Collaborative Learning Teams

COMMUNICATE- COLLABORATE - THINK CRITICALLY

"The strength of the team is each individual member.

The strength of each member is the team."

                                                                 - Phil Jackson

The development of a network of collaborative learning teams within you classroom can create an educational environment where the responsibility for learning lies upon both the students and teacher who comprise that leaning community.

Learners learn by teaching one another. When students teach one another they take ownership of the material by passing it along they actually make it part of themselves. 

The process of teaching one another is by its very nature acive learning.  Student engagement increases the opportunities to learn. 

The saying goes that "Two heads are better than one."  Sharing knowledge creates opportunities for more ideas, alternate approaches, increased possibilites and new perspectives.

Students who have difficulty in the larger classroom may find comfort in smaller groups. This provides avenues for increased communication and the unleashing of ideas that may never be shared in a larger group setting. 

Collaboration brings about an ease and comfort that encourages further attendance in the class as interdependence breeds both responsibility and commraderie. 

Although the goal is increased learning for all, the idea of positive competition among smaller groups may lead to greater problem solving success.

Collaboration encourages the development of leadership skills.

Students who work in groups learn to delegate tasks to maximize group success.

Collaboration increases the development of time mangement skills.    

"Coming together is a beginning, staying together is progress, and working together is success."

                                                             - Henry Ford

Chaos Towers Revisited

The Conceptual Physics class worked on chaos towers to demonstrate concepts of Physics, Mechanics, Falling Objects, Newton's Law, Potential and Kinetic Energy.

CHAOS WORLD OF MOTION

Teaching Physics Toy - Construction Toy Equipment - Child Construction Toy - Educational Learning Toy

http://www.chaostoy.com/  

Students work in three groups to construct the chaos towers. They then draw vector diagrams representing velocity of the marble through the track.  Students then identify five concepts from first semester physics and explain how they are represented on the chaos tower.  Lastly, they evaluate each member of their group against the Three C's: collaboration, communication and critical thinking. 

This year one of my students put together a quick video of the chaos towers in action. 

 

Who Killed the Electric Car

Chris Paine's documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car" is an excellent film to get students to understand the problems faced when trying to initiate ecological change vs. cultural, economic and political pressures.

The analysis of who is to blame for stopping the electrical vehicles in the 1990's forces students to understand that all parties must be involved in bringing about environmental change.

From consumers to oil companies, from the technology to the government, students must understand that the process of change begins with their own choices. That their power lies in the choices they make as a consumer. 

I look forward to Chris Paine's follow-up "Revenge of the Electric Car."

Revisiting Confucius

More than 2500 years ago Confucius has been credited for stating the following words concerning how we learn:

I hear and I forget...

I see and I remember...

I do and I understand.

Not that I would even compare myself as an intellectual equal to Confucius, but I would like to make an addition to his words.

I hear and I forget...

I see and I remember...

I do and I understand...

I teach others and make it my own.

It is in the ability of one person to share knowledge with another that the knowledge truly becomes their own to share.  When the information reaches that point of synthesis that it truly becomes clear enough in one's own mind that there is comfort in passing it on to another.  It is in that act that true ownership of the concept is understood and confirmed.

How can we as educators provide the opportunities for our students to gain ownership of the knowledge?

Study Card Rings

There are a tremendous amount of great sites online for creating online study aids
(see - quizlet.com), but nothing beats creating and working through your own set of study cards.   Whether it is a full stack of 3 x 5 cards wrapped in a rubber band, or one inch strips cut from 3 x 5 cards and hole punched on a snap key ring.  The actual pocess of creating hand written study cards is a study staple for most students.


I demonstrate this process to my chemistry students when they need to learn the cations and anions that will be used in naming and creating inonic formulas.  To assist students in learning the ions, I create three sets of twenty ions that students are responsible for knowing.  On one side of card stock I have the names of the ions neatly organized in a four card by five card grid created on an excel spreadsheet.  On the opposite side I have the ion formulas with their ionic charge.  On this side I do not put grid lines.  When students cut them out, they only use the name grid lines and that way the lines do not need to match up (for some students this is a distraction if there are random lines on their cards).

I take part of a class period for the students to cut out and punch the cards and place them on a snap ring that I provide for them. It is worth the class time to have students complete the task.  This garauntees every student has the complete set and leaves the student with the idea that they are of some importance since you gave up class time to make the ring card sets.

I have divided the ion sets on three separate color cards and quiz the students on each set separately.  I find that ionic naming, writng balanced chemical equations and stoichiometry all go more quickly and smoother when the students know these ions from memory.


I then suggest that students can create their own study sets in any of their classes by cutting the
3 x 5 cards into one inch strips or they can by the pre-made blank sets at most bookstores or teacher supply stores.

Half the job, is having the correct tools.