Add Your Personality to Your Virtual Classroom with Virtual Classroom Backgrounds

We’re not robots. Right? Well, we’re probably not robots. Anyway! We have personalities and we express ourselves in many ways from the clothes we wear to the way we decorate our rooms. When I think of it, teachers were some of the first people I saw as a kid that expressed themselves so wonderfully. Every classroom was different and unique befitting that teacher’s personality. When holidays rolled by, teachers went all out from student-made decorations to those crazy knitted sweater vests that every teacher seemed to wear.

One of the things we tend to lose when we start teaching in online schools or hybrid learning is opportunities to express ourselves. And that’s a shame. Expressive teachers are incredibly impactful on a student’s cognitive load and learning. They also tacitly give students the freedom to express themselves. So, it’s important to find ways to express ourselves in our virtual world be that through engaging video or even in the design of our virtual classrooms with virtual classroom backgrounds. Every little bit goes a long way.

Let’s talk about virtual classroom backgrounds.

Jump to:

• What is a virtual classroom background?
• How to choose a virtual classroom background?
• List of top 5 Free downloadable Virtual Classroom Background Templates
• How to create your own virtual classroom background?
• Meet Kaltura Virtual Classroom Platform 
• Summary

What is a Virtual Classroom Background

A virtual classroom background is the wallpaper – colors, images, and digital signage – that decorates the background of your virtual classroom. Virtual classroom backgrounds are like the desktop on a new computer or the home screen on your phone. What’s the first thing you do? You choose a nice picture that reflects something meaningful to you. In that same way, virtual classroom backgrounds are images used to decorate the background of your virtual classroom. They help you inject a bit of your personality into your classroom.

How to Choose a Virtual Classroom Background?

When you’re in your virtual classroom, there are a lot of blank white walls. Virtual classroom backgrounds help you decorate those walls with things meaningful to you or even things that delight your students.

• Share your Interests – Use this space to let students know more about you. By opening up to your students, you are setting the stage for more personal and meaningful connections with your students

• Match your subjects – Stay on topic with virtual classroom backgrounds that are suitable to the topics of the class. You can have equations on a chalkboard or key historical figures populating the walls of your virtual classroom.

• Enjoy the holidays – Change it up when the season calls for it. It’s fun to mark the passing of time with touches of the season or holiday mirth. If it’s Halloween then you can make your virtual classroom background a bit spooky or if it’s springtime, then you can celebrate with flowers and green. You can even have happy birthday messages!

• Celebrate your students’ interests – You know what your students love. A great way to show you are listening and that you care is to decorate your virtual classroom background with things they are interested in. Maybe you can make your background one giant Popit 🙂

• Have school pride – Maybe we just want to help our students have a deeper connection with the school. Try setting virtual classroom backgrounds that reflect school colors and mascots.

Just as we decorate our physical rooms, the options for virtual classroom backgrounds are endless. There are many options to get virtual classroom backgrounds from creating your own to downloading them. Feel free to download the virtual classroom backgrounds below to add a little color to your virtual classrooms.

Top 5 Free downloadable Virtual Classroom Background Templates

Download the following virtual classroom backgrounds. You can use these as templates and add your personalization to them or feel free to use them as is.

How to Create your Own Virtual Classroom Background?

If you’re interested in creating your own virtual classroom backgrounds, then you have a lot of options from the professional to the consumer level. Let’s take a look at the options below.

• Adobe Photoshop – Photoshop is the go-to for professional image editing. If you have the skill or interest in sharpening your skills, then Adobe Photoshop is the program to master. It may have steeper learning curves, but you’ll have the greatest flexibility down the line.

• Take a picture – Most of us have amazing cameras in our pockets. Use a photo you snapped while traveling or from one of your school events. These work great. Just remember that the photo is for the background and let that inform your composition.

• Canva – Canva is another great option for creating fun backgrounds. It’s more approachable than Photoshop and has a lot of fun options to help you unleash your creativity.

• Google Slides or Microsoft PowerPoint – Slide creation tools are super flexible, and you can use them to create your virtual classroom backgrounds as well.

Meet Kaltura Virtual Classroom Platform

The Kaltura Virtual Classroom platform lets you engage your students in meaningful ways through tools like quick polls, quizzes, breakout rooms, and more. You can also customize the look and feel of your virtual classroom by adding school logos, and colors, and even add your own virtual classroom backgrounds with Kaltura’s virtual classroom branding and customization tools. Virtual classroom backgrounds can be set at the account level to deliver a consistent virtual classroom experience for students and teachers or customized per room to add additional personality.

Summary

It’s the little things that count. We often think about the tools we use to deliver effective learning online like the number of webcams, quick polls, quizzing, digital whiteboards, and breakouts. However, it’s also important to think of the overall experience our learners have. Virtual classroom backgrounds are a nice touch to make your remote and hybrid classrooms more personal and intimate. Highlighting your creativity and personality can do wonders for your students, too.