My journey with Bean continues and today's subject is group work. I won't list here the argument for (or against) group work or even discuss the numerous amount of strategies (you can refer to Engaging Ideas for that ;) ). Instead, as group work is already something I use, I will start from my own experience.
My most recent experience of Group work
Forming the groups.
Most of the time, the groups are formed by students sitting close to each others, sometimes more or less randomly assigned. "More or less" is because it happens that I still try to have groups of mixed competences.
I am actually not comfortable with assigning groups completely chosen by me. In a way I don't feel I have the competences or the insight for making groups that would work better than groups formed randomly or by affinity.
Concerning the size of the groups, it might depend of the activity. Usually, there are three to five students in the groups. For some group works, I even do not force the ones who are not comfortable to work in a group. Maybe I should, but I intend to discuss that later.
How do I assign group works?
I make students work in group in different ways.
Most of the time, the groups are formed by students sitting close to each others, sometimes more or less randomly assigned. "More or less" is because it happens that I still try to have groups of mixed competences.
I am actually not comfortable with assigning groups completely chosen by me. In a way I don't feel I have the competences or the insight for making groups that would work better than groups formed randomly or by affinity.
Concerning the size of the groups, it might depend of the activity. Usually, there are three to five students in the groups. For some group works, I even do not force the ones who are not comfortable to work in a group. Maybe I should, but I intend to discuss that later.
How do I assign group works?
I make students work in group in different ways.
- When working on exercises in class, I always encourage my students to discuss them with their "neighbours". This creates a positive emulation between the students and increases the understanding of the whole class.
- In Linear Algebra, I ask students multiple choice concept questions. Mainly for technical reasons, I don't use clickers or other polling systems. Still, they first have to make up their mind before discussing their choice with their neighbours. Then I round-up the whole class.
- Actually, I use group works mainly in my calculus classes. One of my main resources for group work is the Instructor Guide for Stewart's Early Transcendental Calculus. I assign some of them depending on the time I have. Those are usually one to two write-on pages that I copy and hand-out to students. Most of the time, we discuss the answers in class. I have never ask them to hand-out their work.
- I also use group for review games. Most of the time, it takes the form of J. Stewart's version of the hangman. Each student in the groups are assigned a number. We start with all students #1 going to the blackboard where I assign a problem. Everyone in the room tries to solve it. The people at the board cannot speak, but their teammates can work together, speaking quietly. The first person at the board who is done calls for the attention of the class and states his or her solution. Then each other team gets a chance to accept the answer, or challenge. As this is a hangman game, the team that wins (first to have their representative get it right, or first to challenge successfully) gets to guess a letter of the puzzle.
Reflections
On the groups.
I like leaving the choice of their group-mates to the students for standard in-class group work. But I might insist more on the importance and benefits to work in group and not leave any student work by him/herself.
On the other side, Bean's idea of using a shuffled deck of numbered cards (p. 187) to assign the groups is tempting. That way, nobody can work by himself/herself. It also has the advantage, having on card labelled "recorder" for each number, to nominate one student per group for taking notes and report the solution. The drawback is that it probably will take more time getting started.
On the conduct of the work.
To be more effective with the group work, I definitely need to set a time limit and to keep the students focused. The tool proposed by Bean is precisely to have a recorder. Being responsible of the note-taking and reporting, the recorder is likely to keep the group on task.
Considering the type of task I am using so far and the size of my classes, I will probably not ask each and every recorder to come to the board. Instead, I might collect one paper/task and select one of the answers to discuss. This will have the advantage as well to allow me to give incentive points for completed tasks if I feel the need of it. Or I could just call a recorder at random...
I like leaving the choice of their group-mates to the students for standard in-class group work. But I might insist more on the importance and benefits to work in group and not leave any student work by him/herself.
On the other side, Bean's idea of using a shuffled deck of numbered cards (p. 187) to assign the groups is tempting. That way, nobody can work by himself/herself. It also has the advantage, having on card labelled "recorder" for each number, to nominate one student per group for taking notes and report the solution. The drawback is that it probably will take more time getting started.
On the conduct of the work.
To be more effective with the group work, I definitely need to set a time limit and to keep the students focused. The tool proposed by Bean is precisely to have a recorder. Being responsible of the note-taking and reporting, the recorder is likely to keep the group on task.
Considering the type of task I am using so far and the size of my classes, I will probably not ask each and every recorder to come to the board. Instead, I might collect one paper/task and select one of the answers to discuss. This will have the advantage as well to allow me to give incentive points for completed tasks if I feel the need of it. Or I could just call a recorder at random...
Further ideas
I am thinking about assigning out of class writing projects. Why not doing this as group work (max three students per group)? This will divide the grading time while maybe decreasing the apprehension of students for this unfamiliar type of task.
Now it is not that easy to be fair when more than one student is responsible for the work. But Tommy Ratliff has a nice solution: he allows the students in the group to determine the distribution of the points. This is definitely something I will implement for any graded group work.
Now it is not that easy to be fair when more than one student is responsible for the work. But Tommy Ratliff has a nice solution: he allows the students in the group to determine the distribution of the points. This is definitely something I will implement for any graded group work.