Appropriateness of using group (or collaborative) instructional activities and independent instructional activities

Essai , 2022 , 8 Pages

Pédagogie - Pédagogie pour écoles

This essay will highlight the importance of using appropriate collaborative instructional activities when planning lessons within an international school environment. Whether educators are teaching middle or secondary school, planning is an essential part of that, educators must conclude and offer a range of activities to stimulate the student educationally to achieve their goals and targets are important worldwide. The notion of implementing inquiry-based learning as part of the international baccalaureate programme fosters a love and appreciation for academic honesty, and cooperative learning, and prepares students for the 21st century by making them aware of being proactive within their classroom environments.

Abstract

The following essay will highlight the importance of using appropriate collaborative instructional activities when planning lessons within an international school environment. Whether educators are teaching middle or secondary school, planning is an essential part of that educators must conclude and offer a range of activities to stimulate the student educationally to achieve their goals and targets are important worldwide. The notion of implementing inquiry-based learning as part of the international baccalaureate programme fosters a love and appreciation for academic honesty, and cooperative learning, and prepares students for the 21st century by making them aware of being proactive within their classroom environments.

Keywords: Collaboration, Cooperative, International Baccalaureate, Secondary School.

Introduction

Using instructional activities can only benefit your classroom environment in terms of how students engage and interact with each other and how it helps them to be on task. In an international school setting, one has to conclude administrative duties, and planning, which are essential and differentiated tasks, which help students learn better and see a different perspective through learning in an inquiry-based environment.

When to implement independent and group instructional activities

Working in the IB curriculum school expects to plan accordingly to the needs of the students in the classroom, promoting independent learning and allowing them to flourish and become natural inquirers as guided by the IB curriculum and outlined by IBO (n.d., 2018). It is important to consider how to cater for all the students. Especially students listed on the EAL (English as Additional Language) and SEN (Special Educational Needs) registry and make adequate provision for their educational needs by choosing instructional activities that will benefit them to be on task and reach their goals and targets set within the classroom setting. According to Instructional Strategies (2012) which describes: “Instructional strategies are techniques teachers use to help students become independent, strategic learners. These strategies become learning strategies when students independently select the appropriate ones and use them effectively to accomplish tasks or meet goals'' (p. 67). When it comes to understanding what independent instructional activities are. One has to understand the definition as described by Instructional Strategies (2012) elaborates:

Independent study is an individualised learning experience that allows students to select a topic focus, define problems or questions, gather and analyse information, apply skills, and create a product to show what has been learned. Independent study can be effectively used in upper elementary and junior high health programs (p. 74).

It is important to understand the students will gather, analyse and report information that they have inquired about. To promote an in-depth understanding of a particular topic or subject being covered. For students to make connections between content and real-life applications, which ties into the philosophy of IB where students make connections within a global context and understand other cultures, become tolerant and interact on an international level. For students employing an Independent instructional activity they will conclude the following:

- Student planning when necessary with a course outline of the expectations and what will be covered,
- Alternative ideas for gathering their information, data and processing the information gathered,
- Have access to multiple resources when available and use them as required,
- Teacher intervention through regular communication between the teacher and student and vice versa, and
- Time is given to work and conferences (Instructional Activities, 2012).

In comparison with group instructional activities, they are geared within a group setting where students are using cooperative learning with a specific seating plan usually in a jigsaw method. From the beginning of planning my lessons, the seating plan was essentially important for me as it helped and assisted the students that were very shy and not comfortable working with peers and working in isolation.

To avoid this the author used to implement cooperative learning as he could observe the difference and changes in those particular students. Zook (2018) describes this instructional activity as "Cooperative learning is the process of breaking a classroom of students into small groups so they can discover a new concept together and help each other learn” (p. 1).

Getting the students enthusiastic about the topic from the starter activity which worked well was how excited students became about their learning and how actively they engaged in the lessons. Even working together within a group setting everyone participated and equally contributed to the discussions, completing the task and being on target in working towards their goals.

When it comes to the planning part it is important to incorporate the following strategies involved to promote positive engagement through having the correct seating arrangements in place. The jigsaw seating arrangement in terms of their position was always helpful. Study.com (n.d.) explains further:

An example of a very popular cooperative learning activity that teachers use is a jigsaw, where each student is required to research one section of the material and then teach it to the other members of the group. Just like a jigsaw puzzle, each piece or section is put together at the end, and only then does the entire picture make sense (p. 1).

Understanding how to incorporate cooperative learning from the beginning of the lesson is essential when it comes to planning and designing the seating arrangements for students, to work in collaboration to learn through peer learning activities.

Elements of cooperative learning promote the following:

1- Face-to-face interaction,
2- Positive interdependence,
3- Individual accountability,
4- Collaborative skills, and
5- Group processing (Study.com, n.d.).

As highlighted previously, it is important to consider your student's educational needs first when you plan accordingly, by having a good seating plan in place, where students can collaborate and work cooperatively together to promote critical thinking skills.

One example of independent instructional activity and one group instructional activity

For the English class, students were asked to research Macbeth and understand Shakespeare’s dramatic work. Each student independently worked on the research employing most characteristics of having access to the course outline and communicating with the teacher regularly and consistently. This displays the independent instructional activity in comparison with the group instructional activity where students were researching the works of the Baroque composer, Handel.

Through means of cooperative learning, students were working in their groups at school and at home using google docs and making their planning collaboratively whilst working on the project by researching the era in terms of repertoire composed during the period, essential characteristics of the Baroque period and all the musical works Handel has written especially the most popular works.

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• Cours: Masters in Education (Advanced Teaching for Elementary, Middle and Secondary)
• Auteur: Dr. Mario Maxwell Müller (Auteur)
• Année de publication: 2022
• Pages: 8
• N° de catalogue: V1292428
• ISBN (PDF): 9783346760869
• Langue: anglais
• mots-clé: Collaboration, Cooperative, International Baccalaureate, Secondary School.