Vanessa Gould

Study Question: How do I teach children the

skills to work in collaborative groups?

Vanessa Gould

What to teach ? How to teach ?

Two types of group work skills

1.) Task skills•Writing reports•Staying on task•Following directions•Planning and reviewing progress

2.) Working relationship skills•Being supportive•Checking for agreement•Being respectful•Disagreeing in an agreeable way

Brown & Thomson, 2000

1.) Establish the need for the skill2.) Define the skill3.) Guided practice4.) Generalise the skill

Johnson &Johnson, 1998

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What to teach?....

In just one week?...

Establishing a code/ Why have a group?/Effective questioning/What should a group be like/Why teamwork?/Expanding the question/What happens when you are working well in a group?/Speaker to speaker communication/Focusing the talk/How does a collaborative group look, feel, sound?/Sharing the floor/Group rules/All views considered/Creative questioning/Open and closed questions/Inside someone else’s head/Provoking a response/Active listening/

Application of Skills:

• Topic Groups• Peer testing

•Book discussion

Clements & Godinho, 2003; Cohen, 1986; MacDonald, 1997, Brown & Thomson, 2000, Johnson & Johnson, 1999)

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LP1: Why teamwork?

WALT: Understand why groups are a good way to work.

•Sell the idea to your students (Cohen, 1986, Brown & Thomson, 2000; Clements & Godinho, 2003)

•THINK/SHARE/PAIR(Brown & Thomson, 2000)

Teams divide the task and double the success(Unknown)

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LP 2: Broken Squares:Graves & Graves, 1985

WALT: Understand what to do to make our group work well together.

Rules:1.) The task must be done in silence2.) Hand signals are not allowed3.) You can give pieces your pieces away but can not take another persons piece (s)4.) The task is not finished until all group members have a completed square.

The whole is greater than the sum of the parts(Unknown)

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LP 3: Y Chart

WALT: Make a Y Chart on what a group should be (looks, sounds and feels)

(Clements & Godinho, 2003; MacDonald, 1997)

Coming together is the beginning,keeping together is progress,working together is success.(Henry Ford)

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LP 4 Group Rules:

Help each otherListen to each otherRespect all ideasTake turnsEveryone contributes

NO MEAN TEAMS!None of us is as smart as all of us (K. Blanchard)

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LP 5: Questioning:Beat the barrier:Rules:You must question your partner to find out what his/her picture isYour partner must answer only with yes or no

What am I looking at?One person has an object in mind, located somewhere in the classroom.The class asks questions to find out what it isThe person can only answer yes or no.

We, is less of me (unknown)Bright & Joyner, 2008; Clements & Godinho,

2003)

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Reflection on problems so far

1.) Students struggling with positives in group work2.) Non collaborators (4 in total)

• Topic Grouping (Heterogeneous)Social/Group Skills (Homogenous)Academic Ability (Homogenous)Lower academic ability (Empowerment)

3.) Friendship Bonds•Age•Lack of skills in peer assessment

(Cohen, 1986; Johnson & Johnsons, 1975)

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Application of learning:Topic Groups: To research a planet, produce a Paper Mache replica and mount research content.•Heterogeneous (3)• One = Academic ability•One = Pre existing social skills•One = Lower academic skills ( artistic/manipulative

Math Groups: (STAD)•Most improved group won•Homogenous (7 – average)•All children with social skills in the one group

Book discussion:•Homogenous (6)•Highest academic achievers•Individualistic tendencies

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What did I learn about my question?

•Teaching collaborative group work is an on going and extensive process•Start small•The biggest barrier is individualistic attitudes to those have succeeded as individuals•Self disclosure tasks (Johnson & Johnson, 1999)•Must prove to these students that the process is beneficial•Grouping Structures - JigsawRoles

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Where to next?•Further research into collaborative structures•Further research into allocation of roles•Further research into effective group assessment

Myself as teacher/researcher?

•Smaller bites needed•Its a way of life – like long learner•There is so much I don’t know•Avoids stagnation•Seeing the wood for the trees

Vanessa Gould

References