...It feels like the Xmas holiday was so long ago now. This week back has kind of just carried on from where I was last term. I mentioned in a previous blog how I disliked doing group work, particulaly moving students out of their seats and working amongst new people. I had found a good seating system which worked very well in terms of behaviour, additionally I was very reluctant to get students working in groups; this always caused too much noise and it appeared too many students were off task.
As normal practice, I was observed in a lesson by my mentor this week. I split the students into mixed ability groups and gave them a topic to research on which they had to do a mini presentation on. This lesson went smoother and was much more hassle free than other group lesson I have taught with this group. I think the improvement was partly down to me reiterating my expectations of them before they began the task; that I expected the same behaviour and work from them as when they are sat in their normal seats. I also found that even though I set them 10minutes for the task that it needed to be broken down and not just left to their own devices. I worked my way around the groups, supervising and listening to their discussions and repeatedly stopped the whole class every 2-3 minutes to check progress and do some mini AFL questioning which appeared to keep them far more focused.
I was unrealstic in my time expectations of them but it was clear that they were doing what was asked and if anything thoroughly. This is certainly an approach I will adopt more regualrly in terms of group work.
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