This document discusses various collaborative activities and tools that can be used to build classroom community and encourage active learning. It recommends getting to know students' names, welcoming questions, and using group activities. Specific collaborative techniques described include think-pair-share, group projects, case-based learning, jigsaw activities, and checklist for creating collaborative activities. Web-based collaboration tools like Google Docs, Stixy and Popplet are also mentioned. The overall message is that collaborative learning allows students to take responsibility for learning together and has benefits for motivation, critical thinking, and knowledge development.

1. Collaborative Activities
and tools
Ana Maria Menezes
Center for Teaching & Learning Excellence

2. Building a Classroom community
You will find that each of your classes
carries its own dynamic and its own
personality.
Your responsibility as an instructor is to do what
you can to create an environment in which the
students can learn together.
Research has shown that students learn
best in a classroom where they feel free to
express their ideas, they feel needed, and
they feel comfortable with their peers.

3. A classroom community
Learn students' names and help them to learn each others' names.
Use an icebreaker on the first day in order to help students get to know each other.
Welcome questions and continually thank students for asking them. If students seem
hesitant to ask questions, try using the "Think-Pair-Share" activity or leave a little
more wait time after asking if there are any questions.
Welcome diversity and model tolerance in the classroom.
Arrive early to class in order to chat with students and stay a couple of minutes after
class to answer any individual questions they might have.
Use group activities to help students feel more comfortable with each other.
Create lessons that allow students to be active learners with their own contributions,
not just empty receptacles that need to be filled.
Ask for feedback on your teaching and do it often with various methods .

4. Collaborative
Activities
Collaborative learning is the act of giving the responsibility of the learning to the
students. Don't panic if you haven't heard of collaborative learning before,
you've probably done a collaborative learning activity in a class without
knowing it. It's basically the instructional art of using groups and pairs of
students to fulfill a task/assignment. If done well, these activities can create a
valuable source of motivation, critical thinking skills, and active learning while
the students learn to manipulate classroom information into their own working
knowledge.

5. Think-pair Share
This activity helps to relieve the anxiety and mental
block of being called on to answer a question in
class. The rules are as follows:
1. Ask an open-ended question or pose a problem
to the students.
2. Give the students a time limit in which they can
ponder the answer.
3. Have them discuss their answer with someone
sitting next to them.
4. Call on different pairs to share their answers.

6. Group Projects
These are field-specific, but the following are a few pointers in order to carry
group projects out successfully:
1. Choose a project that will be challenging, yet not too difficult, for the students.
It will succeed if it is interesting to the students-especially if it has direct relation
to their own lives.
2. Either assign each member a key role in the project or let them assume a
role (e.g., one scribe, one data collector, one mathematician, one
theoretician…). This will help with grading issues and responsibility and it will
also help your groups to work as a team.
3. Specify exactly what you expect of the students and the end product you
anticipate.

7. Classroom Problems
After presenting information to the class , problems
are given to the students.
The students are paired or grouped, depending on
the activity.
The basics of this type of activity are the same as
the group projects, but you might find that your
students are a little hesitant to break out of their
comfort zones and meet new people in the class.

8. Case-based Learning
This style of learning works with several different fields and types of
coursework. It is often very successful at getting students engaged-especially
when they have received a great deal of abstract information that they need to
translate into real-life situations.
1. Group the students .
2. Give each group a situation that will require them to use the day's subject in
a creative or thoughtful way.
For example, if you've been teaching about marketing strategies, give the
students a specific product and have them use the information they've learned
by setting up a "plan-of-attack" to market it
(If you feel uncomfortable making up cases for your specific field, chances are
there is a book available with already-made cases. Check with your
department).
3. Time the students and have them share their results in the end.

9. Jigsaw Activity
The basis of the activity is for each person to become an expert in a subject and then to teach
that information to their peers. It can be somewhat confusing to figure out how to group the
students, but if you have the patience to try it, it can be an excellent resource when you need to
convey a lot of information in a small amount of time:
1. Group students together and give each group a different resource sheet regarding an aspect of
the subject. Number them adequately, for example, if you have three resource sheets, create
three groups in the class.
2. Have the students read the information and take notes (if you have a specific
worksheet/graphic organizer to help them organize the information, you'll have more success with
this activity). They should become the "expert" on this topic.
3. Number the students off again. The tricky part is numbering adequately. For example, if you
have 21 students and three resource sheets, the students will have to count off into groups of
seven (seven groups of three people).
4. In the new groups, the "experts" will have to teach their peers about the information (again, it is
best for all participants to have a worksheet where they can take guided notes).
5. In the end, evaluate what the students have understood about the subject

10. Checklist for creating
collaborative activities

11. Collaborative techniques
Write - pair Switch
Numbered Heads / Travelling Heads
Jigsaw
Carousel
ROLES: facilitator, recorder, summarizer, reporter,
time-keeper.
http://www.academia.edu/443286/Language_learning_theories_and_cooperative_learning_techniques_in_the_EFL_classroom

12. Tasks using CL techniques
Collaborative shadowing (listening + speaking)
Tourist skit.

13. Web-based collaboration
Google Docs
Stixy
Popplet
for Webtool lovers:
http://cooltoolsforschools.wikispaces.com/Colla
borative+Tools