The build-up of a close-knit community in an online classroom

Abstract

This action research was conducted in an online English class during the first term of the school year 2021-2022. It aims to build up and enhance personal connections among the members of the class in order to create and nurture a collaborative close-knit learning community in the context of the covid-19 pandemic when the students who never met before the start of the course had to work online together during the term. The findings reveal that when students’ interactions with learning materials through team work are promoted, free chat applications such as Zalo are efficiently used, and personal interests are paid good attention to, the ice is broken and student-student and student-teacher tight bonds are established for a strong classroom community.