This study presents the results of a national survey of 1500 K-2 teachers describing understandings and practices related to guided reading. Results focused on five questions: What is the purpose of guided reading groups? What grouping techniques should be used? What texts should be used? How is instruction planned with and away from the teacher?…

Advocates the use of two frameworks, "gathering" and "sharing," for junior high school homework assignments that connect the classroom to the outside world and make students responsible for some of their own learning. (NKA)

This book provides educators with the background and procedures needed to conduct group investigation, a method for classroom instruction in which students work collaboratively in small groups to examine, experience, and understand their topic of study. Significantly different from traditional instruction, group investigation is designed to appeal…

To help committed student writers make the transition from school-sponsored to self-sponsored forms of discourse, an advanced expository writing course combines student-chosen writing assignments with a pedagogical structure that promotes a sensitive and critical response to prose. The class is organized into writing groups containing four or five…

Describes how less able students were motivated when assigned the task of inviting and being responsible for guest speakers from the community. (CRH)

Considers cooperative reading and study groups and suggests activities designed to enhance individual learning and study skills for such groups. (NKA)

Several years of research support a differentiated system of supervision in which teachers can choose from among four different supervision styles. With the clinical style, intense observation and feedback is conducted by a trained supervisor. Cooperative professional development consists of small teams of peers working together for their mutual…

This manual was prepared for use by adult education teachers in facilitating a self-directed learning (SDL) group for students based on the modules described in the manual. The SDL group involves 10 sessions with specific objectives and activities for each session. Following an introduction, the manual is organized in five additional sections. The…

Noting that collaboration can enhance children's ability to solve problems of increasing difficulty, this paper discusses the theory of collaborative talk in the classroom and how it can be applied. The first section of the paper introduces the notion of collaborative talk by describing a classroom setting and offering an excerpt of two children…

This two-volume set offers 16 narrative case studies and a facilitator's guide. Cases were written by teachers about their personal experiences with teaching and groupwork, especially the problematic situations and dilemmas they faced. Groupwork is a well-documented and highly recommended strategy for enhancing students' academic, cognitive,…

Reports on the impact of an introductory biology course sequence that incorporated experience-based, group learning. Achievement results indicate that students were not disadvantaged by this new approach and, in fact, displayed a superior grasp of group-work, open lab utilization, and creative problem solutions. Attitudes regarding anxiety over…

Peter Elbow's concepts of "pointing,""summarizing,""telling," and "showing" can form an effective method for training students to give reader-based feedback to peer writing. In pointing, students jot down all the words and phrases they can remember from an oral reading of a draft. These lists stimulate…

This document includes a final report and curriculum manual from a project to help adult educators teach team training by developing a curriculum for use in teaching teamwork skills in work force literacy programs and by providing two half-day seminars to assist adult educators with effectively using the curriculum. The manual for work force…

This monograph explores the current use in higher education of cooperative learning, the instructional use of small groups so that students work together to maximize their own and each other's learning. The opening section sets out to define cooperative learning, and to look at the history of the technique, its basic elements, types of cooperative…