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Lisa Ann de Garcia (2011)

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"The satisfaction of students in the cooperative learning teaching method is higher compared to students who are taught by the lecture teaching method. In a cooperative learning clasroom, students can state theirs thoughts, interests, and ideas better, and find out about their classmates’ and friends’ opinions. This teaching method will make students get more motivated while learning, increase their excitement, and encourage them to ask more questions," (Mohammadjani, 2015).

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Making Cooperative Learning Powerful (Salvin, 2014

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Just about everyone loves the idea of cooperative learning. Think of kids working productively and excitedly in groups, everyone getting along and enthusiastically helping one another learn. Think of kids completing great projects together, encouraging one another, and forming friendships. In this ideal scenario, all students are engaged, active, and minds-on. They are learning cooperation itself, an important life skill. Cooperative learning: how pro-social, how liberating-and how does anyone really accomplish this?

Cooperative learning can be wonderful. Students often love working this way. I've heard comments like, "An explanation is easier to understand if it's coming from another kid" or "My teammates ... make sure I understand the work." But for many teachers who've tried it, cooperative learning is a noisy mess rather than a stairway to heaven. One student might be doing all the work while the others socialize, for example. Kids may ignore or belittle group mates they perceive to be low achievers. Some students may think cooperative learning is party time rather than learning time. This is why studies find that most teachers don't use cooperative learning regularly, despite extensive research supporting it (Gillies, 2014; Roseth, Johnson, &amp; Johnson, 2008; Slavin, 1995, 2013; Webb, 2008).

It is the "learning" in cooperative learning that is too often left out. But it needn't be. Using these five strategies, teachers can get the greatest benefit possible from cooperative learning and ensure that collaboration enhances learning.

An effective cooperative group is not a collection of kids thrown together for a brief activity. It's a team composed of diverse students who care about helping one another learn-and about the success of the team itself. All members must know they can depend on one another for help.

In the forms of cooperative learning we've used for years at Johns Hopkins University and at the Success for All Foundation in elementary and secondary schools (Slavin, 1995), we group students into four-member teams (if the class doesn't divide evenly, we have a few five-member teams). A foursome provides flexibility. Some activities can be done in pairs and some with the whole team. Teams work together daily for 6-8 weeks; after that period, teachers assign new teams.

Team members move their desks together and choose a team name. At the beginning of the team's work, members engage in group bonding activities, like creating a motto or coat of arms to express their team personality.

In middle or high school, groups might investigate careers that interest them and colleges known for majors tied to those careers. Their research often culminates in each team giving a presentation about why they recommend a particular college, and teams sometimes name themselves after the school they recommend. Even if students choose Duke because of basketball fame, they've spent time helping one another learn something new, shared what matters to them, and met a deadline.

It's best if teams are composed of a cross section of the class: high and low achievers, boys and girls, students of different ethnicities. Groups definitely won't have such diversity if students choose their teams, so the teacher should make team assignments.

Too often in cooperative learning, students are put into teams and instructed to "help one another." Helping one another is a good thing, but kids will do a lot more of it if they share a team goal.

A team goal is a target, product, or indicator that shows a team has done a good job of getting every member to perform at his or her personal best. A team goal could be increasing the average score on a quiz that all students take individually after they help one another prepare. It could be one overall product with individual components that each team member clearly contributed to, such as by coding a specific part of a computer program or contributing essential data to a group lab report.

In each case, a teacher both looks at the team average and evaluates the individual products. Teams whose work meets certain criteria are awarded certificates or small privileges. This helps team members see their joint work as achieving something important. Teams that don't have a goal are like sports teams in a game where no one knows, or cares, what the score is-not the sort of game in which all players do their best.

This is the essential element most often left out of cooperative learning-and when it is, teachers lose a lot of cooperative learning's potential.

Individual accountability means that to reach the team goal, all team members must master the targeted content or skills. Team success should depend on the hard work-and therefore the learning-of all members.

To understand why this is important, consider a team working together without individual accountability. Imagine that a team studies together and then takes one quiz, on which all team members can help one another. This arrangement will likely produce two undesirable outcomes: the free rider and the know-it-all.

Free riders do little work. They may chat with others, but they don't try much to learn or help others learn. "The others will do it anyway," they reason. "Why should I try?" Students who have doubts about their own skills may be shy or reluctant to participate if they know others will do the work.

The know-it-all is another story. A know-it-all (or two) may dominate the group and tell others the answers. I once saw a group of middle schoolers trying to solve a complex math problem together. (Their task was to solve the problem and give the answer as a group.) Two kids were doing most of the talking. When one of their (usually quiet) teammates ventured an opinion, both know-it-alls shushed her and told her to wait for them to deliver the answer.

How can teachers ensure individual accountability? First, make sure the team goal requires the learning and participation of all team members. For example, if the team goal is to score an average of 80 percent or better on a quiz, all students need to do well. Or a goal might be to write an outstanding report on a given country, with each chapter signed by a team member. Never choose an outcome one student could do alone. In addition, frequently reinforce the idea that the purpose of the team is to make sure that all members are learning, not just to get the right answers or complete the project. Explain why individual accountability is fair; students will readily understand why no team member should get a free ride.

During lessons, use informal cooperative structures that reinforce the idea of individual accountability. Teachers we work with in Success for All programs, for example, make frequent use of a technique called "random reporter." Each student is given a number from 1 to 5. When teachers ask a question, they direct it to a team and then pick a number at random. The student on that team with that number has to respond for the whole group-and the team can earn points based on the answer.

Practices like random reporter communicate consistently that teams must make sure all their members learn. Potential free riders understand that they will be held accountable and that they can't wait for their teammates to make all the effort. Know-it-alls realize that if they don't engage, teach, and give feedback to every team member, their team won't succeed. One middle school math teacher noted, "Students ... know they need to work hard on math problems and be ready to explain them. If they aren't ready, they can't get off the hook easily."

Finally, it's important that the teacher lets the work be challenging and doesn't step in too early to do the work for students who struggle. Doing so not only undermines teammates' developing interdependence, but also teaches students that if they feign helplessness, display apathy, or work slowly, the teacher will soon step in and complete the tasks. If kids instead learn to make appropriate levels of effort and to persist, they will build confidence in their ability to improve and learn. They'll realize that asking for help-not the answers-helps them learn. Letting students struggle constructively and safely in their teams enables each student to reflect on his or her thinking, compare it with others' ideas, and refine that thinking before sharing it with the class-or on a test.

Setting up structures that promote effective cooperative learning is not enough. Team members need to know how to make good use of the opportunity to work with one another; this means they need to learn about, practice, and refine key interpersonal skills.

Active listening. Active listening skills are essential in good group work-and in life. When students are listening well, their eyes are on the speaker and they occasionally nod. Active listeners avoid interrupting but periodically summarize what they hear and ask for clarification when needed. These practices communicate respect for the speaker and enable the listener to learn as much as possible from that speaker's words.

Explaining ideas and opinions. Team members need this skill to communicate and persuade in cooperative interactions. Explaining must go beyond single-word answers; students must be able to identify sources or reasons for their personal opinions or conclusions. They must explain their ideas to others so that peers can understand them too. This demands metacognition, evidentiary thinking, summarizing, paraphrasing, and listening to others thoughtfully.

Encouraging teammates. Effective team members know how to encourage and support teammates, disagree with dignity, and help maintain a positive, prosocial tone within the group. Tell students you expect them to make sure that all team members are actively participating in the thinking parts of the group's tasks. Teach them how to make that happen.

Explaining your own ideas while also encouraging others is a complex skill that demands that students respect one another. Guide kids to make teamwork time a safe environment in which to speak, receive feedback, and admit what they don't understand. Once students establish a productive working relationship, they can set goals together, monitor their own progress, and solve learning problems together.

Completing tasks. Students should be expected to work on the group's tasks until they are finished to a high standard and to ensure that at the end of a team study session, all participants have learned the class objective.

When students know what constitutes great work within their team, and reach that standard, they can be proud of themselves and of any recognition their group receives.

Cooperative learning should be seen as a key part of each lesson, but not the whole lesson. Effective class lessons might also include teacher instruction, media- or computer-based activities, and individual assessments of various kinds. Informal cooperative-learning activities such as random reporter or think-pair-share may also be used, but these shouldn't be the only cooperative activity.

The best way to use cooperative learning is to replace individual work, which in traditional lesson cycles happens after lessons and before assessments. Individual, isolated practice is boring and ineffective for most students, especially if they struggle. Cooperative learning makes practicing to mastery engaging and social and gives all students "study buddies" to help them when they run into difficulties.

Sometimes team activities may come before teacher instruction, as when teams are conducting experiments in a discovery learning format. But at some point, a teacher needs to explain the essential objectives and give students parameters and guidance for their group work so they can move forward.

I once observed a class of 9th graders who started the school year reading significantly below grade level. Their first-year teacher worked hard to provide a research-based cooperative learning model in which they would read a wide variety of complex texts, discuss them in teams, and prepare one another to participate in class discussions. However, students weren't making the desired progress. As the teacher looked for what was missing, she noticed students were sloppy in their work and slow to complete tasks. Although they often talked to one another, they weren't helping one another.

The first change this educator made was holding each student individually accountable for the work. The second was providing and discussing with the class rubrics for high-quality answers or comments in discussions. Students and teachers practiced scoring sample answers and exchanged feedback.

Then she made the task more interesting, challenging, personal, and relevant. She asked students to read closely and compare several journal articles about the science of emotions. Team members were to help one another answer questions that required more than recitation of facts from the articles, but to individually form their own hypotheses about the author's intent in writing the articles-and support those hypotheses with evidence from the texts.

In a few days, when the students realized that the teacher wasn't going to dilute this work to save time, they dug into the articles. Discussions flourished. Well-structured cooperative learning and recognition of work that met the standards of the rubrics ultimately transformed this class from remedial to advanced. When the students were asked what they thought about how their class was changing, one girl summed it up: "When I work with my teammates and we use the rubrics and our brains, we know we have a good answer. We're proud to show what we know-we are ready for any of us to report out."

Used properly, cooperative learning is an exciting way for all kids to learn. Research finds that if teachers make the five elements discussed here part of group learning, students learn more, feel more successful, love school, and enjoy the subject they're studying-and like and accept one another (Roseth et al., 2008; Slavin, 2013; Webb, 2008). For outcomes like these, it's worth the effort.

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Five key practices bring out the tremendous potential of this approach.

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"Cooperative learning  is based on the philosophy that education should be learner-centered and learner-directed; that learners can be teachers; and that teachers are guides and facilitators rather than the source of all knowledge and direction,"
Tamah (2012)

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Engagement Levels in a Graphic Design Clicker Class: Students’ Perceptions around Attention, Participation and Peer Learning  ( Gachago, Morris, and Cape, 2011)

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Incorporating reading in math.  In the video, students are working together in structured small groups to solve problems that involve representing situations algebraically and then finding a solution. Each small group includes a reader, translator, annotator, and double-checker. (Annenberg, 2016)

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Video and Reflection: Now watch Deconstructing Word Problems, in which students are working together in structured small groups to solve problems that involve representing situations algebraically and then finding a solution. Each small group includes a reader, translator, annotator, and double-checker. Each group also has a graphic organizer on which they capture their thinking. You may want to take notes on the questions below.

Before you watch: How do you support student engagement in making sense of mathematics texts and other instructional resources? What indicators do you use to monitor whether these supports work?

Watch the video: As you watch, pay attention to the different roles students take on and the purpose of each role. Note the different ways Ms. Gay supports student engagement in making sense of the mathematical text as they enact these roles.

Deconstructing Word Problems

Students in Kelly Gay's class work together in specific roles (reader, translator, annotator, double-checker) to solve mathematical word problems.

Teacher: Kelly Gay

School: Centennial Campus Magnet Middle School, Raleigh, NC

Grade: 6

Discipline: Mathematics

Lesson Topic: Translating real-world scenarios into algebraic equations

Lesson Month: November

Number of Students: 19

Other: School uses Sheltered Instructional Observation Protocol

Reflect: How do the assigned roles and the graphic organizer support student sense making of the mathematics text? What strategies do you see used in this classroom that might also work in your own classroom?

What if student collaboration to make sense of mathematics text is not a possibility? Sometimes it is important to see how well students can make sense of text as they solve mathematics problems on their own, particularly as you prepare students to engage in the rich non-routine mathematics tasks that are likely to be included in many assessments that reflect the expectations of the CCSSM. How might students learn to make sense of mathematics materials when they are working alone?

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Video and Reflection: Now watch Deconstructing Word Problems, in which students are working together in structured small groups to solve problems that involve representing situations algebraically and then finding a solution. Each small group includes a reader, translator, annotator, and double-checker. Each group also has a graphic organizer on which they capture their thinking.

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Number Talks can increase student participation.

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Number Talks can increase student participation.

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Cooperative Learning can be used to increase student engagement and participation in math. 

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Cooperative Learning can be used to increase student engagement and participation in math. 

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Clickers and Classroom Dynamics

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By Derek Bruff, Vanderbilt University

Classroom response systems create new opportunities for managing student discussions and assessing student learning.

What Are Clickers?

Clickers, or classroom or audience response systems, are instructional technologies that enable teachers to rapidly collect and analyze student responses to questions during class. The following sequence is a typical use of such a system.

1. A teacher poses a multiple-choice question to his or her students via an overhead or computer projector.

2. Each student submits an answer to the question using a handheld transmitter that beams a radio frequency signal to a receiver attached to the teacher's computer.

3. Software on the teacher's computer collects the students' answers and produces a bar chart showing how many students chose each of the answer choices.

4. The teacher makes instructional choices "on the fly" in response to the bar chart by, for example, leading students in a discussion of the merits of each response or asking students to discuss the answer in small groups.

A number of classroom response systems are on the market, and the particular functions of each system vary. See Barber and Njus (2007) for a comparison of some leading vendors.

Teaching with Clickers

Instructors can use clickers for a variety of classroom activities. Straightforward uses include taking attendance and administering in-class quizzes. These methods increase efficiency, but other uses can dramatically change the classroom dynamic.

For instance, clickers can be used for warming up the class prior to a discussion. Asking students to submit their answers to a question individually-without talking about it with their neighbor-allows all students time to think about the question and commit to an answer before a class-wide discussion. Compared with taking the first hand that is raised after a question is asked, this approach sets the stage for greater participation and engagement.

In "peer instruction," a strategy popularized by Harvard University physics professor Eric Mazur (1997), the teacher poses a question, students answer individually, and the bar chart showing their responses is displayed. If a significant number of students choose the wrong answer, students are asked to discuss the question with those sitting nearby. After a few minutes of discussion, the students submit their answers again. Often, but not always, the students converge on the correct answer as a result of the peer instruction. This technique can lead to a lecture hall buzzing with hundreds of students discussing the topic.

Clickers also enable what is called "contingent teaching" by Draper and Brown (2004) and "agile teaching" by Beatty, Gerace, Leonard, and Dufresne (2006). Since clickers can be used to gauge what students do and do not understand during class, instructors can use the results of clicker questions to change the course of their lessons "on the fly." If the results show that most students understand a concept, then the instructor moves on. If the results indicate that many students are still confused, then the teacher can spend more time on that topic via lecture, class discussion, or even another clicker question.

Clicker Questions

Many instructors begin using clickers by asking straight-forward, factual questions. These instructors are often happily surprised to hear about other types of clicker questions that do more to engage their students and reveal more about their students learning.

For instance, Mazur asks his students the following conceptual question (which he calls a "ConcepTest."): "Imagine holding two identical bricks under water. Brick A is just beneath the surface of the water, while brick B is at a greater depth. Is the force needed to hold brick B in place larger than, the same as, or smaller than the force required to hold brick A in place?" Although Mazur could ask a computational question focusing on the same principle, he uses this question to assess his students' conceptual understanding independent of their computational skills. This is useful because he finds that many students can solve computational problems without developing accurate conceptual understanding.

Clicker questions can also focus on critical thinking skills. For example, professor Mike Dorsher, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, uses clickers in his course on mass media ethics to engage students in discussions of the following ethical dilemma.

In the 1990s, the Unabomber sent a manifesto to the editors of certain large newspapers, demanding that they publish it. If they did not, he said he would continue his mail bombing campaign. Dorsher first uses clickers to have his students vote on the most important values and loyalties involved in the ethical dilemma these editors faced. Then he asks them to determine which of several classical ethical philosophies would be consistent with those values and loyalties. By having his students use the peer technique described above, Dorsher helps them develop critical thinking skills important in the field of ethics.

Questions can also connect abstract theory with students' personal experiences. In a class on attachment theory, Vanderbilt University professor Robert Innes asks his students, "Have you ever personally followed someone around or conspired to run into them?" and "If you did follow someone or conspire to meet them, did you do that alone or with a close friend?" Innes has his male and female students answer these questions separately. As students see how their peers respond to these questions, they see the relevance of the theory to their "real life" experiences and are more engaged with the conceptual material of the lesson. Since the clickers allow for anonymous responses, students can respond more honestly than they would without the technology.

Instructors can ask a variety of other questions with clickers-computational questions, opinion questions, questions asking students to predict the outcome of an in-class experiment, and more.

Why Use Clickers?

Clickers promote active participation, engagement, and discussion among all students, even those who might not participate in typical class-wide discussions. Clickers can also be assessment tools, providing students with useful and motivational feedback on their own learning, and providing instructors with information about student learning that helps them respond to immediate student learning needs.

Research on classroom response systems indicates that when used with active learning techniques such as peer instruction, clickers can improve student learning in measurable ways (Crouch and Mazur, 2001). Furthermore, students appreciate the anonymity of clicker systems, as well as the opportunity to test their understanding against their peers. See Caldwell (2007) for a recent review of the literature.

Clickers also have a certain novelty factor that appeals to both students and teachers, at least initially. Even when the novelty wears off, there is still the sense of anticipation that builds just before the bar chart showing the students responses is revealed. For these and other reasons, many instructors who start using clickers find them such an enjoyable and effective instructional tool that they cannot imagine teaching without them.

References & Resources

Barber, M., & Njus, D. (2007). Clicker Evolution: Seeking Intelligent Design. CBE-Life Sciences Education, 6(1), 1-8.

Beatty, I., Gerace, W., Leonard, W., & Dufresne, R. (2006). Designing Effective Questions for Classroom Response System Teaching. American Journal of Physics, 74(1), 31-39.

Caldwell, J. (2007). Clickers in the Large Classroom: Current Research and Best-Practice Tips. CBE-Life Sciences Education, 6(1), 9-20.

Case, S., & Swanson, D. (2002). Constructing Written Test Questions for the Basic and Clinical Sciences. Philadelphia: National Board of Medical Examiners.

Crouch, C., & Mazur, E. (2001). Peer Instruction: Ten Years of Experience and Results. American Journal of Physics, 69(9), 970-977.

Draper, S., & Brown, M. (2004). Increasing Interactivity in Lectures Using an Electronic Voting System. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 20(2), 81-94.

Mazur, E. (1997). Peer Instruction: A User's Manual. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

For more on teaching with clickers, visit the Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching resource page on clickers. It features more types of clicker questions and activities, as well as an extensive bibliography arranged by discipline.

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By Derek Bruff, Vanderbilt University Classroom response systems create new opportunities for managing student discussions and assessing student learning. Clickers, or classroom or audience response systems, are instructional technologies that enable teachers to rapidly collect and analyze student responses to questions during class. The following sequence is a typical use of such a system.

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Clickers (SRS) can be used to increase student participation 

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Clickers (SRS) can be used to increase student participation 

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Some students  and teachers feel that the inclusion of clickers helped them to better learn and understand course material.  Clickers can also attribute to more participation from all students.  (Gok, 2007)

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Number Talks by Sherry Perish.  If I establish essential procedures and expectations for Number Talks, will I also increase student participation?
Will Number Talks enhance student enjoyment, engagement, andincrease  intrinsic motivation?
(Perish, 2010)

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Using "Math Talks" to increase student participation (Wagganer, 2015)

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Use these five strategies to encourage meaningful classroom discussions.

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If I incorporate Kagan structures, will I also increase student participation and engagement?
(Kagan, 2011)

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kagan publishing teaching catalog teacher resources school supplies music games cooperative learning differentiated instruction educational products esl ell foreign language posters multiple intelligences textbooks math books science literature social studies

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Kagan's FREE Articles - Kagan Structures: A Miracle of Active Engagement

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Read Dr. Spencer Kagans provocative and insightful articles on Kagan Structures and how they have the power to transform education. Cooperative learning, multiple intelligences, the brain, character development, Win-Win Discipline.

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Read about research: Student participation in elementary mathematics classrooms (Ink, Franke, Webb, 2015)

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Students do not participate often during Number Corner (calendar time) instruction.  This time of the day is very teacher-led.  I want to find activities, strategies, and interventions to increase student engagement and participation.

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(Executive Board of the Michigan Council for Teachers of Mathematics, 2007)
Can writing in math icrease participation and lead to a richer understanding of mathematics?

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My focus: I plan to study the impact of increasing participation in the classroom environment, because I want to find out, if implementing  new strategies will effect change and show improvement in learning outcomes in math.

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All teachers want their classrooms to be engines of learning where students feel inspired to focus, think, and participate and know that they are expected to perform. There are many ways to create this kind of high-performance learning environment, from changing the way your room looks to rethinking your class structure. Let's look at a few ideas and options to get started.
Setting the Standard
How do you set a high standard for student performance? It starts with your own vision for each class, before the school year begins. When you imagine your ideal classes, what do you see-what would you like to see? Students going over peer edits in pairs? Small groups analyzing a text or image? Whole-class discussions with full participation? Discussions led by students instead of you? Once you know what you want to see, brainstorm ideas for making it happen. How can you structure your classes to allow for this kind of activity? It might mean shortening lectures or moving them offline by flipping your classroom, at least part of the time. Or it could mean creating a new routine that allows students to move from lecture to discussion to individual work more frequently. As the school year progresses, you can fine-tune your changes. Learn more about " Starting in September ".

Once you have a strategy and a goal, explain them clearly to your students. Most teachers hand out a set of rules for behavior at the beginning of the year that describe policies for homework, grading, attendance, etc. Add your expectations for student performance to that handout. What level of analysis do you expect in class discussions? How often do you expect them to lead a small group through an assignment? How often will you ask someone to engage you in a dialogue in front of the class? How many revisions will they be expected to do for major pieces of writing? These specific guidelines alert students to the level of performance you are expecting of them.
Staging the Room
In the elementary grades, there can be more flexibility to create open spaces and small group learning stations than in the middle and high school grades because there is more understanding that younger students need to move around and shift focus over the course of the school day. Since their students are in the same room for most of the day, elementary teachers have developed many clever ways to change up the scenery from morning to afternoon. Gathering in reading circles, moving through stations, and creating places for quiet, independent work are all part of this environment.

Observe the classrooms in these workshops to see examples of engaging learning environments:

But what about the older grades? Most middle and high school classrooms do not feature cozy rugs and library corners. Step into the average 8 th or 11 th-grade classroom and you still find rows of desks facing the front of the room. Students don't move around the room, and their focus remains in one place for the duration of the class. Teachers who are in constant motion may see this as a positive, but it can be paralyzing for students. When the body checks out, the mind often follows, and the longer a student is not allowed to move or speak, the more likely it is that s/he will drift. Students fight this battle to keep their minds alert while their bodies remain static every day.

In the older grades, you can address this threat to high performance in a few ways. An easy place to start is the seating chart. It's easy to seat students in pairs without having to restructure your whole classroom; once this is done, take a few short breaks during your lecture to allow the student pairs to share notes, ask questions, or complete a quick activity or solve a problem. When you resume your lecture, begin by asking a few pairs for their thoughts or solutions. Change the seating chart frequently so students end up working with everyone in the class at least once a term. In addition, work in opportunities for collaborative grouping and for independent study to allow introverts time to work alone.
Making Tactical Changes
Here are some quick ideas for ramping up student performance:

Question the content. Why do we need to learn history? When will we ever use this math again? Why do we need to graph this data? Do regular reality checks on the subject at hand, and don't provide the answers-guide students to find and describe real applications of and real meaning in the work they are doing. If that meaning is hard to find, challenge students to delve into the subject and find a purpose for it.

Re-evaluate your routine. Is every part of your class structure working? For example, if you always have students do a quick problem before your lecture, and you answer the problem in your lecture, students may just skip solving the problem. That's wasted time for you and for them. Consider shifting the activity from written to oral by asking students how they would solve the problem. Then incorporate their responses into your lecture.

Create a space for vulnerability. This is hard. School is a public forum and many students don't want to make themselves vulnerable by participating in class. It's up to you to model vulnerability: be willing to say "I don't know", be willing to laugh at yourself, be willing to change your mind based on what you hear from your students. Be in real dialogue with your students-let them see that their ideas can impact your own. When you are willing to let students shine their own spotlight on you, they will be more willing to also step into it themselves.

Most important to high-performance is this golden rule: generate goodwill. If students see that you are consistently respectful and thoughtful, they will participate more readily and sign on to your vision. When students see that you are committed to increasing their performance, they will more readily share that commitment. Learn more about building student trust, no matter what subject you teach, by watching The Art of Teaching the Arts, workshop 5, " Creating Rich Learning Environments" and reading our blog post " Get Ready: Build a Learning Community."

For more on creating a High-Performance Learning Environment, see The Learning Classroom: Theory into Practice for all K-12 teachers.
(This post was originally published on Feb 4, 2015.) Image Copyright: michaeljung / 123RF Stock Photo

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Creating a High-Performance Learning Environment

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All teachers want their classrooms to be engines of learning where students feel inspired to focus, think, and participate and know that they are expected to perform. There are many ways to create this kind of high-performance learning environment, from changing the way your room looks to rethinking your class structure.