John, I would be interested in what techniques you use to explain to the students how important the project is to their learning. Could you share some of the things you do that have provided results in getting students to fully participate in your group activities? I am sure other readers would benefit greatly from your ideas and experiences.
Regards,
James Jackson
Yes, I utilize group activities in the class and it seems that once in awhile students will not want to participate. So, I make sure and let them know that the project is important to their learning and will help them in the future.
I have my students bring in current event articles. They go through them and pick out good phrases and briefs to teach the other students. I let the students use the white board to list their briefs and phrases and explain them. I dictate the articles to the entire class and they read them back. I teach court reporting and when we have extra time at the end of the class, I have the students bring out one of their articles and we get to work. The students really like going to the board and explaining their phrases to the other students.
I have utilized small group activities in my classroom and found for the most part that it was successful, however, sometimes the student's work independently. I observe this and try to relay their views back to the group while including them. This seems to put that student back on task by including in the group.
Great post Michael. I really like the information you provided about talking with other instructors to better understand the students in your classes you do not already know. You demonstrate the difference between leading by example and just following the pack. By being a leader and seeking the information you need you are taking assertive actions that will allow you to better service your students. Servant Leadership is a key topic in higher education today with specific focus on the role faculty play in overall student support and student success.
Regards,
James Jackson
I use small group activities in many of my classes. I assign groups either randomly, if I do not know a large portion of the students, or make certain that there are some strong students in each group I can depend upon to help lead the group if I do know many of the students in a class. The projects and activities also always have an individual component so that I can rate the students separately. I keep myself involved with the students so that I can identify those who do not actually contribute and can encourage them to do so or make certain they do not benefit from the efforts of the others.
The challenges include having members of the groups who do not actually participate or contribute to the group effort. This I deal with by getting to know the students and speaking with other instructors about those I do not know. That way I can both deal with the inevitable complaints and also encourage the non-participants to contribute to the group effort. When the complaints come from certain group members that others are not participating I usually know it beforehand but then can evaluate the complaint and take whatever action may be appropriate.
Winnifred, I am glad to hear that all of your group activities have gone so well. Working in small groups can be a great way to get more and more students involved. The shy students can become your classroom leaders and other students that do not normally participate in the larger group discussions can get their ideas across to the smaller groups.
Regards,
James Jackson
Small group activities is always enjoyed by students, especially the shy ones. Once students are placed into small groups their fears and inhibitions are erased. Shy students as well as the shining stars loves to interact with each other. This interaction can lead to self confidence, friendship among peers and other fulfillment such as forming the "buddy system" to study for class exams.
Thanks for sharing James. Do you encounter situations where a dominate student takes over too much control in the classroom? How do you bring the more passive students to take on a more active role as a group leader? Sounds like you have some interesting experiences that could be of value to other educators.
Thanks for anything you can share.
I use peer tutoring in my classrooms. This may be in groups that are only two or in larger groups. The student feel at ease with other students. Stronger students are able to encourage and support the weaker. This tutoring also re-enforces the knowledge base of the stronger students and adds to collegiality of the classroom as a whole.
Dillon, sounds like you have a great game plan. Another suggestion is to get into some role play and have students take turns playing the role of a supervisor in a work related scenario and have other students play the role of an employee. You can even take this as far as to have scripts for the students. The true value of this activity comes when you discuss the activity as a capstone exercise and have the students discuss their feelings about the different roles of management and employees. Students feel less threatened whey they discuss a scenario outside of their own experiences even though they are really getting into issues about themselves and their feelings about authority or lack of ability to see themselves in leadership roles.
I have seen some great group activities that come from role play and really loosen up the conversations between students that might not normally agree or get along.
I have worked with small groups in the past and have found that in my field, we have a lot of personality conflicts. As most of the participants are adult males, we do have clashes of egos and strong opinions. I have found that the best thing to do is to clearly state what the expectations are, model appropriate behavior and privately correct any inappropriate comments. I try to model what a good communicator is for small group activities and walk around the room to monitor students.
Shannon you share a very interesting and sometimes complex issue when working with groups. Thanks for sharing your solution and providing how the activity ended on a positive. Another suggestion is to provide the kind of group activities whenever possible that allows each group member to take a lead on some aspect of the overall project. You could even incorporate a grading rubric that allows each member of the group to rate the leadership qualities of the others in an anonymous fashion and then do some group discussions about the pros and cons of leading in such situations.
Regards,
James
I do utilize small group activities in my classroom. Usually there are not any problems but I have had some problems in the past. I had a situation where a group of students who were friends when the assignment was given became enemies by the time the assignment was due. They fought over who was in charge of what duty and what the group presentation was going to be about. I had to have a private meeting with them explaining that they had chosen the group themselves and in their future work experience, they are going to have situations in which case they will not want to work with their co-workers. I told them that they would have to get past the problems that they were having and have to focus on the project and find a way to work together effectively. They did so and proved that they would be able to cooperate with others, and put aside their differences.
Wilfredo, thanks for sharing your experiences with working in small groups. There are many common threads from other instructors I have encountered over the years and trust me when I say you are not alone in the challenges you have shared. Not sure if you have ever read “Leaving The Lectern: Cooperative Learning and the Critical First Days of Students Working in Groups†by Dean McManus but the book provides some great information on how to set the stage early for success when working with student groups. The important concepts to take away here is the reality that you have already made a huge leap in your active learning approach of getting your students to communicate with each other in group activities. The fact that not all students contribute equally is really a great teaching tool to expose your students to the “real-worldâ€. It is rare that all employees of an organization contribute identical outcomes. It is this differentiator that allows some individuals to grow and be promoted within an organization or a career structure while others remain stuck or move from job to job. One of your roles as an instructor is to do all you can to motivate your students to contribute to their groups but it is also critical to provide non-threating explanations as to how those that contribute will be more likely to carryon such traits to a new job while those that choose not to contribute are losing out on learning critical communication and collaboration skills that could have a negative impact on their ability to be promoted and grow within a company or career field.
Kindest regards and good luck with all future endeavors.
James
I use small group activities in my classes and in the assignments that are assigned to our students to be done in the school library or in the filmmaking areas. Frequently one of the main problems that can be a challenge is to achieve that all students participate in the completion of the work goals and a high level of engagement in the group’s work dynamics in a way so that they do different task that complement each other. The design of activities where the students learn from other students it’s necessary.
Another challenge is to avoid the frequent student distractions in class. To confront this situation, tasks that the teacher prepares for the small groups are important. This task should have questionings and problems taken from reality. The professor should be paying attention to the functioning of the group in order to neutralize politely the distractions and get them back to work in an appropriated form.
Great response Shawnie. Keeping students on track during group activities is the most common topic of discussion I have received over the years. The section on group activities provides some great concepts to keep in mind and I also love your comment on using more advanced students to assist in leading discussions and keeping the lesson on track.
Always remember to focus on what takes place the first day of class and set the stage early and announce to students that group activities are part of the course. This will give them time to adapt and accept that they will be expected to communicate with fellow students and engage.
You already mentioned you use a proactive technique with respect to walking around the classroom listening to each group. This is a great practice and keeps the students engaged by knowing they cannot just be passive participants. Great job here by the way.
Another thing to always remember is to have backups to your backups when performing any kind of presentations as part of the group activities. Have a resource you can pull out even if you were to lose all the electricity in the classroom. This can be as simple as planning a backup activity that keeps the students engaged on the lesson plan. If the group activity were being conducted in an eLearning Environment, you can setup a backup plan by having a conference line ready to go that is separate from the primary eLearning Portal. It would be important that students know beforehand what to do when the primary system were to go down, may even be good to have a live rehearsal at some early point during the class term.
Perhaps the most important topic to take from this section of the course is to always encourage proper behavior. As humans we all are teleological which means we tend to become that which we think of the most. If we are constantly exposed to positive behavior then we tend to move in positive directions.
Thanks for participating in the course and providing your great feedback.
Kindest Regards
James Jackson
We do use small group activities in the classroom and the main problem that we have faced is keeping students on track. I found that the best way to have students be engaged is to mix the groups with more advanced students who can lead the discussion and keep it on track. I also walk around the class and listen to each group several times to make sure that they are doing what they are supposed to.
