Do you think your kid’s having a problem at school? If you’re a school staff (or even a parent), you might wonder what cooperative learning activities can help your child. At Bonneville Academy, we are here to assist you with your kids’ educational environment and learning activities for better performance. Discover more about cooperative learning in this post!
What is Cooperative Learning?
Cooperative learning entails academic and social learning experiences in the classroom. Students are instructed to execute work as a group towards a common goal. It is believed that cooperative learning fosters healthy interpersonal relationships, generates a drive to learn, and boosts self-esteem.
They promote favorable social outcomes, such as positive inter-group connections and the capacity to collaborate with others. Also, these activities provide the ideal opportunity to demonstrate concern for students. These exercises teach kids how to engage with one another and help them become acquainted.
By maintaining social competency, middle school students can balance satisfying their own needs and fostering meaningful relationships with others. Understanding cooperative behaviors encourage kids to negotiate with others, develop inventive problem-solving techniques, and value each group member.
The Components of Cooperative Learning
- Engagement and results
- Individual obligation to maintain student responsibility and proper conduct
- Positive dependency results from each group member learning to rely on the rest of the group to fulfill the goal.
- Positive face-to-face interactions involve listening, promoting shared decision making, individual responsibilities, and training on how to offer and take feedback.
- Group processing enables the team to discuss how successfully the group achieved its objective and maintained a productive working relationship.
Cooperative Learning Activities
Here are the following cooperative learning exercises to try throughout the first week of school. You can use many ones of varying grade levels based on their expertise.
The Spider Web
This one is very entertaining! You will need a ball of yarn or string of any color. Students should sit in a circle on the carpet or in chairs. Begin with oneself. Give your name and a brief description of yourself.
Then, select a pupil across the circle and roll or pass the ball to them. This student states his name and one personal fact. The game continues until each student has had a turn, and the circle is covered with a crisscrossing web of string.
Consider how each individual is a part of the web, which represents the classroom, and how the classroom would be incomplete without each individual’s contribution. When the reflection is complete, have one student release their string to demonstrate what occurs when one person is left out of the web. It falls apart. We do not want our network (or classroom) to fail!
You can make the game easier by having students choose the next student, or you can make it more difficult by requiring them to share something about themselves, such as their favorite dish. In either case, the game is enjoyable and demonstrates the inclusion of all pupils.
Find Someone Who
This is similar to an interview in that students are asking questions. However, each student is asked only one question. Again, determine the questions based on the age level of the pupils. Initially, the game was intended to use qualities instead of questions. In any case, the objective is for pupils to converse with multiple classmates.
For the second-grade students, you can build a grid that is approximately 4 x 3 and lists 12 questions or traits in each box. Students must find another student, ask them one question, and then have them sign this box.
Graffiti
This is one of the best activities, particularly for high school students. In this assignment, you can construct six pieces of chart paper, each containing a single sentence. Divide the kids into groups and give them a marker.
Students answer the prompt on each chart paper as they flip through the chart paper. Since each student is holding a marker, each student must write something. Simplify the statements at the beginning of the year, but as the year develops, increase their complexity, even incorporating academic questions to assess information.
Jigsaw
Students are divided into “home groups” and “expert groups,” Each is assigned a unique subtopic within the same broad subject. Students conduct studies on their themes with others who have the same topic and then return to their home group to instruct them on their topic. All the components come together to make a whole product.
This is beneficial because it encourages student engagement and holds them accountable for their learning. It is genuinely cooperative in that every student must contribute for all group members to gain knowledge of the topics. This can be applied across subject areas and with various themes, allowing students to act as instructors.
The Interview
The interview is straightforward. For younger children, utilize images; for older students, generate a list of questions from which they can choose which to record. Two students will be placed together and will conduct interviews with one another.
The student who led the discussion will provide a report on the interviewee. This reporting can be accomplished within a week or so. My kids cannot sit still while hearing about more than 20 classmates. I often do interviews on a single day and report over several days.
Help The Kids Learn!
The cooperative learning technique is effective because it requires students to collaborate not only inside their groups but also as a class. Students must verify that they are reading what other students have written and generating fresh ideas instead of simply replicating what is already there.
All students are held accountable since they must write down their ideas, and group members who struggle to come up with something to write down are assisted. But this activity wouldn’t be effective if not worked with professional teachers and a school.
Bonneville Academy is here to guide you and your kids if you’re ever stuck on what school your kid must go to. Contact us or visit the school to learn more about our school programs and activities!
