Using the Zoom Chat Feature

The Zoom chat feature is a powerful tool for online classroom engagement, especially in larger classes where not everyone can speak up on camera or by microphone. This page covers the basics of Zoom chat, along with strategies for using it purposefully in your course.

On This Page

Chat Basics

Use the chat feature to communicate with participants during a meeting. Depending on the settings, you can send a message to everyone in the meeting or privately to an individual. Private messages between students are not visible to the instructor. You can also share documents directly in the chat by clicking the File button.

Learn more about chatting in a Zoom Meeting.

Why Use Chat Intentionally?

The Zoom chat feature can be helpful in allowing students to ask and answer questions as well as share their ideas and links during class.  However, it can become overwhelming to follow and respond to all students in a large class. Below are strategies for making Zoom chat manageable.

Setting Expectations and Managing the Chat

  • Assign a chat monitor: Designate a TA or student volunteer to monitor the chat and verbally flag questions for the lecture.
  • Review chat after class: If you miss activity during the session, use Zoom's Save Chat feature to download the full transcript and review it afterward.

Accessibility Considerations

  • Respond to chat questions and comments aloud, so everyone is informed.
  • If you are aware of a student using a screen reader in your class, reach out to the Digital Accessibility Office for help identifying the best way to work with that student.

Integrating Chat into your Teaching Strategy

Chat works best as part of your broader Teaching Strategy. Columbia’s Center for Teaching and Learning frames active learning around three components: students need to encounter information, engage with it, and reflect on it.

A holistic approach to active learning includes information and ideas, experience, and reflective dialogue. Chat is well suited to the "engage" and "reflect" stages — for example, pairing a chat-based reflection prompt with Zoom polling or breakout room discussion gives students multiple ways to process material, not just one.

Chat + Think-Pair-Share: Students type their individual response ("think"), then go to breakout rooms to compare ("pair"), then the whole class debriefs back in the main room ("share") — chat anchors the first stage so no one's response gets lost.

Chat + Zoom Poll: Pose a multiple-choice question verbally, have students discuss in chat first, then launch the poll. The chat discussion before voting pushes students to reason rather than guess.

Chat + Exit Ticket: At the end of class, ask students to post one thing they learned and one remaining question in chat. Saves you from building a separate survey tool, and the saved chat becomes a ready-made formative assessment record.

Sources