1. PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTING COLLABORATION
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

2. Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004
GROUPS
Higher order thinking is learned socially.
Learning takes place through talking.
Motivation rises through student autonomy, choice and responsibility.
Learning improves through active exchange.
Teaching is not feeding ducks.
The teacher must ‘scaffold’ learning in groups.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

3. CONSIDERATIONS IN GROUP WORK
Task-related talk is high in cooperative groups.
Plan tasks which require collaboration.
Groups of four or five are likely to work better than too small or too large groups.
Being a girl in a group with mostly boys depresses the amount of participation by girls and the amount of high level talk.
Have reporting back sessions.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

4. Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004
GROUPING CRITERIA
Age groups
Attainment groups
Mixed ability groups
Interest groups
Friendship groups
Convenience groups
Gender groups
Activity groups
Preferred learning style.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

5. Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004
MOVING TO GROUP WORK
Re-arrange the classroom for group work.
Stage one: Have only one or two groups working apart from the class at any one time, while the remainder of the class is involved in class/individual work.
Stage two: Each group replicates the same activity.
Stage three: Each group works on the same activity in a variety of ways.
Stage four: Each group work on a variety of aspects of a topic.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

6. KEY CONSIDERATIONS IN GROUP WORK
Avoid being too ambitious for self and students.
Enable students to learn and practice being in a group.
Don’t expect too much too quickly by way of results.
Tell students clearly the intended outcome of their group work.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

7. KEY CONSIDERATIONS IN GROUP WORK
Give clear instructions.
Be vigilant to the whole class.
Comment on the group success.
Be prepared to stop everyone to calm matters.
Reward group behaviour.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

8. TEACHERS AND GROUP WORK
Judge when to intervene and when to stand back: children work well in groups when the teacher is with them, but the level of activity can drop by 50 per cent when the group is working without the teacher.
Getting ideas from the group.
Allocating tasks.
Pacing the work.
Providing encouragement and support.
Fitting it all together.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

9. IMPROVING TALK IN GROUPS
Initiating discussion of a new issue.
Qualifying another person’s contribution.
Accepting a qualification.
Extending a previous contribution.
Asking for an example.
Providing an example.
Using evidence to challenge an assertion.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004

10. IMPROVING TALK IN GROUPS
Reformulating one’s own assertions.
Completing unfinished sentence.
Encouraging others to continue.
Inviting others to contribute.
Repeating with modifications.
Supporting another person’s assertions with evidence.
Copyright Keith Morrison, 2004