Cooperative Learning

Today I attended my first summer workshop, well, half a day of it! No babysitter this afternoon =(
Anyways, it was all about collaborative learning and ways to get your kids discussing and learning with each other. A few things sparked my interest (minus the peanut M&M's, Diet Sundrop, and fudge Pop-Tarts I brought along!)
The first was a Kagan strategy for calling on students or teamwork management. Kagan suggests assigning letters and numbers to students, then when you want a discussion leader for instance, say, "OK, all the number 1's begin." The important thing here is that there were some cute "maps" on our tables. Each was divided into fourths and labeled with a letter and number (gives more options). I had to come home and recreate a few. Not sure which I like most from all my new Lettering Delights graphics (bugs, animals, letters, travel!), so enjoy all or one! Just tape in the middle of your tables and leave for the year!

I updated the file! I forgot to rotate the top ones so they'd face the kids on that side of the table! OPPS!

Click here to download a zip file with several options.

 Another thing I l-o-v-e-d where these questioning cubes and dice. I know we have all probably used beach balls with question stems, but what set these apart was that you used two spinners or cubes to form a higher level question. They were great! You could make out of foam dice from Dollar Tree or Target dollar spot. If you have a Smart Board you can create spinners! Oh, the possibilities!

If you are interested in more files, Laura Candler has lots for free on her site. Tomorrow I will post about using AlphaBoxes for preassessing or reviewing. My file is saved at work!