Forming “Teams” or “Discussion Groups” to Facilitate Learning

by Todd Zakrajsek, Teaching Professor

Learning is enhanced when the material to be learned is thought about deeply and also when related material is retrieved from memory and associated with the new material. When students have an opportunity to work together to learn course content, particularly when applying that material to a new challenge, both deep thinking and retrieval of associated materials are realized. Active and collaborative learning are regularly discussed in the literature, and when done well few debate their value in terms of impact on student learning (1, 2). Although some students resist anything that even resembles group work, most students understand the value of working in teams or in discussion groups. Responses from students indicate that they learn when they “reflect, dialogue, question, write, summarize, and create their own knowledge” (3).

http://cgi.stanford.edu/~dept-ctl/cgi-bin/tomprof/enewsletter.php?msgno=1315

Share on Facebook



from Educational Technology http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/uis/edtech/~3/QOa72P_HXzQ/