At the beginning of each semester, rather than talking about content of the class and grading etc., Dr. Jackie Gerstein believes in establishing connections with and between students.  On User Generated Education, he blogged this week about activities to break the ice in the classroom using mobile devices.

Below is one of Dr. Gerstein’s exercises from his post “First Class Ice Breakers Using Mobile Devices.”

Cell Sharing

• Ask participants to locate a photo, song, or video from their mobile device that best represents them.
• Each person then shares his or her media and the reason it was selected.
• For photo or video sharing: Pass the device around so all students can view the image or use a webcam to project the image onto a larger computer screen or whiteboard.
• For sharing of music: Attach portable speakers to assist with the sharing of songs so others can hear them.