Sharon, Charlie and Charlotte

Leader for learning presents an opportunity for staff/children to write down their view on a subject. For example ‘what makes an incredible teacher’. Everyone has 5-10 minutes to write down their view on a post-it note. Time is then given for everyone to stand up and move around the room, meeting different people. When you partner up, you swap post-it notes and continue to the next partner. You then speak for your previous partner ‘Well, you’ll never guess what Alan says… he believes that a great teacher has a passion for learning and sees every child as unique and individual” and so on! 

Participants write down a personal experience in a learning community that they remember as a positive learning experience for them (e.g. school, cooking, workshop, extra curricular). Include how long the context has existed, how it was structured and why it was positive. Share your stories within the group and pick out similar attributes that stand out within the experience. Each group shares 3-4 and the facilitator writes them down. Discuss how we can implement them into practice and our teaching experiences.

Put up posters around the room with each learner attribute. Everyone moves around the room and adds to the attribute with activity ideas and provocations. Facilitator to collate ideas and produce a whole school document for staff to dip into.

This game is great for getting people to work as a group. Set up a circle of chairs for everyone except you.  Stand in the middle of the circle and invite the group to sit on the chairs.  Explain that the main goal of the game is to get a chair to sit on.  The way to achieve that aim is by saying a statement that is true for you, and also true for most players in the group.  So for example, if you have brown eyes, you can say “anyone who has brown eyes please change seat”. If that statement is true for anyone in the group, they must get up out of their chair and quickly move to a different chair. The game continues with the person left without a chair and he or she must then say something true for them and so the game goes on. Adapt accordingly to your learning objective eg ‘anyone who enjoys sport’- choose 2 to share why- what attributes does that show?

Set up an activity how you would for your children. Have the facilitator model the input and explain the activity. Get the staff to participate as the children would and have reflection points throughout where you talk about skills, learning opportunities and development of the whole child. Examples I have previously taught were in Beach School training, where I took 60 member of staff to the beach and went through the structure of a beach school activity, pausing to reflect on the ethos of ‘beach school’ and also a continuous provision workshop where I set up a table with materials and tools. We then talked about our environment being ‘The Third Teacher’ and how continuous provision is paramount. It was one of the most memorable moments in our staff meetings as we chatted, laughed and collaborated as we worked on our designs. 

Utilise teaching staff to share their knowledge and skills with the team. Everyone has got something to offer and in order to build and boost your staff, you should show them that you believe in them and encourage them to lead sessions. 

SOLO Taxonomy provides a mental model of learning outcomes to empower students to change the way they think about their learning outcomes, monitor their progress, and make informed decisions on their next steps.

The Prestructural level is when a student is not sure about the task and needs help.
The Unistructural level is when a student begins to grasp the concept and can provide one relevant idea.
The Multistructural level is when a student is able to contribute several relevant ideas but is not yet able to connect them.
The Relational level is when a student has several ideas and can connect them to the big ideas to show deeper understanding.
The Extended Abstract level is when a student has several related ideas to the big picture and can look at these ideas in a new and different way.

I like this interactive approach where students can use hand signs to show the level they are working at during the learning engagement and it facilitates teacher and peers discussions on how they can demonstrate the next level of thinking and understanding.

Natalie's "Curated Collaborative Resources"
Differentiated Thinking Tools and Strategies
1. See-Think-Me-We

Teachers using artwork, images, photography, or any form of visual media can use the See, Think, Me, We thinking routine to help students think critically about the media as well as make connections to their own lives and the world beyond.

See: what do you notice? Make observations

Think: what thoughts do you have?

Me: what connections can you make to your life and past experiences?

We: how might you connect this to bigger issues and ideas?

2.  6 thinking hat

"Six Thinking Hats" is a way of investigating an issue from a variety of perspectives, but in a clear, conflict-free way. It can be used by individuals or groups to move outside habitual ways of thinking, try out different approaches, and then think constructively about how to move forward. 

When you or your team are in blue hat mode, you focus on controlling your thinking and managing the decision-making process. You have an agenda, ask for summaries, and reach conclusions.

The green hat represents creative thinking. When you're "wearing" this hat, you explore a range of ideas and possible ways forward.

This hat represents feelings and instincts. When you're engaged in this type of thinking, you can express your feelings without having to justify them logically.

With yellow-hat thinking, you look at issues in the most positive light possible. You accentuate the benefits and the added value that could come from your ideas.

This hat is about being cautious and assessing risks. You employ critical judgment and explain exactly why you have concerns.

The white hat represents information gathering. Think about the knowledge and insights that you've collected already – but also the information you're missing, and where you can go to get it.

Sandra's "Curated Collaborative Resources"
The Jigsaw method is great for understanding systems in science, exploring concepts in social studies, unpacking a short story or informational text in language arts, looking at team strategies in sports, or any other subject, deepening conversations about complex issues or analyzing any type of work.
Whenever you can look at parts of the material and bring those together to make a new understanding of the whole, you should have student's jigsaw.

Jigsaw is also great as a review in preparation for an assessment: experts bring their summaries back to the jigsaw group and everyone remembers the material better.
Students who jigsaw are using the skills of collaboration, organization, reading, writing, and inquiry. At the same time, they are working together in a social setting that supports English language learners and enhances memory for all students.

Thanks to Elliot Aranson, who invented the Jigsaw method, we have this amazing way to collaborate in our classrooms. The Jigsaw Method allows one student to be part of a cooperative learning group and also be an expert! Each student in a jigsaw becomes the expert in one chunk of the work and then teaches that to the other group members.

Divide your students into groups – jigsaw is best when there are the same number of students in each team, but it will still work if there is an “odd man” in a group. (These are your jigsaw groups.)

Then, divide your content into the same number of chunks as you have students in each group. (Odd students can work in pairs.)
After you have your groups figured out, and your content divided into chunks, assign one person in each group to a chunk of the content. (so, if you have six chunks of content, then one person in each group of six is responsible for one chunk of that content. That’s their expert material.)

Independent study is an important part of the jigsaw. Set a time limit and have your students stay with their jigsaw and independently study their expert material. Assign specific tasks, or “look for” activities for each piece of content. 

Have students move to their expert groups. When they are with their expert group, have them work together to share ideas, and prepare to present their findings to their jigsaw group. It may be helpful to give them a structure for their presentation – like sentence starters, or cloze notes. This way important concepts are emphasized and student knowledge is expanded.

After collecting information as an expert and preparing a presentation for the jigsaw group, students return to their respective jigsaw groups. Here, students share their acquired knowledge. Their jigsaw partners inquire about what they are learning and take notes. Each participant presents what they've learned in their respective expert groups.

You can use the jigsaw method as a formative assessment since it enables you to identify any gaps in student understanding.
 
It is a great technique to increase student collaboration and facilitate their learning!


Jyoti's "Curated Collaborative Resources"

Offering learners a variety of ways to share their thinking in collaborative environments helps to differentiate the learning process. The following resources were selected as they can be adapted to address different areas of collaboration and differentiation - process, product, environment and content.

 

 

Visual thinking routines allow for all learners to share their thinking in a structured way that can be written, spoken, drawn or acted out, just to name a few ways. See, Think Wonder? Connect, extend, challenge? Simple, yet powerful, these routines give learners the time they need to process their ideas, before having to share with others. Or they can be used just to generate thinking within learners. Many of these routines are scafollded in a way that helps move student thinking from surface ideas, to more deeper thinking. These routines can be shared and used to further develop collaboration amongst learners of any age. 

 

 

Youcubed emphasizes the importance of collaboration, discussion and having all students feel that their ideas are valued. Their lessons are constructed with these key ideas in mind, so the learning engagements are open ended, have discussion points built into the lessons, and encourage positive conversations that help students build on the ideas of one another through sentence stems, and opportunities to share in small group and whole class discussions in ways that invite responses and feedback from peers. I have used their challenges with all ages of learners and they always ensure great conversation, critical thinking and teamwork.

 

 

This past year I had the pleasure of watching a group of 5th grade students bring a Minecraft world alive through their collaboration. Why not have teachers use it as a teamwork exercise? Plan the new teacher workspace or complete a team building challenge! Last year, my student’s used their understanding of area model and collaboration skills to construct a model school in the Minecraft world. Student’s talked with one another, constructed their buildings, screen recorded their process and shared with their classmates for feedback on their designs. Student’s also used Minecraft Education to collaboratively demonstrate their understanding of our changing earth. Working together to build landforms. This is just one tiny glimpse into the collaborative power of Minecraft Education.


Sabrina’s “Curated Collaborative Resources”

http://buildingpublicunderstanding.org/assets/files/chalk_talk.pdf   (Silence chalk talk)

http://buildingpublicunderstanding.org/assets/files/wagon_wheels.pdf  (Fun wagon wheel)

https://www.nsrfharmony.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/blind_count_0.pdf  (Challenging blind count)

Planning a 45 minutes staff training session on “Community values and our responsibilities” as a first session, leading to the 2nd session “Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE)”, 

using “Silence Chalk talk+Rumours protocol+Gallery walk” as collaborative skills. 

Time: approximately 45 minutes

White A3 papers on the wall, sticky notes, pens and A4 white paper on each table.

Relevant questions wrote in a center circle on the A4 paper on the table. 

Questions: 

What are all community members entitled to? 

     - I believe that everyone should have…

   - I believe that everyone should feel…

   - I believe that everyone should be able to…

Step 1: Write your answers down on a sticky note and walk around silently. Find the people who have the same ideas (maximum 5 people) and wrote your main ideas on a A3 paper on the wall, put your sticky notes around your main ideas.       15 minutes 

Step 2:  Go to a different idea group silently with your group and make comments on their A3 paper.       10 minutes

Step 3:  Have a gallery walk silently by yourself. Find one that you connect most with and on a sticky note write down an example of how you have fostered or enabled this already, ot how you plan to.       10 minutes

Step 4: Read the pamphlet “Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE” on your table silently

and write down a few sentences of your understanding the impact of values and attitudes within RSE teaching and learning in the padlet sending to you earlier in the email.   10 minutes 

It is done for this session. Next session, we will carry on the session  to “ Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE)”. 

This is a great tool for teaching Science across all age groups and offers mini-lessons and longer classes that include activities for students to work on collaboratively whilst discovering new concepts and exploring new ideas. The lesson linked requires students to work together to discover how much of the planet's water is ice, salt or fresh. The videos that accompany the lessons can either be shown as a whole class or guided by individual groups and many of the tasks offer opportunities for discussion based on conclusions at the end. 

Drama is an excellent way for students to collaborate and the use of Freeze Frames is great to get them thinking about individual characters and the wider situation of other characters too. If a 'Freeze Frame' is like pressing pause on a remote, the teacher can also hit play to start the live drama from each group, along with fast forward to move the story on to maybe show predictions as to what could happen next, or rewind to act out previous events. The need to work together is emphasised by the requirement of knowing what each character may say or do in any given situation and each person in the group needs to respond on the spot. 

One of the first steps to successful collaboration is the skill to listen. This engagement gets students to listen to others and recount the information. In pairs, students are explicitly asked to listen and be ready to share their partner's experience. Questions could range from opinions; what they at that morning; or what they are looking forward to doing that day.

This is again another engagement that works on the skills of collaboration rather than using collaboration to achieve something greater.

3. Jigsaw puzzle reading
1) Assign each student to a "home group" of 3-5 students who reflect a range of reading abilities.
2) Determine a set of reading selections and assign one selection to each student.
3) Create "expert groups" that consist of students across "home groups" who will read the same selection.
4) Give all students a framework for managing their time on the various parts of the jigsaw task.
5) Provide key questions to help the "expert groups" gather information in their particular area.
6) Provide materials and resources necessary for all students to learn about their topics and become "experts."

4. Peeling the fruit
Peeling the Fruit thinking routine can be used to develop understanding of a complex topic over the course of days or weeks. It tracks and guides the exploration of a topic and requires students to look at the topic in a number of different ways. Works well with poetry, artwork, and much other complex material that is usually difficult for students to comprehend.
You can download the peeling the fruit template here http://www.rcsthinkfromthemiddle.com/uploads/2/3/4/1/23418034/peeling_the_fruit_template.pdf

Chalk Talk

4. People write as they feel moved. There are likely to be long silences — that is natural, so allow plenty of wait time before deciding it is over.