I love groupwork. I think there are so many benefits to having students participate in groupwork not the least of which the skill will come in handy in the workplace.
However, I am student teaching a multi-session lesson in middle school and not everyone know how to work as a team. One would think that by middle school, they would have had experience and some training in teamwork. I was wrong. I should not be surprised. I don't remember being taught how to work effectively together with a group of classmates as a team. I was just told to work as a team.
Now that my lesson depend on effective teamwork, I learn that I need to make sure I teach teamwork before assigning teams. Confusion about roles, how to get along, how to interact, etc. affect a couple of teams and I ended up troubleshooting when I should be facilitating. I can see how setting expectations and groupwork training can make a difference. The next question is a good team building/how to work as a team curriculum unit. Who has done this effectively?
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