Answer: small-group work in a big classroom requires
patience and understanding from both teachers and students. While movable
tables and chairs are ideal for GL activities, the restrictions caused by the
furniture shouldn't interfere with team work. There can be groups of four
formed by two people from one row and two from the other row.
Question: Is it common to find some students who
dominate teams and others who don't participate at all? How can this be
avoided?
Answer: promote equal participation in the groups by
making all the team members feel like they have unique roles within the group
and that their role is essential for the group's success. Some of the
strategies used to accomplish this are: asking for only one result per team,
assigning roles and swapping them, giving each member different critical
resources, choosing a team member to explain and summarize the results and the
methods used, and then giving a grade to the whole team.
All of the team members should give a list of
participation expectations and group behavior. The students:
♦ Should
create ideas about behaviors that could interfere with team work.
♦ Can
create a behavior code for all members.
♦ Define
acceptable group behavior.
♦ List
the behaviors expected from each person, pair, group or from the class in
general.
♦ Help
the instructor and students portray specific behavior, making everyone feel
included and expressing, for example, their disagreements in a constructive
manner, offering help and support, asking for clarification and avoiding
negative comments.
The instructors should constantly monitor group
activities taking place in the classroom, writing down who contributes a lot
and who doesn't. It's good to meet the team members in private to communicate
any observations. These talks should be friendly and should offer support,
showing specific strategies to solve a problem. In the case of teachers who use
LS to document an activity's results, this task is simplified because they have
access to each team member's contributions and their characteristics,
facilitating an intervention if necessary.
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