The right tools foster a sense of pride in accomplishment.
Together Everyone Achieves More. If you teach your students the true meaning of teamwork, they’ll begin to understand why it’s important to have more than one person working on a project at a time and how sharing their best ideas can benefit everyone on a team. Through productive group brainstorming sessions, some of the most revolutionary products and services have been conceived.
Here are some tips to encourage collaboration in the classroom:
- Give each group a goal. Each student needs to be held accountable for their own part of the project. Their participation in the group also needs to be assessed before final grades are given.
- Don’t put too many students in a group because it is counterproductive. Mid-sized groups work best because they allow students to work together easily. Too many ideas derail students from the task at hand. Groups of four to five students usually work best depending on the overall size of the classroom.
- Demonstrate the importance of communication skills. Use your CTL Chromebook to provide detailed instructions on how to communicate effectively. Hook up your CTL computer to a TV and run videos demonstrating how to get more done in less time by expressing one’s needs and asking for help whenever problems arise.
- Give each group member a role. Rather than leave it up to the students, assign specific roles to each student in the group. If one student struggles in the role he or she is given, ask that the other group members pitch in by helping out when they can.
- Have students document successes and things that they would change. Get feedback from the group members. That way, you can plan future projects with greater ease. It also helps the students think outside the box and problem solve better because they know what worked and didn’t work in the past.
It’s important to recognize individual achievements but to also facilitate group projects that invite collaboration, innovation, and creativity. It’s not enough for students to be self-starters. They need to learn how to work within the constraints of teams so they’re better able to prepare themselves for real-world settings. If they were to work for a company in the future, they’ll be asked to share their ideas and skills with others regularly.
