Reading Reflection 4

The first chapter defines what group work is, and how teachers can act as engineers to delegate tasks rather than being the sole body every student looks up to for information. Students learn from each other, whether through discussion and debate to mirroring tasks, and the teacher should be there as a manager,
We’ve learned these theories a lot in Dr. Lawler’s mathematics content course on how teachers can effectively delegate tasks to students and to have students explore on their own. However, all of the settings in such a case have been demonstrated through an interactive mathematics approach. How can it be adapted to a more traditional mathematics curriculum?

The second chapter explains why group work is an effective strategy to teaching in the classroom. It has been explained in other texts learning through interaction greatly increases knowledge retention, and what is lacking in the traditional curriculum is associating problem solving with experiences.
I’m curious in what would happen if we related all learning content with experiences. I would imagine students retain content for longer periods because it is different than the traditional methods of teaching. More often we remember things which are unique, but if all the content we learn is through experiences, it will no longer become unique.

In chapter 3, the author discusses the problems faced with group work in the classroom, specifically the status of each of the student’s affect the outcome of the task. Just as there is a status hierarchy among adults, there exists such a hierarchy in students as well, and depending on that status, whether it be knowledge based or socially based, students have implicitly set roles according to their status. However, assigning roles to individuals can alleviate the problems associated with this type of thinking.
This has equity written all over it. Students come to class with different needs and status’. The teacher ends up providing equity among individuals by providing roles to certain individuals over others.

Group work takes a lot of time to establish in the classroom. I believe it is a really important concept to teach students, especially because any workplace requires group work, yet so many individuals are hesitant to work with others. How can we implement group work into the classroom in such little time, while covering content when other teachers are not mirroring group work as essential. Establishing the base to have students work in groups in a fluid manner takes time, and given 4 week periods in my specific case, can I establish it while covering content?