Okay you guys... I have to share something that I witnessed this morning in the classroom. I'm pretty sure that my CT, I'll call her Mrs. H, is a genius. Here's why:
Mrs. H assigned her students to read the first few chapters of "Their Eyes Were Watching God", which were due to be read today, and she gave them a quiz at the beginning of class. Later, she planned on having them get into groups to discuss what they read. After the students completed their quizzes, Mrs. H had them switch papers to grade them. She collected the papers afterward and ordered them from the highest grades to the lowest grades, which took her all of about thirty seconds. Then...get ready for it...she had the students who did the best in one group, the students who did fairly in another, and the students who did poorly in the last group. This way, the students who did poorly could not simply ask others who read the book for answers during the discussion. The ones who obviously read and comprehended the reading were all in one group. Therefore, they were not weighed down by others who neglected to do the reading. I LOVE this method of grouping because it truly makes the students responsible for their education and keeps them from leaning on the students who do what they are supposed to do.
Overall, I'm enjoying the time I've spent thus far in pre-student teaching. Mrs. H is very helpful and always makes sure that I have all of the materials, handouts, and information that I need in order to be successful and organized. I'm looking forward to the rest of the semester.
Oh yeah, the students are awesome, too! :)
Mrs. H is a rock star! Thanks for sharing this idea with us, Leslie. Perhaps you should jump over to Mr. Whitman's page, and contribute to the conversation on his post about group work. I bet your colleagues would be very interested in this idea. :-)
ReplyDeleteI really like Mrs. H's grouping strategy. I witnessed group sessions in my CT's classroom that I felt were not very productive. More often than not, one or two students ended up doing the majority of the work. I like the idea of students being responsible for their own learning. Was there a negative side to grouping students based on their scores
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