Providing students with opportunities to work in groups in the
classroom can be successful in producing a wide range of educational outcomes
including; improved achievement, and positive interpersonal relationships with
other students. These outcomes however, are only achievable when teachers set
up conditions that motivate students to prepare and engage in ‘give-and-take
discussions’ (Michaelsen 1998). Simply allocating students groups does not mean
students will be engaged with one another, thus it is crucial that you
thoughtfully plan group work and the types of groups you will be using (BHE 2012).
When implementing group work in the classroom your chief role is to plan,
manage and monitor the learning environment ‘so that students can collaborate
and engage productively in learning’ (Killen 2009 p222).
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When forming groups in your classroom you have three choices.
You can;
1) allow your students to form their own groups
2) form groups by random
3) place individuals learners in groups for a specific reason
If you choose to take the third approach, the basic choices
are to make the groups heterogeneous
or homogeneous (Killen 2009).
Heterogeneous
The first
type is heterogeneous grouping. Heterogeneous
means to group students of different ability levels together. This definition
can also be extended to include grouping together students of different ages
and races (BHE 2012).
Homogenous
The second
type is homogenous grouping and simply means grouping students who are
similar together.
Setting Up Group Work
¨ Start
by introduce group work gradually to your class. This can be achieved by
progressing from pair work to
larger groups; short periods of time to longer periods of time; teacher
formulated groups to student formulated groups (Killen 2009). As this will
allow students to gradually assume greater responsibility.
¨ The nature of certain tasks you set
will ultimately determine the type of grouping strategy that you implement in
the classroom. While numeracy groups may be suited best to ability groups, the group
for a problem-solving task for example, may be based on student interests
(Marsh 2004).
¨ When implementing group work in the
classroom be sure to make it clear what the purpose of the task you have set
is, as well as the steps required to be complete within the time frame provided.
As well as making it clear what you expect of the final product and how you
plan to assess it (Killen, 2009).
See De Bono’s six thinking hats (De
Bono 1992) for a way of assigning specific roles to students in group work
tasks.
Take a look at the following links
to find more detailed information on cooperative grouping strategies:
Checkout the following link to find
one strategy that a practicing teacher used in her class to allocate roles for
students in groups: http://stepintosecondgrade.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/group-work-jobs-and-sale.html
Picture sourced from http://media-cache-ec5.pinterest.com/upload/175218241722768471_jkR0Dcum.jpg
References
Bright Hub Education (BHE) 2012, ‘The Importance of Group Work
in Your Classroom’, URL: http://www.cambridge.org/other_files/downloads/esl/booklets/Jones-Student-Centered.pdf
(Accessed 23 October 2012).
De Bono, E.,
1992, ‘Six thinking Hats for Schools Book 2. Victoria, Australia: Hawker
Brownlow Education.
Killen, R., 2009, ‘Effective Teaching Strategies: lessons from
research and practice’ eth edition, Cengage Learning, Victoria: Australia.
Marsh, C.,
2004, ‘Becoming a Teacher: knowledge, skills and issues’
(3rd
Edition). NSW, Australia: Pearson Education Australia.
Michaelsen, L, K., no date, ‘Three Keys to Using Learning
Groups Effectively’, URL: http://www.cambridge.org/other_files/downloads/esl/booklets/Jones-Student-Centered.pdf
(Accessed 23 October 2012).
