An Interactive Classroom Icebreaker and Parting-Ways Activity to Introduce and Review the Effector Functions of Cellular Players Associated with the Immune Response

is wide agreement that what happens during the first few sessions of a course are important for creating a respectful community of learners and setting the tone for in class participation expectations for the remainder of the semester. A classic way for instructors to create a sense of community is the use of an icebreaker activity, which can engage and create excitement for students if used in the right way. Here we introduce an engaging classroom icebreaker activity for an immunology course, which introduces course content and structures student interactions. Specifically, students introduce themselves to their peers as a cell involved in the immune response using the iconic “Hello my name is” name badges with a personified cartoon cell illustration and relevant biographical information on each name badge. The immune response cell name badges can further be modified and be used toward the end of a course in a parting-ways activity to encourage retrieval practice as student work towards synthesizing information as well as providing course closure through a familiar activity. Instructors may also use the cell illustrations throughout the progression of an immunology course to more formally introduce cell types and promote the use of military analogies found on the name badges to facilitate student understanding of the effector functions of cells associated with the immune response.