Collaboration is an essential component of any PBL activity. Unfortunately, most students do not know how to properly collaboration within a group. When I first started teaching, I assumed that students knew how to work together in groups. Boy, was I wrong! Even as 7th graders, many students see collaboration of one of two things. First, many see it as a time to socialize and they struggle with getting meaningful work completed. Second, some see collaboration as a means to finish their work faster (i.e. "You do this half and I'll do this half."). Through this course and the two PBL blog articles, I've learned that collaboration should help promote diversity in thinking and ultimately lead to high quality work. In fact, collaborative groups should be able to produce better products than students working individually.
After reading and studying the two blog posts on collaboration, I've determined that the top three important elements that I hope to use in my classroom are team contracts, teaching collaboration, and creating public benchmarks. During my first PBL with the density ships, I flirted with the idea of using team contracts. By creating team contracts, students will know their roles and responsibilities within the group, as well as making a commitment to their group members. I like how the contracts clearly state expectations but also outlines disciplinary actions for students who refuse to obey the contract. Second, I plan to actually teach collaboration within the scope of my next PBL. Groups need to be shown how to collaborate effectively. I will do this by continuously monitoring group discussion, but also checking in very frequently with each group to make sure they are making adequate progress. Third, I like the idea of public benchmarks for collaboration. I've already found that making something "public" can already have a huge change on achievement. During my next PBL, I'm going to create some benchmarks for collaboration and have it posted somewhere in the classroom along with each group's name. As they complete one of the benchmarks, I'll check it off. By making this part public, groups will be able to see where they fall when compared to other groups in the class.
Teaching and modeling good collaboration is so important, but is often times overlooked as something students should already know how to do. Using the three techniques discussed above will help me create better peer-to-peer communication in my class, but will also help produced better quality projects.
After reading and studying the two blog posts on collaboration, I've determined that the top three important elements that I hope to use in my classroom are team contracts, teaching collaboration, and creating public benchmarks. During my first PBL with the density ships, I flirted with the idea of using team contracts. By creating team contracts, students will know their roles and responsibilities within the group, as well as making a commitment to their group members. I like how the contracts clearly state expectations but also outlines disciplinary actions for students who refuse to obey the contract. Second, I plan to actually teach collaboration within the scope of my next PBL. Groups need to be shown how to collaborate effectively. I will do this by continuously monitoring group discussion, but also checking in very frequently with each group to make sure they are making adequate progress. Third, I like the idea of public benchmarks for collaboration. I've already found that making something "public" can already have a huge change on achievement. During my next PBL, I'm going to create some benchmarks for collaboration and have it posted somewhere in the classroom along with each group's name. As they complete one of the benchmarks, I'll check it off. By making this part public, groups will be able to see where they fall when compared to other groups in the class.
Teaching and modeling good collaboration is so important, but is often times overlooked as something students should already know how to do. Using the three techniques discussed above will help me create better peer-to-peer communication in my class, but will also help produced better quality projects.
Hi Jonathan,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your thoughts on your experience with implementing pbl collaboration in your classroom and also what you've learned from the articles and rubrics provided in the homework. You shared how you've learned that collaboration should help promote diversity in thinking and ultimately lead to high quality work. Yes! Ideally collaboration should not just be a diverse structure to apply but should promote higher quality products and promote student achievement.
You shared how you've learned that team contracts, teaching collaboration as a soft skill, and public benchmarks are all strategies you've learned you want to try. I agree that many times we assume that our students already have these skills or should have them by the time we plan to utilize them. Not so and the time we spent teaching students how to work collaboratively within the pbl unit is an investment not only into that unit but into subsequent learning opportunities and into the learner themselves.
Sincerely,
Dawn