Along with establishing a collaborative environment in a classroom, teachers must find ways to ensure that every student is involved and engaged in the class objectives. Placing students into groups helps develops skills to learn to work with others. There are three types of grouping strategies that can be used: Randomized groups, teacher-assigned groups, and student chose groups. In an art classroom, teacher assigned groups might produces the best results. When a teacher has the power of uniquely placing students, they can do so by comparing the characteristics that they have observed of their students. This strategy would be more suitable after a few weeks of class, to give time for the development of the relationships and personalities of the students. At the start of the semester however, randomized grouping can work to facilitate students introducing themselves to each other. Student chose groups should fall the last in order later in the school term. By this time, relationships have been built, and students have a good understanding of who each other are.

This strategy is executed by pulling names that are on popsicle sticks or anything that you can write on out of a hat. As a form of randomized group work, teachers can use this method as a way for students to introduce themselves to each other while together. Because it is not a strict way of grouping students, selections are random.("30 Ways to Arrange Students for Group Work", 2017)

If you have a classroom where students have assigned desks, you can confuse them by rearranging the desks before they come in for the day. By switching students away from their normal tendencies, you can encourage students to work outside of their comfort zone and to be able to get a task completed while collaborating on-spot in group assignments. ("30 Ways to Arrange Students for Group Work", 2017)

When using the grouping strategy to separate students according to similar interests, a teacher has to be aware of the different interests of each student. You can learn of each student’s interests by observing over time and taking notes, discussion, or by having students partake in a survey. After getting the information needed, their teacher can put them together into small or large groups and have them connect their common interest to the task. Grouping students with similar beliefs allows the assignments to run more smoothly because the students in the groups are not exhausting time debating on contrasting decisions. Instead they can harmoniously work together, further creating stronger student-to-student relationships in your classroom ("30 Ways to Arrange Students for Group Work", 2017)

“Rows of students turn their desks to face one another. This is a very quick way to have students share ideas, listen or team up with a partner.” This is a very common and easy grouping strategy to conduct. A teacher’s role in this strategy is to roam the roam and observe the small groups as they work together on the tasks. Teachers are there to clarify the assignment’s agenda and instructions, and ensure that the groups are progressing in completing the task. ("30 Ways to Arrange Students for Group Work", 2017)

30 Ways to Arrange Students for Group Work. (2017). TeachHUB. http://www.teachhub.com/30-ways-arrange-students-group-work

            Collaborating occurs when two or more individuals work together to solve a problem or issue. To learn to adjust in any environment and be able to work with people from a variety of backgrounds is a very important trait to hold in the professional world. As a future high school art teacher, I hope to instill the importance of learning to understand others around them so that we can continue to pass down generations the ideology of working better to treat each other equally. “Collaborative learning teams are said to attain higher level thinking and preserve information for longer times than students working individually.”

A very important asset to collaborative learning is establishing group goals, as well as individual accountability. This keeps the group on task and establishes an overall purpose for the group. Before beginning an assignment, it is best to define goals and objectives to save time. ("20 Collaborative Learning Tips And Strategies For Teachers", 2017) Goal setting can be the easiest part of starting a project. In the world of art, setting goals is what keeps an artists of all ages mind’s churning.  

When working in a group to reach a primary goal, students must learn to respect and appreciate each other’s viewpoints and opinions in order to find success. For instance, class discussions can emphasize the need for different perspectives.  Students should be taught the value of having an understanding of the variety in perspectives people take each day. Art is all about a person finding ways of expressing themselves. Students can gain a value for diversity through their teacher. The first step is to educate the class on the many different cultures of this world. ("20 Collaborative Learning Tips And Strategies For Teachers", 2017)

A concept that is largely overlooked about art is that it involves critical thinking and finding solutions to problems. Teachers should work to design assignments that allow room for varied interpretations.  “Different types of problems might focus on categorizing, planning, taking multiple perspectives, or forming solutions.” (20 Collaborative Learning Tips And Strategies For Teachers", 2017)

Many art projects begin with brainstorming or sketches of the vision a student might have or may have experienced. The model feedback strategy can be used by the instructor to set out an outline and instructions for an assignment. Then have students start to brainstorm and work on rough compositions of the project. After the rough studies are made, the instructor finds the students with the best drafts and presents them to the class on what directions they can go with the assignment. This helps because, students can relate more with their peers than the artists in their textbooks. After presenting each example, the instructor asks the class: What they notice or what stands out? What makes these pieces good examples? Or what they would change. “These affirmations set a tone for appreciating each other's work.” After the teacher answers the class’s questions, they can then open the table to open-table discussions between the students whose work was selected and the rest of the class. After we have a list on the board of pluses (+), I then ask the class if they have questions (?) for the author. “Asking for multiple questions instead of critiques helps me to reinforce the idea that, as authors and creators, it's important to solicit feedback and that everyone has the right to decide which feedback is most helpful for them.” (Block, 2017) 

20 Collaborative Learning Tips And Strategies For Teachers. (2017). Teachthought.com, from http://www.teachthought.com/pedagogy/20-collaborative-learning-tips-and-strategies/

Block, J. (2017). Nurturing Collaboration: 5 Strategies. Edutopia. Retrieved 9 February 2017, from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/nurturing-collaboration-5-strategies-joshua-block