Collaboration
Collaboration is a crucial part of Blended Learning. Students collaborate in finding the answers to their questions, in solving problems, in learning, sharing learning, and teaching others. In our blended learning classroom students collabrate throughout the day and across all curricular areas. But they didn't walk in the door knowing how to effectively colaborate. So how does effective collaboration happen? Lots and lots of practice and lots and lots of praise!
We start by making effective collaborative group rules... in collaborative groups! Each group writes what we should see and hear in effective collaborative groups. These are shared and posted in the room and combined into one classroom list. Over the next several days as I give groups tasks to complete collaboratively they revise the list of expectations. We also start a list of what the class feels we should not see or hear during effective collaborative groups (such as pouting, crying, growling, stomping). This list gets a little silly but it also makes some kiddos really think about their behavior choices. The Effective Collaborative Group Chart stays in the classroom all year. The "should not" list goes away after a few weeks.
Whole Group Sharing:
As beginning collaborators we take the time (10 minutes or so) at the end of each session to share, whole group, what went really well during the collaborative group session and what we could improve. Then I ask students to name some effective collaborators and why they were effective.
As beginning collaborators we take the time (10 minutes or so) at the end of each session to share, whole group, what went really well during the collaborative group session and what we could improve. Then I ask students to name some effective collaborators and why they were effective.
Next I ask students to decide which fairy tale character is the best "good guy" and which fairy tale character is the best "bad guy". This task is a little more difficult because they are not deciding between two given choices but from all the fairy tale characters their group happens to know. Another variation of this task is asking students to decide on the scariest Halloween character. If students are not ready for a task with so many choices simply provide some characters for them. But remember the goal is to gradually release the teacher structure and control so students learn to narrow topics and make decisions together.
Then we graduate to a task that matters. I ask students to come up with playground safety rules for our new Kinders. They take this task very seriously. First students brainstorm all the safety rules they can think of and then they must reduce the list to the 5 most important rules. The discussion gets lively!!! Then students must decide how to best communicate the rules to Kinders, who may not know how to read yet. Finally each group presents their work to small groups of Kinders followed by a joint recess to practice! Because students take this task so seriously this is when I start to see some behaviors that may limit a group's ability to collaborate effectively. Whatever struggles I notice become minilessons before the next collaborative group session.
Because most learning in our classroom occurs in small groups or partnerships students have lots of opportunities to fine tune their effective collaborative group skills. Collaborative group mini-lessons continue all year long as new situations pop up. In a blended learning environment the goal is to gradually move students from a teacher structured collaborative group experience to a student driven, student structured collaborative group experience. It is because of this goal that I do not assign group members or group roles. In our reflection sessions we discuss possible roles of effective group members and continue throughout the year to discuss effective group behaviors. I want students to learn to structure and adapt their groups on their own.