By grouping students of all ages with their classmates for a learning activity, teachers can enhance the educational process and foster a sense of community. Cooperative learning groups can enhance the learning process, cause students to realize the strengths and weaknesses of others and themselves, enhance communication skills, and grow leadership abilities.

Building Groups

There are many ways so create a cooperative learning group. Groups can be various sizes, form two students to half the class. Many teachers prefer placing the students in groups of four. This is so they can structure the group by skills, personality, or tasks.

Building a group by skill will take careful observation on the part of the teacher. In this model, students are grouped together based on their classroom performance. At leas one high achieving student is placed with students who function at the appropriate level. Along with them, select a student or two who are not at grade level. In this way, students will develop a codependence with each other.

Selecting group members by personality will also be determined by careful examination of each student. Naturally, some students take on a leadership role and are skilled at assigning tasks and settling disputes. Teachers will want to place one of these students with a few students who are excellent at completing their assigned task or have good imagination or brain-storming skills. These groups should be rounded off with a student or two who have difficulty functioning in a group. They may have trouble communicating, completing a task, or they may not function well in a group situation because of their personality.

Grouping by task is based on the ability of each student. If the lesson is designed to use various subject related skills, then they teacher should have an understanding what subjects students are best at. For example, if the students were given a lesson on marine life the student who excels at mathematics may be in charge of researching statistics, students who are artistic may be given the task of drawing various types of sea life, and students who are skilled at writing or presentation are given the task of delivering the assignment.

Group Challenges

Though the teacher has carefully planned for the groups to function in a specific way, there are a few things they should be ready for. First of all, allowing the students to select or assign themselves their jobs is always a good idea. Even

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