13 Tips From Creators to Make Online Live Classes Interactive

Planning to make some money as a creator? Then stop for a second… I might just have what you need. 

Engaging students in live online classes can be challenging, but it is an excellent opportunity to create dynamic and interactive experiences. With the right strategies, you will be able to boost student engagement, satisfaction, and retention levels. 

So, let’s jump into the 13 proven tips on making your live classes more engaging than ever. It’s worth mentioning that tips and strategies packed in this guide are based on interviews we have conducted with industry-leading creators :) 

Importance of engaging live classes

Before diving into the practical section of this guide, let’s briefly overview the importance of engaging in live classes. Engagement and interaction are crucial for your course’s success, after all. 

As Jan Keck (famous course facilitator and experience designer), whom our team interviewed, said: 

"If I do a live cohort and all I do is have some PowerPoint slides behind me, and I just talk nonstop for an hour, and then I say goodbye, everyone, then, of course, they’re not going to really learn because it feels like a waste of their time. They could have watched that in a recording."​ 

Jan Keck

Learning Experience Designer

Engaging in live classes will help you to: 

• Enhance student retention levels. When you encourage participation and discussions, classes become interesting. Thus, students are more motivated to finish the course and return as returning customers. 
• Facilitates deeper learning. Students engaging in live discussions with instructors and their peers will learn the topic in more depth. 
• Promotes Accountability. A live setting motivates students to stay on track and attend sessions regularly.
• Fosters a sense of community. Engagement fosters a sense of belonging and connection among learners, enhancing the overall learning experience. 

At the end of the day, engaging live courses will enhance student satisfaction levels. Satisfied students equal good reputation, returning customers, and word-of-mouth marketing. 

#1 Make the content relevant to learners' goals 

The number one tip is to make content relevant. As a frequent course taker (who almost always finishes a course), I can confidently state that I will not be going through all the classes if the content is irrelevant to my goals. I just do not have the time, you know? Nobody does. 

"I was talking to people and getting feedback in regards to the book, saying that they love the book, but they're like, well, it’s a long book. And can you condense things down for us? And, you know, simplify a little bit more? So I was like, okay, I can definitely do that. And that kind of led me to create my parenting course.” 

- Helen Hicks, a parenting coach and health professional

Relevance of your content is key to learner engagement. If your students cannot see how the material aligns with their goals, then they will not finish the course or be enthusiastic about participating. 

The question is, how do you make course content more relevant? Here are a few tips: 

• Know your audience. 
• Tie content to use cases. 
• Define clear learning objectives. 

To further ensure relevancy and satisfaction, you can regularly ask for feedback. This will allow you to meet students' expectations and understand where you fell short. 

Angel Rodriguez, creator at Uteach, tailors his teaching methodologies to align with learners' objectives. By incorporating real-world applications, he ensures that students find the content directly applicable to their professional goals. 

This is one of the main reasons why his business is thriving. 

#2 Implement warm-up activities

Do not underestimate the importance of warm-up activities. These help break the ice and energize students. Moreover, these are perfect to set a positive tone for the class. 

Here is a short breakdown of how to do so:

• Create quick polls using tools such as Mentimeter. Ask fun or thought-provoking questions. 
• Incorporate games into the online live classes. Thrivia or word association games will help you create fun and engaging games to prepare students for further class. 
• Encourage personal sharing. Ask students to share a fun fact, a challenge they faced, or their expectations for the session. 

Make sure the activities are short and aligned with the lesson. Also, do not use the same warm-up techniques each lesson; rotate and try out something new every time. 

For instance, in the course "How to Add Originality to Your Presentations," instructors Kimberly MacLean and Sammy Wegent begin sessions with engaging warm-up exercises. 

One such activity, "Three Things," encourages quick thinking and creativity, setting an energetic tone for the class.

#3 Use name-calling 

Students are people with identities, names, personalities, and different traits. 

Of course, a live class is not a personal meeting to get to know everything about them. However, it should not stop you from learning their names and frequently using them during the sessions. 

"I don’t want anybody who joins a cohort to be just a number. I want to know their names. Luckily, if we're on Zoom, I can always read people's names. I'm going to welcome them by their name." 

Jan Keck, facilitator, trainer, and learning experience designer. 

By frequent name-calling, you can foster a sense of belonging and accountability. Moreover, you can show students that their contributions to class matter. 

A few ways you can incorporate name-calling include the following: 

• Start the course with an introductory session. 
• Acknowledge student's contributions by calling their name and giving feedback. 
• Call on students to answer questions and share their thoughts, concerns, or insights during the class. 
• Individually thank learners for their input and participation, 

In larger classes, create a system (like a participant list) to ensure you address all students periodically. 

For instance, facilitators at Genesis incorporate activities such as “Two Truths and a Lie.” 

This is a great way to personalize interaction. Besides, they address each participant by name and encourage personal sharing simultaneously. Thus, they manage to create more engaging and connected live classes, 

#4 Avoid monotony 

Think about this. If you were a student about to listen to a 45-minute lecture, knowing the professor and lectures are monotonous, what would you do? Most likely, they skip the class or get easily distracted. Either way, the chances of you actually being engaged in the process are quite low. 

That is precisely why keeping your live classes active with proper voice intonation and pacing is essential. The way you deliver content will help to create more engagement. 

"When I design something, it's usually very interactive. There are going to be small group discussions, breakout rooms, and exercises. Switching it up helps make it more memorable."-

Jan Keck, facilitator, trainer, and learning experience designer

So, here are a few tips on how to keep your classes more engaging: 

• Mix visuals, videos, storytelling, and presentations. By offering content that constantly differs from the previous one, you have a higher chance of keeping students engaged. 
• Switch the activities during classes. For instance, after introducing a concept, initiate a discussion, take a quiz, or ask questions. 
• Include breaks if your sessions are long, and then make sure to include mini-breaks or polls to re-energize the participants. 
• Use humor. Stay lighthearted and make learning more enjoyable for everyone by making jokes. 

Overall, keep an eye on student behavior, e.g., participation and frequency at which they get distracted. This will allow you to easily identify signs and causes of disengagement, making sure to eliminate the causes next time. 

Pat Flynn, a course creator at Smart Passive Income, uses a mix of storytelling and interactive slides in his webinars. Also, his energetic delivery style helps a lot when it comes to keeping learners engaged.    
 

#5 Use micro-engagement tactics 

Live, laugh, micro engagements. That’s all I have to say. Well, not really. Give me a chance to expand. As one of the experts we interviewed said:   

"I made it a habit to constantly keep checking in with my group in those really small asks for engagement. That could be giving a thumbs up, using reaction buttons, or writing something in the chat. I switch it up to avoid it getting boring." 

- Jan Keck, facilitator, trainer, and learning experience designer. 

Avoid boring at all costs to keep your learners. Micro engagements involve interactive but short activities to spike learners' interest and involvement. Here are a few ways you can add micro-engagements into your live class: 

• Rapid-fire questions. Ask a question, then encourage students to type their responses quickly. 
• Use gamification to create challenges or competitions. 
• Use quick polls to engage learners. 
• Make jokes. Yes, as simple as that. To establish a strong connection with the audience, you need to be yourself, make jokes, and be fun (also relatable). 

Overall, make sure your micro-engagement activities are aligned with your lesson’s objectives. 

#6 Create breakout rooms 

Use breakout rooms with large groups of students. Breakout rooms will allow students to collaborate and engage more deeply with the material. 

"I send them to breakout rooms and tell them, 'Find ten things you have in common with the other person.' This helps them connect and build a sense of belonging."

- Jan Keck, facilitator, trainer, and learning experience designer 

To make sure the breakout rooms deliver anticipated engagement results, set clear objectives. 

Provide students with a clear task or discussion topic. Then, assign roles such as recorder, leader, and spokesperson for each group. Assigning roles will help to keep the discussion focused. 

Do not leave students, and occasionally drop them into breakout rooms to ensure participants are on track. After the breakout room discussion is over, bring everyone together. Then, encourage students to share their insights and conclusions from the discussion. 

Breakout rooms work best for small group projects.

For instance, let’s say you are offering a course on entrepreneurship and investments. Assign students in each group to prepare a quick pitch of a business idea with the aim of convincing “investors” to fund their project. 

This is a great way to engage students. Also, it helps students apply their creativity and skills in a potential scenario. 

#7 Run live quizzes 

Quizzes are excellent engagement tools. Live quizzes will help you make sessions interactive and simultaneously reinforce key concepts. 

"Yes, they’re short quizzes. They’re really not designed to challenge people but really just to reiterate the information that was presented. So I believe I limited the quizzes to about five different questions and really focused on the key points that I want people to be able to take away." 

- Helen Hicks, a parenting coach and health professional. 

You can take the quizzes one step further by offering gamified ones. 

These allow students to compete with one another and offer a fun visual experience. One of the best platforms to use for creating gamified quizzes is Kahoot. Create a fun quiz on Kahoot, share the QR, and let your students join, play, and engage. 

Sample quiz questions, e.g., for a marketing basics course,se can look like this: 

• True/False

For example:

The main purpose of marketing is to generate leads and drive sales. 

Market segmentation divides the market based on random selection.

• Open-ended Questions 

For example

What is the difference between B2B and B2C marketing? 

• Blank questions (allowing students to fill in the blanks) 

The primary goal of content marketing is to create and distribute ________ content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience. (Answer: valuable)

Personally, I love these types of quizzes, and we frequently took them during university classes. After group presentations, some students would suggest playing a Kahoot quiz, which encouraged everyone to listen to their presentation more carefully to be able to win the quiz later on. 

#8 Share real-life examples and stories 

One of the proven ways to establish a connection with an audience is by sharing personal stories. Whether you are a public speaker, YouTube creator, or a course creator, it works. Real-world concepts are better illustrated and memorized when given an example. 

"You can’t just say, 'I empathize, I get it, I understand.' You have to be able to really relate to it and use examples of how you can relate to it. So I think that’s a huge piece of it, making sure people have examples to relay back to them."​

- Helen Hicks, a parenting coach and health professional. 

For instance, let’s say you are a digital marketing coach. 

The current topic that should be discussed in the live class is “How to go viral?” Instead of just talking about how in theory, share your story of “how” in practice. Then, based on that story you can analyze elements of marketing that contributed to that video going viral and how these can be applied further. 

In the end, by giving a personal example, you make the concept clear, more engaging, and practical.

Nancy Duarte successfully practices this in her online workshops. In fact, she is a professional communication and presentation coach. This explains her ability to draw in and maintain the attention of learners through expert storytelling.    
 

#9 Use enough visual materials 

Did you know that over 65% of people are visual learners? And those who are not still enjoy good visuals accompanying learning materials. 

To level up your visual game, make sure to: 

Design slides that are slick, stylish, and clean. Use the minimal text on the slides and lean more toward visuals and consistent formatting. 

• Incorporate visual elements such as charts and graphs to simplify data-heavy concepts for the learners. 
• Embed short videos (relevant to your topic) to demonstrate or explain certain concepts. 
• Avoid overcrowding slides with too many visuals or information. 
• Use high-quality graphics to make slides visually appealing. 

You can use Canva and the pre-made templates it offers to create visually appealing presentations. 

#10 Give students time for reflection

If students do not have to reflect on what they have learned, they will most likely forget about it. 

That is why you need to offer them time for reflection, during which they can identify key takeaways and consider the practical application of their knowledge. 

"I always include time for people to think about their answer when I ask a question before I invite people to unmute. I want to make sure that there's time for people to think about the answer." 

 Jan Keck, facilitator, trainer, and learning experience designer. 

How can you give them time for reflection? 

There are a few ways to do so. For instance, sometimes, you can use reflection breaks. For example, you pause after a major topic and let students sit down with it and jot down questions or thoughts.  

You also can ask students questions yourself. Try to stick to reflective and thought-provoking questions. E.g., how the material learned applied to their goals. Or how they can solve an X challenge with the Y concept. 

One more method coaches use is to ask students to keep a learning journal for notes. While taking notes, students memorize the material better and summarize key takeaways of the major concept. 

#11 Facilitate discussion 

Would you participate in a class in which nobody looks forward to your input? I do not think so. If someone keeps lecturing and explaining, it would be rude to interrupt, yet also boring not to get distracted. 

Every time you catch yourself on a long lecture run, remember that today’s learners' attention spans are short. This does not mean your lectures are not of quality. This simply means you need a better approach to engage. One of the best ways to do so is to facilitate discussions. 

"I love those discussions with groups in a live cohort-based course. The conversations that they have with each other sometimes deepen the learning in a way or talk about examples I could not have come up with." 

Jan Keck, facilitator, trainer, and learning experience designer. 

Encourage active participation by asking questions that raise discussions and debates. You can do so by: 

• Create a list of open-ended questions for each session to spark discussion.
• Use breakout rooms and divide students into smaller groups for focused discussions. 
• Participate and guide the conversations by giving your input as well. 

You need to create a safe environment where students feel comfortable sharing their thoughts. So, keep encouraging participation via discussions and validate students' opinions. 

To learn how to facilitate discussions expertly, you can take a sneak peek at Marie Forleo’s example. She teaches business, and she knows how to grow hers. Marie facilitates rich discussions during her live coaching sessions, using questions that inspire deep reflection and interaction. 

#12 Keep it planned yet flexible 

The structured course is great. But, when it is a live course, the initial plan is not always followed. So, make sure to remain flexible and adapt to students’ needs if necessary. This will help to create a dynamic and responsive learning environment. 

To avoid completely falling off the track and sticking to the plan, make sure to: 

• Set a clear agenda and outline the key topic of the session. 
• Highlight key activities and assignments that students need to complete. 
• Monitor student engagement levels and shift focus to something else if learners are disengaged. 
• Incorporate short Q& sessions. By doing so, students can get answers to desirable questions and stay engaged. 

Overall, always use feedback from students to fine-tune your approach in real-time. An expert top here would be to have backup activities and examples ready to fill in gaps. 

If there is one person from whom you can learn blending impromptu activities, it is Tony Robbins. In his course “Unlead the Power Within,” Tony not only offers structured content and delivery but also impromptu interactions, which make the course even more engaging. 

For instance, in a 2019 UPW event, a participant shared a personal fear. Robbins used impromptu humor and engaging storytelling to help them reframe their mindset

#13 Implement the experimental learning cycle 

The experimental learning cycle includes: 

• Hands-on activities 
• Deep reflection & feedback 
• Conceptualization 
• Experimentation. 

Implementing this approach will help learners to apply concepts in real-world scenarios. It will ultimately lead to high levels of knowledge retention. 

To efficiently incorporate the experimental learning cycle, make sure to: 

• Design and plan interactive activities. E.g., role-playing exercises, simulations, and others that allow students to apply their knowledge in practice. 
• Incorporate reflection time after activities. Then, guide students in analyzing their experience and discussing the outcomes with the whole class. 
• Build theories. Help students connect their reflections to broader concepts and frameworks to understand how these are correlated with specific theories. 

A pro tip for this step is to analyze lots of case studies and real-life examples. Then, based on these, activities will be created for the students. 

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