Attention to diversity: designing a collaborative activity (1h. long)
Special Education Needs provision within Mainstream Education
1st Activity: ‘At a
Glance’
1. Timing: 20 minutes.
-
2 minutes
for the first approach.
-
15
minutes for looking for answers.
-
3 minutes
for agreement within each group.
2. Material needed:
-
Information
structured in four parts.
-
Sellotape
to paste the information in the walls.
-
6 papers
with the 8 questions written.
3. Initial organization:
-
We have
divided the whole information into 4 parts and paste them in the walls.
-
The class
is organized in groups (the fixed ones for this subject).
-
We allow
two minutes for one member of each group to have a glance at the 4 parts.
-
There
will be one member of the group in charge of writing.
-
We
provide each group a paper with 8 questions (2 for each part of the text). Each group will have them ordered in a
different way so there won’t be many people looking for the same information at
the same time.
4. Rules of the activity:
-
The time
starts and one member (the runner) has to run and look for the answers of the
given questions. Go back to the group
and tell the writer. The rest of members
have to listen carefully.
5. Evaluation:
-
All
answers will be gathered and evaluated later.
-
Also
rapidity will be taken into account.
-
2nd Activity: ‘Group of Experts’ –
(modified ‘Pictured Card Album’)
1. Timing: 25 minutes.
-
5 minutes
for first reading.
-
15
minutes for explanations.
-
5 minutes
for making the questions.
2. Material needed:
-
Information
structured in four parts five times (to provide with one copy to each member of
each group).
-
Information
structured in five parts (to provide information to the one 5 member group).
3. Initial organization:
-
The class
is organized in groups (the fixed ones for this subject).
-
We
divided the information into 4 parts (and 5 parts for one group).
-
Provide
each member of each group with one part.
4. Rules of the activity:
-
Each
member has to read its part.
-
Once the
information is understood, each member has to explain it to the rest of the
members of the group.
-
The group
has to elaborate 4 (5) questions regarding the whole text.
§
Each
member has to think a question from other’s texts.
5. Evaluation:
-
Assessment
on quality of the questions will be done.
3rd Activity: ‘The Number’
1. Timing: 15 minutes.
-
5 minutes
for answering
-
10
minutes to comment and improve answers.
2. Material needed:
-
Questions
from the previous activity.
3. Initial organization:
-
Every
student will be associated with a number.
-
Questions
from the previous activity will be exchanged between groups.
4. Rules of the Activity:
-
Once the
questions are exchanged between groups, a number will be chosen randomly.
-
The
student with that number will be the one that would have to answer to the
questions of its group.
-
Once
questions are answered the rest of the class will assess the answers and
provide ideas for improving the answer (if improvement is needed).
5. Evaluation:
-
Individual
knowledge will be assessed as well as mates’ contributions.
Our evaluation
after the activities were done:
We will first
show an evaluation of the participants’ attitudes towards the topic and by
activity; then we will try to provide a self evaluation for the activities
proposed.
Participants’
Assessment:
There were 5
groups structured as follows:
Group
A: Chusa, Ariadna and Leticia
Group
B: Belén, Ana, Daniel Muñoz and Andrea González
Group
C: Pablo, Daniel Jarque, Raúl and Ruth
Group
D: Gemma, Almudena Bellot, Azahara and Athina
Group
E: Blanca and Raquel
|
GROUPS
| <><>
ACTIVITY 1
| <><>
ACTIVITY 2
| <><>
ACTIVITY 3
| <><>
COMMENTS
| <><>
|
A
| <><>
Very positive attitude
Well
performance in their work (7 out of 8 questions answered)
| <><>
Very positive attitude
They worked on their texts properly
| <><>
Question: not very clearly expressed
Answer:
correctly answered although it took time to understand the question
| <><>
Much interest
was shown
| <><>
|
B
| <><>
Negative attitude.
Passivity while
accomplishing tasks (3 out of 8 questions answered)
| <><>
They did not
work on their texts the way it was proposed, they cheated one another, maybe
collaborative work (?)
| <><>
Question: The
person making the question did not even know what was asking for.
Answer: The answer was correct.
| <><>
Tasks were not
divided in a balanced way, it is a very heterogenous group.
| <><>
|
C
| <><>
Didn´t follow the instructions given.
Fair
performance in their results for this activity (5 out of 8 questions
answered)
| <><>
Negative attitude
Although they
worked a bit on their texts.
| <><>
Question: Well formulated and interesting.
Answer: Did not
give the correct answer (the question was not well done, could this be the
reason?)
| <><>
Quite of
interest was shown despite their behavior since they made suggestions for
improvement.
| <><>
|
D
| <><>
Very positive attitude
Well
performance in their work (6 out of 8 questions answered)
| <><>
Very positive attitude
They worked on
their texts in a fair way.
| <><>
Question: Well formulated and interesting.
Answer: Did not
give the correct answer (the question was not clearly expressed, could this
be the reason?)
| <><>
A very balanced
group.
| <><>
|
E
| <><>
Didn´t follow
the instructions given.
Fair performance
in their results for this activity (5 out of 8 questions answered)
| <><>
Very positive attitude
They worked on
their texts properly
| <><>
Question: It
was too wide at the beginning, it needed to be narrowed.
Answer: The
answer was correct.
| <><>
They were only
two participants in this group to do the same work as groups composed of 4
persons.
| <><>
Self Assessment:
For our self
evaluation we are going to highlight the things we belief we have done better
and things that we need to improve:
|
WELL DONE
| <><>
IMPROVEMENT IS NEEDED
| <><>
|
We adapted very well and fast to new necessities that have arise
during the activity:
-
Timing adaptation
-
Development of the activity **
| <><>
Better timing planning
| <><>
|
Natural role distribution within our group:
-
Anna: Explaining Activities and giving instructions
-
Elisa: Organizing the work
-
Myriam: Observing within the groups
-
Almudena: Assessment
| <><>
More simple and clearer explanations
| <><>
|
Make activities less complex
| <><>
|
|
Look for new techniques for motivating demotivated participants
| <><>
** For instance, during
the last activity we planned to chose by chance the person who was going to
answer before asking the question, but then on the go we realized it was a
better proposal to ask the question first, leave some minutes for the group to
find the answer and then choose the person. The learning and motivation gets
better.
Suggestions:
A suggestion was
made by a participant (Raúl) in order to improve our activities; this was to
repeat the first activity at the end of the rest of the activities in order for
them to make sure that they have understood properly the topic.
From the
activities a debate about motivation has arisen among us. What are the key
points to motivate our students? Why do students get motivated and other
students don’t? What should be done?
We must conclude
that from the participants’ point of view the topic was well understood and
learned, their self-assessment shows that almost all of them acquired some
knowledge about what ‘Special Education Needs provision within Mainstream
Education’ is.
