Engaging Students Through Cooperative Learning: Ideas for Success Chris Jonassen Troy Elementary School

What makes a TEAM different than a group?

How Are Teams Formed? Variety of methods Friendships or interests Random teams Teacher assigns students to teams Heterogeneous - maximize the probability of peer tutoring and improving cross-race and cross-sex relations

What is Cooperative Learning? Cooperative Learning refers to a set of instructional methods in which students work in small, mixed-ability learning teams. The students in each team are responsible not only for learning the material being taught, but also for helping their teammates learn.

Why Cooperative Learning?

We Learn: 10% of what we read 20% of what we hear 30% of what we see 50% of what we both see and hear 70% of what is discussed with others 80% of what we experience personally 95% of what we teach someone else William Glasser

According to Fortune 500 Companies: The Top Skills sought by employers 1970 READING COMPUTATION WRITING 2000 INTERPERSONAL SKILLS PROBLEM SOLVING TEAMWORK

4 CORNERS Post four multiple choice responses, one in each corner. Students select their responses and move. Members of groups discuss their choices in round robin. Spokespersons summarize/present group members’ thoughts.

Expectations Everyone will participate Students will be respectful of each other’s opinions Stay on task Be mindful of time

4 Corners Directions Determine whether you Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree, or Strongly Disagree with the statement Write your response on a 3x5 card (2 min) Move to the corner of the room that matches your response While in your corner, you will have a small group discussion with your peers (round robin-everyone shares) One additional step that would be useful for ELs is to give students time to right out their reasons on a 3x5 card first before going to their corner.

Statement: Teaching is the best profession!

Go to the corner… 4 CORNERS 2 1 4 3

Alternative to Round Robin Talking Chips Students place their chip in the center each time they talk; they cannot speak again until all chips are in the center and collected. Response Mode Chips: Like Talking Chips but chips contain response modes: For examples, Summarizing, Giving an Idea, Praising an Idea.

Stand up, Hand up, Pair up/Timed Pair, Share Stand up and find a partner within 10 seconds and slap hands (GENTLY) – refer to classroom norms Partner with the longer hair is A, other person in B A tell B one way you could use 4 corners in your classroom(45 seconds) Switch (45 seconds)

Alternative Activity: THINK – WRITE – PAIR - COMPARE Objectives: to give rehearsal time, engage more students, and promote thoughtful responses Directions: Present a problem, idea or question to be discussed Allow time for individuals to think in silence Allot time for students to write responses (independently) Pair students Give time for partners to compare their responses Give the whole class time to discuss responses

Inside/Outside Circle Students in concentric circles rotate to face a partner to answer the teacher’s questions or those of the partner. What does it look like? Watch these 2 videos. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNONGkX89yE http://vimeo.com/53949503

Gallery Walk Activity Number off (1-5) Each group starts at a different place 2 minutes of silent reading and 3 minutes of discussion. Write something your group learned from the reading.

Helpful Hints for Cooperative Learning Activities Monitor the noise level and have consequences when kids get too loud. If you are asked the same question by two groups, you may want to stop the whole class to clarify and take additional questions. Use a rubric or checklist for students to grade their group’s collaboration. Assign a group monitor if you are concerned about off task behavior. Assign a role to each student. Noise level: You could turn on soft music and tell students that if they can’t hear the music, they are too noisy.  You could have a visual on the board, such as a stoplight, to show when the noise level is getting too high.  Remember that the concept of ‘quiet’ must be taught like any other procedure. Worksheets: Students who are inexperienced with CL often have a difficult time getting started or reaching their goals. Having a worksheet to guide them will help the groups set their priorities, work towards their goal, and produce the assessment task.

Cooperative Learning Strategies from Today’s Session 4 corners Think. Write, Pair, Share Talking Chips Gallery Walk Stand up, Hand up, Pair up Timed Pair/Share Inside/Outside Circle

Plus/Delta On your way out please complete one sticky for a plus and one for a delta on the chart paper