Small Group
I love the ideas of playing group games, but my difficulty is that I only have 8 students in my MT/AP class right now. Any ideas for smaller groups. Scrabble will definitely work, and I'm planning on trying that, but other ideas would be helpful.
Go fish can work if you break the class into 2 groups of 4. Each go fish match is a term and its definition on separate cards. Make 2 sets and let the 2 groups play simultaneusly.
In my Medical Systems class I use the small group learning style. I have them come up with
situations that may occur in the medical office,then explain to their partners how to apply them and incorporate them in daily practice
I like using small group learning as well and hope it opens up more teaching methods to you other than lecture.
Small groups help students interact,somewhat come to an aggrement,overall help them learn how to work together
Teamwork is hard to teach, but these ideas can model good teamwork.
I only have one student this term, but I still utilize the game methods for her own benefit and I still make it enjoyable. My student tells me how much she has learned, and says she gets more out of it than if I were just lecturing for 4 hours. I even have noticed her test scores are substantially better than week one. Even thought right now it's a one person team I definitely recommend implementing more "FUN" into the classroom for sure regardless of whether you are teaching college level or elementary, it has to strive away from the same old same old mundane teaching method of straight lecture.
Samantha, thanks for sharing your success story. It's gratifying to see your hard work pay off. I'm sure your students appreciates it.
Many of my classes are small. One thing that's very helpful is having students create a patient based on the info learned in class today. They write the patient's symptoms and trade that description with the other group(s). Each group then diagnoses the patient. This works well in classes about disorders, but I also modify it for classes that discuss patient care situations. (Students make up mock patients and act out scenes, including the appropriate responses from the healthcare professional.)
Students love to play instructor, I have found it to be a motivator therefore the students work harder to accomplish the goal.
I am trying out something new in my Coding class. We are going to do the "Roundtable." Each is assigned a coding scenario. Then that student must play the part of the instructor. We will go around the room so that each student will have an opportunity to have explained out they came up with their answers. The following week, I will have the students pair up with another student so that they can work in teams to do the same thing except now instead of one student explaining one scenario, that student will be the spokesperson for the team. That spokesperson will then explain several different scenario answers to the class. I think that this way the students will have variety in the Roundtable.
Joanne, thank you for sharing your explanation of how you will involve your students. It sounds great!
Michele Deck
