Group work is an idea that can strike fear into the hearts of school staff – but what does the wider research say, and how can it be used in the classroom?
Group work is an extremely broad term, applicable across a range of subjects and learning activities in classrooms. At its core, it simply means students working together in small groups to complete a task or project, while - it is hoped - simultaneously developing their skills around communication, collaboration and problem-solving.
But group work is also a pretty hotly contested issue in education, and it’s easy to understand why. For some, the very mention of it summons images of sprawling groups of off-task, misbehaving children, or pupils being assigned to fixed groups according to their “ability”.
How it works in the classroom:
Christine Howe, emeritus professor of education at the University of Cambridge, is a passionate advocate for group work. Speaking to Tes, she proposed that group work could be used in every lesson, as long as the groundwork is laid by teachers to enable rich discussion to take place.
Her research found that “teachers sometimes need more training on the key variables that are absolutely crucial to effective group work”, such as creating contexts in which students have different views, in order to get them to engage meaningfully and enthusiastically with one another. Teachers need to set up tasks where students negotiate their positions and give reasons for their differing views, for example, and are then obliged to come to a consensual view.
She proposed that teachers structure tasks to ensure that everyone contributes: for example, setting ground rules, such as making sure that everyone has time to say what they think and that everyone is listened to, or asking students to write down their views on a piece of paper before the discussion starts, so they “can’t hide behind not having an idea”.
She continued: “Once you have student participation, two further things need to happen: firstly, the student’s contributions need to be elaborated upon, either by other students or by the teacher; and secondly, there needs to be questioning of the ideas expressed. If you can do that, it will pay dividends.”
The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) is an independent charity dedicated to breaking the link between family income and educational achievement.
To achieve this, it summarises the best available evidence for teachers; its Teaching and Learning Toolkit, for example, is used by 70 per cent of secondary schools.
The charity also generates new evidence of “what works” to improve teaching and learning, by funding independent evaluations of high-potential projects, and supports teachers and senior leaders to use the evidence to achieve the maximum possible benefit for young people.
