Hannah Thomas, Director of Professional Learning

Recently Nick Hanrahan facilitated an inspiring discussion on the International Baccalaureate Approaches to Teaching at a Cranbrook School‘s Teachers Talking Teaching (CTTT) session.

The group particularly focused on collaboration and discussed 6 key strategies to maximise the impact of activities that integrate this skill:

1. Group students carefully.
2. Set expectations/rules/guidelines for the collaboration process, and demonstrate these in action by modelling effective and ineffective collaboration.
3. Integrate peer assessment, so that each student provides and receives feedback on collaboration (in response to set guidelines).
4. Clarify the expectations for the task, and model what students should be aiming for.
5. Create differentiated resources (with adequate challenge and support) to ensure all students can meaningfully collaborate.
6. Integrate group and individual reflection on their collaboration, exploring what worked well and what would have made the collaboration more effective.

Hannah Thomas
Director of Professional Learning