My biggest surprise lately came from a change in methods that I have instituted in my classroom planning. I have always had my students do collaborative work fairly frequently because I feel that it is a powerful tool for preparing students for the workplace. Sometimes, I would randomly assign groups/partners and occasionally I would let students choose work partners. However, since learning about all of the factors and methods for grouping we have covered in class, I have been purposely using selected grouping and partnering (along with some of the suggested group-style activities) to cover our course work.
The surprise has been the dramatic difference it has made in both the quality of work I receive as well as the student's retention of material. Specifically, I have been purposely balancing skill levels in groups, and looking at pairing personality types in various ways to see what works best. I am so surprised at how my high-performers are engaged in leadership roles, and even more so how my lower performers are taking an active part in group participation. I am seeing positive behaviors and development of communication skills. Shy students who never spoke in class are coming out of their shells and participating more in class discussion. Even in just two week's time, the change has been notable.
I would have never guessed implementing something like this would have such a powerful and positive impact on my classroom! It has been a great change that I plan to continue using and refining in my program.
We have been doing a lot of group work to cover the book portion of the class. Grouping them up based upon the methods in which we learned has had a dramatic impact on the class. Also using the grading and student evaluations has been a great way to make sure that everyone has pulled there weight and keeps them accountable. Are you using the group evaluation forms as well, if not how are you evaluating each member? So glade to hear that this is working as well for you as it is for me.
ReplyDeleteJessica,
ReplyDeleteI am glad to see that well thought out grouping is working so well in your classroom. I have trouble with this in video because I usually do partners for video projects, but after learning that groups of 3 or 4 work best, I will probably re-think the way I assign my groups. It is also interesting to hear that the quality of work increased so much as well. When I think about the benefits of grouping, I primarily think about behavior and social skills. I guess it is easy to forget that with good behavior and social skills comes a better final product. Keep up the good work!
Anna