Shared Sharing Practice

Critical Skills in the languages class

Photo of a girl giving a presentation in class

Outcomes

When Judit had completed the course, she was keen to put the ideas into practice in the classroom.

Judit says:

‘The first step is to build a community among all members of the class. This can be done using different means. During the training we used lots of tools and ideas, but I was unable to use some of them in my class due to limitations of space and time. So here I will describe only the ones I have been using in my classes (mainly in S1 and S2).’

Ideas Judit used in the class

  1. Adjective game: 'I used this activity on the day when I presented my first challenge. The students were asked to think of an adjective to describe themselves starting with the same letter of their first name. They were given a few minutes to think, then, with the whole class sitting in a circle, I began with 'My name is Judit and I am joyful.' All the students followed suit. Once everyone had had a turn, I took a soft toy (a teddy - I know it sounds childish for high school pupils but it works, believe me) and the students passed the teddy and tried to remember what the others said in the previous round. I started, passing the teddy to Lisa saying, 'Your name is Lisa and you are loving.' The students were asked to pass the toy to another pupil, keeping in mind they could not pass the teddy to someone who had already had the toy.'
  2. Tell me a secret: 'The students are asked to write down on a piece of paper one thing that no one knows about them. Then I put all the papers in a hat and read them one by one out loud. Then the students try to guess the identity of the person who wrote the secret.'
  3. How are you feeling?: 'Students are asked to say, in one word, how they feel that day, eg 'excited'.'
  4. Lining-up activity (NB: watch the limitations in your class): 'Students have one minute to line themselves up from the youngest to the oldest; then one by one they have to say the month they were born in the foreign language while doing a Mexican wave.'
  5. Two truths and a lie: 'Students are asked to think about two true things about themselves and one lie. They are given two minutes to think about it. Then ask a few of them to say the three statements. The others guess which one is the lie.'

Establishing the rules

Once the community is built (every time you start a challenge the community needs to be rebuilt again), the rules need to be established. This is known as the creation of a Full Value Contract. It is a social contract that helps to create a ‘safe place to be’ for each member.

What Judit would normally say to her students is:

‘We are going to write a contract of certain behaviour guidelines for the group which will help enforce them. We are not just writing them for the sake of writing them but if all of us agree, we have to follow them when doing the challenge.’

Then she would give them an example of a rule:

‘Listen to each other and respect each other and our work.’

Next, the pupils had to come up with different rules (no hands up) and by means of ‘thumbs up/thumbs down’ they would all agree on the rules. They would finally write down the Full Value Contract, which was then displayed in the class all the time they were doing the challenges. Every now and then, Judit would remind them about the rules that they had agreed on.

After this was established, Judit and her class wrote another contract about Quality Audience. She started by giving them an example of an attribute of a good quality audience, for example: ‘Listen to the person who is talking and don’t interrupt.’ With the Full Value Contract, they would all agree on what makes a good quality audience.

Roles in the class

Each member of the group must have a role and has to stick to the role. The roles that CSP requires are:

  • facilitator - keeps the group focused on the topic and makes sure that everyone has the opportunity to speak
  • recorder - takes accurate and readable notes
  • time keeper - monitors the time for the group
  • materials manager - manages materials and work space for the group
  • quality checker - checks the quality of the materials produced
  • team representative.

Grouping the pupils

Once the pupils are clear about the roles, there comes the tricky part: grouping them.

Judit says:

'During training we were shown different techniques but in my opinion and experience much depends on group size, individual accountability, etc.

'In training, we looked at three main ways to group students: teacher selection, random selection and student choice. Each teacher will have his or her preference or will use the method that is most suitable for that class on a certain day. There are many ways in which to select randomly: using numbers, colours, shoe sizes, etc.'

The challenges

Once all the rules and groups are established, you can give the pupils their challenge. Judit likes to display it using a projector and also to give a paper copy to the pupils.

Pupils are normally given four minutes to look at the challenge, first individually and then in groups. Then Judit will ask a member of the class to come to the front to 'chunk the challenge'. This is the most important stage as all pupils must clearly understand what they have to do. It requires pupils to engage in the process and ask questions which appeal to very distinct styles of thinking.

Once the challenge is 'chunked' then they can start, not forgetting that they must always know how much time they have to complete it.

Judit has supplied these Critical Skills challenges for you to try. There are also sheets to help with self-assessment and brainstorming.

Role of the teacher

While the pupils are completing the challenge, the CSP model encourages teachers to become coaches, helping pupils to develop the abilities to achieve targets on their own and then realistically to assess their own performance. Coaches help the pupils to understand their learning tasks and in so doing promote self-esteem. They also encourage effective learning by generating high expectations and helping to develop collaborative relationships.

Presentations

Once the groups are ready with the outcome, they are asked to present it to the rest of the class following the rules of quality audience. After their presentations, Judit will give one minute to each group to think of a good thing they liked about the presentation they just heard from their classmates. She makes very clear that they are not allowed put-downs or negative comments. When the minute is over the listening groups give positive feedback to the presenting group. Once all groups have had their go, Judit will ask the presenting group to tell her one good thing they liked about their presentation.

Feedback

Once all the groups have finished their presentations, Judit gives them her own feedback on whether they followed the instructions and fulfilled the criteria. After this, she issues each group with an individual feedback sheet to complete, and then another one which is for the whole group.