Step 5: Moving Around the Room to Encourage Participation

Instructors can encourage different students to participate not only by calling on them directly but also through physical proximity. Dan Levy intentionally moves around the classroom as a way of encouraging more students to share their thoughts during discussions. Standing in different places in the room allows him to express support for students sharing controversial or nondominant views and to create room for students to engage with one another. This technique can be especially helpful for large classes, where some students might be quite far from the front of the room. As Levy’s teaching assistant explains, this practice “helps even out participation as well as engagement across all sides of the classroom, as opposed to just focusing on the most active corner or the loudest corner, as is often the case in other classes.”

Profiled: Dan Levy, Senior Lecturer in Public Policy, teaches "Advanced Quantitative Methods" to 74 students at the Harvard Kennedy School.

Takeaway Tips

Plan your routes ahead of time. Pick a couple of paths you might take in your classroom and consider how standing in those places might change the gaze and attention of your students.

Be prepared to move improvisationally as well. Notice moments when particular students might benefit from having your physical presence nearby. 

Engage with students throughout the room both verbally and nonverbally. Making eye contact with students who are not front and center welcomes all students into the fold rather than a select few.

Related Resources

This resource from Yale on “Classroom Seating Arrangements” can help instructors choose classroom layouts that allow them to circulate among students. 

Teachly is a technology tool that can help you map classroom interactions, which can in turn help you determine how movement can help create more equitable participation.

In a related Instructional Move on "Using the physical space to support a democratic philosophy", Christina Villarreal discussed how she arranges her classroom and uses visual cues to "agentize" her students

Reflection Questions

Where do you typically position yourself in your classroom during large-group discussions? Are there parts of the room you could spend more time in?

Are there particular students in your classroom who might benefit from greater proximity to you? How can you move around to be near these students when they need it?

Changing your position in the room can help create an environment where all students feel supported and comfortable sharing their thoughts, particularly those students who might need some additional encouragement. In the next video, we’ll move away from whole group discussions to look at using small groups to bring students into the conversation.

Back to Step 4

Continue to Step 6