[mesmark]

I've been doing some lessons on group work and making decisions. It's been great and great for the students so I thought I'd share and maybe get some advice.

I start out by explaining how to introduce ideas:
- How about ...?/ What about ...?
- Why don't we ...?
- What do you think about ...?
- Let's ...

Then I go into accepting ideas:
- That sounds great.
- I like that idea.
- Let's do that.

rejecting ideas:
- That's a good idea, but ...
- I'd rather not.
- Let's keep thinking.

indifference:
- It doesn't matter to me.
- I don't care.

I write these up on the board, starting with ideas and how to suggest something. I throw out some ideas for plans for tomorrow and then fill in the responses section for accepting, rejecting, and indifference as I get them from the students.

After that I give them a task to decide upon. The first few are generally easy.
- What game will we play at the end of class?
- What will we do tomorrow? (There's no school.)

Then we move on to bigger decisions, like planning a school trip, making a robot, making a movie, making a main character for a racing game.

This has been really helpful for all kinds of group discussions. My problem is the approach seems rather 'sink or swim.' I pretty much just make the list on the board and say 'Go!' They do OK, but it's pretty rough in the beginning. I'd prefer it was smoother.

Does anyone teach something like this? How do you or would you go about it?

The groups are junior high and high school students.

[susan53]

I start with a dialogue of friends discussing what birthday present to by for another friend. It goes something like :

A- OK, what shall we buy Sallie for her birthday?
B -Why don't we buy her a book?
C-No, she hates reading. What about getting her an IPod?
D- Oh no! I don't think that's a good idea- it's much too expensive. Let's get her a kitten. She loves animals.
A- Yes, but her mother is allergic to cats. Let's keep thinking. How about getting her .....

and so on until you've used up all the suggestions and rejection exponents you want to teach. The dialogue goes suggestion-rejection up to the last suggestion which is accepted, at which point everyone says That's a good idea / I like that idea etc.

The students have the dialogue cut up into individual lines and jumbled, and have to put it back in order. (Notice that every suggestion only has one logical reply) Once they've done so you can then check understanding and list the exponents on the board.

This is a slightly more involving way of presenting the exponents than just putting them on the board to start with. You can then use the dialogue for repetition work before going into practice activities.

[mesmark]

Thanks, Sue.

I can definitely spin out a little dialog and work from that. It would be better than just making the list.

I appreciate it.

[susan53]

I kept thinking about this and have turned it into a Christmas Activity which also aims to recycle have got. It's on my site if you want to see the new improved version!